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Carl Sagan Quotes - Page 2

All Quotes Acceptance Age Art Astronomy Atheism Atheist Authority Awareness Balance Belief Challenges Character Childhood Children Church Community Compassion Consciousness Creation Criticism Culture Curiosity Darkness Death Doubt Earth Education Enthusiasm Evidence Evolution Giving God Greek Heart History Home Humanity Humility Ignorance Imagination Injury Inspirational Judging Knowledge Learning Life Lifetime Love Loyalty Lying Magic Mathematics Memories Moon Morning Motivation Motivational Nature Observation Opportunity Pain Passion Past Perspective Philosophy Physics Prejudice Purpose Reading Reality Rejection Religion Responsibility Risk Romance Running Science Science And Technology Spirituality Spring Stupidity Survival Teaching Technology Time Today Truth Understanding Universe Vision Waiting War Water Weakness Winter Writing

Better the hard truth, I say, than the comforting fantasy.

Better the hard truth, I say, than the comforting fantasy.

Comforting, Fantasy, Hard

Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.263, Ballantine Books

Every star may be a sun to someone.

Stars, May, Sun

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.27, Ballantine Books

I don't want to believe. I want to know.

Inspirational, Life, Religious

"Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

The dumbing down of America is evident in the slow decay of substantive content, a kind of celebration of ignorance.

Ignorance, America, Decay

Don't judge everyone else by your own limited experience.

Judging

We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever.

Time, Butterfly, Thinking

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.49, Ballantine Books

Where we have strong emotions, we're liable to fool ourselves.

Happiness, Strong, Atheist

We live on a hunk of rock and metal that circles a humdrum star that is one of 400 billion other stars that make up the Milky Way Galaxy which is one of billions of other galaxies which make up a universe which may be one of a very large number, perhaps an infinite number, of other universes. That is a perspective on human life and our culture that is well worth pondering.

Stars, Rocks, Circles

Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence

Demand, Claims, Evidence

we make our world significant by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers

Patience, Our World, Depth

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

One of the great commandments of science is: 'Mistrust arguments from authority.'

Argument, Authority, Primates

Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.52, Ballantine Books

Extinction is the rule. Survival is the exception.

Nature, Mass Extinction, Exception To The Rule

Carl Sagan (2006). “The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God”, p.76, Penguin

Our passion for learning ... is our tool for survival.

Passion, Learning, Science

It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.

Death, Witty, Atheist

Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.32, Ballantine Books

One of the greatest gifts adults can give - to their offspring and to their society - is to read to children.

Education, Children, Giving

Finding the occasional straw of truth awash in a great ocean of confusion and bamboozle requires intelligence, vigilance, dedication, and courage. But if we don't practice these tough habits of thought, we cannot hope to solve the truly serious problems that face us --- and we risk becoming a nation of suckers, up for grabs by the next charlatan who comes along.

Atheist, Ocean, Dedication

If I finish a book a week, I will read only a few thousand books in my lifetime, about a tenth of a percent of the contents of the greatest libraries of our time. The trick is to know which books to read.

Book, Library, Lifetime

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

Frederick Douglas taught that literacy is the path from slavery to freedom. There are many kinds of slavery and many kinds of freedom, but reading is still the path.

Reading, Slavery, Path

If we can't think for ourselves, if we're unwilling to question authority, then we're just putty in the hands of those in power.

Thinking, Hands, Scientific Method

Carl Sagan (2011). “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.434, Ballantine Books

The words "question" and "quest" are cognates. Only through inquiry can we discover truth.

Truth, Inquiry, Quests

Carl Sagan (2011). “Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science”, p.365, Ballantine Books

An atheist is someone who is certain that God does not exist, someone who has compelling evidence against the existence of God. I know of no such compelling evidence. Because God can be relegated to remote times and places and to ultimate causes, we would have to know a great deal more about the universe than we do now to be sure that no such God exists. To be certain of the existence of God and to be certain of the nonexistence of God seem to me to be the confident extremes in a subject so riddled with doubt and uncertainty as to inspire very little confidence indeed.

Atheist, Inspire, Doubt

"Conversations with Carl Sagan". Book edited by Tom Head, p. 70, 2006.

We are the only species on the planet, so far as we know, to have invented a communal memory stored neither in our genes nor in our brains. The warehouse of this memory is called the library

Memories, Brain, Library

Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.305, Ballantine Books

Science ... looks skeptically at all claims to knowledge, old and new. It teaches not blind obedience to those in authority but to vigorous debate, and in many respects that's the secret of its success.

Secret, Looks, Old And New

Who are we, if not measured by our impact on others?

Impact, Ifs

We are, each of us, a multitude. Within us is a little universe.

Pain, Littles, Injury

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