Carl Sagan
The latter decades of the twentieth century saw science increasingly enter public life — not merely as a body of results but as a way of thinking about the world. Carl Sagan, born in Brooklyn on November 9, 1934, became one of the prominent figures working at that intersection.
Educated at Rahway High School and later at the University of Chicago, Sagan worked as an astronomer, astrophysicist, and planetary scientist, while also teaching at the university level. He was equally active as a science writer, non-fiction writer, novelist, and screenwriter, moving between forms with an unusual range. Among his notable works were Cosmos, the television series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, for which he also served as presenter, along with The Demon-Haunted World, Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science, Pale Blue Dot, and the novel Contact. His role as a television presenter gave his scientific concerns a broad platform, while his written work addressed readers across a range of backgrounds and interests.
Critical recognition for his writing came in the form of the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction. Sagan died in Seattle on December 20, 1996, at the age of sixty-two. The Pulitzer, awarded during his lifetime, remains among the most concrete measures of the regard in which his work as a science communicator and writer was held.
Quotes by Carl Sagan
Carl Sagan's insights on:
There is a lurking fear that some things are not 'meant' to be known, that some inquiries are too dangerous for human beings to make.
The Cosmos is all that is or was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries.
There is a lurking fear that some things are not “meant" to be known, that some inquiries are too dangerous for human beings to make.
The world is so exquisite, with so much love and moral depth, that there is no reason to deceive ourselves with pretty stories for which there's little good evidence. Far better, it seems to me, in our vulnerability, is to look Death in the eye and to be grateful every day for the brief but magnificent opportunity that life provides.
On Titan the molecules that have been raining down like manna from heaven for the last 4 billion years might still be there largely unaltered deep-frozen awaiting the chemists from Earth.
The beach reminds us of space. Fine sand grains, all more or less uniform in size, have been produced from the larger rocks through ages of jostling and rubbing, abrasion and erosion, again driven through waves and weather by distinct moon and Sun.
The chemistry of coal is still not fully understood, despite a long standing economic incentive
It is tension between creativity and skepticism that has produced the stunning and unexpected findings of science.
