1,131 Quotes by Carl Sagan

Many religions have attempted to make statues of their gods very large, and the idea, I suppose, is to make us feel small. But if that’s their purpose, they can keep their paltry icons. We need only look up if we wish to feel small.

Thus, 99 percent of the Earth’s atmosphere is of biological origin. The sky is made by life.

Our perceptions are fallible. We sometimes see what isn’t there. We are prey to optical illusions. Occasionally we hallucinate. We are error-prone.

Ubi dubium ibi libertas: Where there is doubt, there is freedom. LATIN PROVERB.

The suppression of uncomfortable ideas may be common in religion or in politics, but it is not the path to knowledge; it has no in the endeavor of science. We do not know in advance who will discover fundamental insights.

We’ve arranged a civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster.

Science is far from a perfect instrument of knowledge. It’s just the best we have.

But deep down, the the molecular heart of life, the trees and we are essentially identical.

Science is merely an extremely powerful method of winnowing what’s true from what feels good.