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Carl Sagan

Carl Sagan Quotes

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Famous Carl Sagan Quotes

“If we teach only the findings and products of science - no matter how useful and even inspiring they may be - without communicating its critical method, how can the average person possibly distinguish science from pseudoscience?”

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Book:Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
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“The cosmic calendar compresses the local history of the universe into a single year. If the universe began on January 1st it was not until May that the Milky Way formed. Other planetary systems may have appeared in June, July and August, but our Sun and Earth not until mid-September. Life arose soon after. We humans appear on the cosmic calendar so recently that our recorded history occupies only the last few seconds of the last minute of December 31st.”

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Author:Carl Sagan
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“Widespread intellectual and moral docility may be convenient for leaders in the short term, but it is suicidal for nations in the long term. One of the criteria for national leadership should therefore be a talent for understanding, encouraging, and making constructive use of vigorous criticism.”

ShouldMayLongUseScienceNationsUnderstandingTermLeaderMoralTalentMoralityIntellectualCriticismLong TermSuicidalShort TermCriteriaConstructiveConvenientVigorous
Book:Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium
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“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.”

WayHumansWellsMayCultureUniverseStarsNumbersRocksPerspectiveInfinitePositive AtheismBillionsCirclesHuman LifeMetalsGalaxyPonderingCosmologyLarge NumbersMilky WayHunkHumdrum
Author:Carl Sagan
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“The suppression of uncomfortable ideas may be common in religion or in politics, but it is not the path to knowledge, and there's no place for it in the endeavor of science. We do not know beforehand where fundamental insights will arise from about our mysterious and lovely solar system. The history of our study of our solar system shows us clearly that accepted and conventional ideas are often wrong, and that fundamental insights can arise from the most unexpected sources.”

KnowsMayIdeasShowsCommonStudyPathSourceFundamentalsInsightPositive AtheismAcceptedLovelyAriseMysteriousUncomfortableUnexpectedEndeavorConventionalSuppressionSolar System
Author:Carl Sagan
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“One of the reasons for its success is that science has a built-in, error-correcting machinery at its very heart. Some may consider this an overbroad characterization, but to me every time we exercise self-criticism, every time we test our ideas against the outside world, we are doing science. When we are self-indulgent and uncritical, when we confuse hopes and facts, we slide into pseudoscience and superstition.”

WorldHeartMayIdeasSelfReasonFactsExerciseBuiltCriticismTestsErrorsSuperstitionsMachinerySlidesOutside WorldCorrectingPseudoscienceCharacterizationSelf CriticismSelf Indulgent
Book:Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
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“There is much that science doesn't understand, many mysteries still to be resolved. In a Universe tens of billions of light-years across and some ten or fifteen billion years old, this may be the case forever. We are constantly stumbling on new surprises”

YearsMayStillsLightUniverseCasesForeverMysteryTenSurpriseBillionsFifteenStumblingLight Years
Book:Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
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“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. But if the citizens are educated and form their own opinions, then those in power work for us. In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness.”

IfsThinkingWorldShouldHumansMayChildrenCountryReasonHandsFormScienceSpiritCertainCommunityOpinionDarknessVirtueRightsTeachingHumilityCitizensAuthorityOur ChildrenMethodBillsPositive AtheismEducatedDemonSkepticismBeing HumanDecencyUnwillingBill Of RightsScientific MethodCommunity Spirit
Author:Carl Sagan
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“Cutting off fundamental, curiosity-driven science is like eating the seed corn. We may have a little more to eat next winter but what will we plant so we and our children will have enough to get through the winters to come?”

MayChildrenLittlesEnoughNextCuttingEatingOur ChildrenFundamentalsPlantCuriosityWinterSeedsDrivenCornCutting Off
Book:The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
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“Is it fair to be suspicious of an entire profession because of a few bad apples? There are at least two important differences, it seems to me. First, no one doubts that science actually works, whatever mistaken and fraudulent claim may from time to time be offered. But whether there are any miraculous cures from faith-healing, beyond the body's own ability to cure itself, is very much at issue. Secondly, the expose' of fraud and error in science is made almost exclusively by science. But the exposure of fraud and error in faith-healing is almost never done by other faith-healers.”

