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Carl Sagan Quotes - Page 17

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They (i. e., the Pythagoreans) did not advocate the free confrontation of conflicting points of view. Instead, like all orthodox religions, they practised a rigidity that prevented them from correcting their errors.

They (i. e., the Pythagoreans) did not advocate the free confrontation of conflicting points of view. Instead, like all orthodox religions, they practised a rigidity that prevented them from correcting their errors.

Errors, Views, Rigidity

"Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Book by Carl Sagan, p. 184, 1980.

Books are like seeds. They can lie dormant for centuries and then flower in the most unpromising soil.

Lying, Flower, Book

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.306, Ballantine Books

We are all star stuff.

Stars, Stuff, All Stars

Books tap the wisdom of our species -- the greatest minds, the best teachers -- from all over the world and from all our history. And they're patient.

Teacher, Book, Mind

I'd like the [Cosmos] series to be so visually stimulating that somebody who isn't even interested in the concepts will just watch for the effects. And I'd like people who are prepared to do some thinking to be really stimulated.

Science, Thinking, People

Carl Sagan, Tom Head (2006). “Conversations with Carl Sagan”, p.55, Univ. Press of Mississippi

You are worth about 3 dollars worth in chemicals.

Dollars, Chemicals

It goes with a courageous intent to greet the universe as it really is, not to foist our emotional predispositions on it but to courageously accept what our explorations tell us.

Emotional, Courageous, Exploration

Carl Sagan (2006). “The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God”, p.197, Penguin

A proclivity for science is embedded deeply within us, in all times, places, and cultures. It has been the means for our survival. It is our birthright. When, through indifference, inattention, incompetence, or fear of skepticism, we discourage children from science, we are disenfranchisin g them, taking from them the tools needed to manage their future.

Children, Mean, Survival

By looking far out into space we are also looking far back into time, back toward the horizon of the universe, back toward the epoch of the Big Bang.

Space, Bangs, Horizon

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.287, Ballantine Books

Chlorine is a deadly poison gas employed on European battlefields in World War I. Sodium is a corrosive metal which burns upon contact with water. Together they make a placid and unpoisonous material, table salt. Why each of these substances has the properties it does is a subject called chemistry.

War, Science, Water

Carl Sagan (1979). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”, Random House Inc

We are the custodians of life's meaning.

Custodians

Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan (2011). “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space”, p.76, Ballantine Books

Our concern for the future can be tested by how well we support our libraries.

Support, Library, Librarian

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.307, Ballantine Books

We are made of starstuff.

Stars, Science, Made

Carl Sagan, Tom Head (2006). “Conversations with Carl Sagan”, p.62, Univ. Press of Mississippi

There is perhaps no better a demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world.

Space, Earth Day, Tiny

Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan (2011). “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space”, p.29, Ballantine Books

My parents were not scientists. They knew almost nothing about science. But in introducing me simultaneously to skepticism and to wonder, they taught me the two uneasily cohabiting modes of thought that are central to the scientific method.

Science, Two, Parent

Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.13, Ballantine Books

The cosmos is full beyond measure of elegant truths; of exquisite interrelationships; of the awesome machinery of nature.

Cosmos, Machinery, Exquisite

"Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Episode 1: "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean". TV Series, 1990.

There is every reason to think that in the coming years Mars and its mysteries will become increasingly familiar to the inhabitants of the Planet Earth.

Thinking, Years, Mars

Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people.

Stars, Science, People

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.217, Ballantine Books

It is all a matter of time scale. An event that would be unthinkable in a hundred years may be inevitable in a hundred million.

Years, May, Matter

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.98, Ballantine Books

In the middle 1970s an astronomer I admire put together a modest manifesto called "Objections to Astrology" and asked me to endorse it. I struggled with his wording, and in the end found myself unable to sign, not because I thought astrology has any validity whatever, but because I felt (and still feel) that the tone of the statement was authoritarian.

Astrology, Atheism, Together

Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.388, Ballantine Books

With insufficient data it is easy to go wrong.

Data, Easy, Insufficient

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.118, Ballantine Books

What is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas. If you are only skeptical, then no new ideas make it through to you. On the other hand, if you are open to the point of gullibility and have not an ounce of skeptical sense in you, then you cannot distinguish useful ideas from the worthless ones.

Hands, Ideas, Two

"The Burden of Skepticism". The Skeptical Inquirer, Volume 12, Issue 1, www.csicop.org. Fall 1987.

Imagine we could accelerate continuously at 1 g-what we're comfortable with on good old terra firma-to the midpoint of our voyage, and decelerate continuously at 1 g until we arrive at our destination. It would take a day to get to Mars, a week and a half to Pluto, a year to the Oort Cloud, and a few years to the nearest stars.

Stars, Clouds, Years

Carl Sagan (1994). “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space”, Random House Incorporated

By exploring other worlds we safeguard this one. By itself, I think this fact more than justifies the money our species has spent in sending ships to other worlds. It is our fate to live during one of the most perilous and, at the same time, one of the most hopeful chapters in human history.

Fate, Thinking, Other Worlds

"Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Documentary (1990 Update). Episode 13: "Who Speaks for Earth?", 1990.

All of the books in the world contain no more information than is broadcast as video in a single large American city in a single year. Not all bits have equal value.

Book, Science, Technology

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.315, Ballantine Books

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