FirstsMayMadeTwoImportantDoneBodySeemsReligionDifferencesAbilityHealingIssuesDoubtFairsClaimsErrorsAtheistProfessionCuresApplesFraudMistakenExposureMiraculousSuspiciousHealerBad AppleFaith Healing
Author:Carl Sagan
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“At the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes-an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counterintuitive they may be, and the most ruthless skeptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new. This is how deep truths are winnowed from deep nonsense.”

HeartMayTwoIdeasMatterScienceAttitudeBalanceEssentialsSmellNonsenseOpennessNew IdeasScentConservationBizarreContradictorySkepticalRuthlessScrutinyOld And New
Author:Carl Sagan
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“Quickly capping 363 oil well fires in a war zone is impossible. The fires would burn out of control until they put themselves out... The resulting soot might well stretch over all of South Asia... It could be carried around the world... [and] the consequences could be dire. Beneath such a pall sunlight would be dimmed, temperatures lowered and droughts more frequent. Spring and summer frosts may be expected... This endangerment of the food supplies... appears to be likely enough that it should affect the war plans.”

WorldShouldWellsMayWarEnoughMightWould BeFirePlansImpossibleSummerSpringConsequenceSouthOilExpectedAround The WorldZoneSunlightAsiaTemperatureSuppliesFrostDroughtBurn OutWar ZonesFood SupplySouth AsiaEndangermentWar Plans
Author:Carl Sagan
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“These are all cases of proved or presumptive baloney. A deception arises, sometimes innocently but collaboratively, sometimes with cynical premeditation. Usually the victim is caught up in a powerful emotion -- wonder, fear, greed, grief. Credulous acceptance of baloney can cost you money; that's what P. T. Barnum meant when he said, 'There's a sucker born every minute.' But it can be much more dangerous than that, and when governments and societies lose the capacity for critical thinking, the results can be catastrophic -- however sympathetic we may be to those who have bought the baloney.”

ThinkingMaySaidSometimesGovernmentBornLosesResultsPowerfulGriefEmotionWonderCasesMinutesDangerousAcceptanceCostCapacityVictimGreedCaughtCriticalAriseDeceptionCynicalCaught UpCritical ThinkingSympatheticSuckerGovernment And SocietyBaloneyPowerful EmotionsPremeditation
Book:The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
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“We seem, these days, much more willing to recognize the perils before us than we were even a decade ago. The newly recognized dangers threaten all of us, equally. No one can say how it will turn out down here. But this is also, we may note, the first time that a species has become able to journey to the planets and the stars. Sailors on a becalmed sea, we sense a stirring of the breeze.”

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Author:Carl Sagan
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“Centuries hence, when current social and political problems may seem as remote as the problems of the Thirty Years' War are to us, our age may be remembered chiefly for one fact: It was the time when the inhabitants of the earth first made contact with the vast cosmos in which their small planet is embedded.”

YearsFirstsMayMadeWarFactsProblemSeemsAgeEarthPoliticalSocialSpaceCenturyPlanetsCurrentsContactRememberedThirtyCosmosThirty YearsEmbeddedStar Gazing
Author:Carl Sagan
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“Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge. Its goal is to find out how the world works, to seek what regularities there may be, to penetrate to the connections of things-from subatomic particles, which may be the constituents of all matter, to living organisms, the human social community, and thence to the cosmos as a whole.”

ThinkingWorldWayHumansMayMatterWholeBodyScienceSocialGoalCommunityConnectionsCosmosOrganismsParticlesPenetrateWay Of ThinkingConstituentsRegularityLiving OrganismsSubatomic Particles
Author:Carl Sagan
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