Carl Sagan Quotes - Page 14

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• He didn't want to believe. He wanted to know.

  Carl Sagan

  Believe, Thinking, Atheism

  6 Copy quote

• 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.

  Carl Sagan

  Suicidal, Science, Long

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium”, p.176, Ballantine Books

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• But down deep, at the molecular heart of life we're essentially identical to trees.

  Carl Sagan

  Heart, Tree, Identical

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• Humans - who enslave, castrate, experiment on, and fillet other animals - have had an understandable penchant for pretending animals do not feel pain.

  Carl Sagan

  Inspirational, Pain, Animal

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• It is said that men may not be the dreams of the god, but rather that the gods are the dreams of men.

  Carl Sagan

  Inspirational, God, Dream

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Cosmos”, p.284, Ballantine Books

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• Modern science has been a voyage into the unknown, with a lesson in humility waiting at every stop. Many passengers would rather have stayed home.

  Carl Sagan

  Home, Humility, Science

  Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan (2011). “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space”, p.41, Ballantine Books

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• Demon mean knowledge in Greek, especially about the material world. Science means knowledge in Latin. A jurisdictional dispute is exposed, even if we look no further

  Carl Sagan

  Latin, Mean, Science

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• Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

  Carl Sagan

  Lonely, Dark, Cosmos

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

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• A googolplex is precisely as far from infinity as is the number 1... no matter what number you have in mind, infinity is larger still.

  Carl Sagan

  Numbers, Mind, Infinity

  "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Book by Carl Sagan, p. 220, 1980.

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• Since, in the long run, every planetary society will be endangered by impacts from space, every surviving civilization is obliged to become spacefaring — not because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most practical reason imaginable: staying alive.

  Carl Sagan

  Running, Responsibility, Space

  "Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space".

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• But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.

  Carl Sagan

  Funny, Brother, Laughter

  Broca's Brain ch. 5 (1979)

  78 Copy quote

• Perhaps, in retrospect, there would be little motivation even for malevolent extraterrestrials to attack the Earth; perhaps, after a preliminary survey, they might decide it is more expedient just to be patient for a little while and wait for us to self-destruct.

  Carl Sagan

  Motivation, Self, Waiting

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium”, p.169, Ballantine Books

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• Maxwell's Equations have had a greater impact on human history than any ten presidents.

  Carl Sagan

  Impact, President, Maxwell

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• What an astonishing thing a book is. It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. ... Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.

  Carl Sagan

  Book, Dark, Years

  "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". TV Series (Episode 11: The Persistence of Memory), 1990.

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• 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.

  Carl Sagan

  Lasts, Calendars, December

  "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Documentary (1990 Update). Episode 1: "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean", 1990.

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• When you buy a used car, you kick the tires, you look at the odometer, you open up the hood. If you do not feel yourself an expert in automobile engines, you bring a friend who is. And you do this with something as unimportant as an automobile. But on the issues of the transcendent, of ethics, of morals, of the origins of the world, of the nature of human beings, on those issues should we not insist upon at least equally skeptical scrutiny?

  Carl Sagan

  Issues, Car, World

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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; it has no in the endeavor of science. We do not know in advance who will discover fundamental insights.

  Carl Sagan

  Knowledge, Science, Ideas

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• In the vastness of the Cosmos there must be other civilizations far older and more advanced than ours.

  Carl Sagan

  Civilization, Cosmos, Vastness

  "Cosmos/ Encyclopaedia Galactica". Documentary, 1980.

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• [Kepler] preferred the hard truth to his dearest illusions, and that is the heart of science.

  Carl Sagan

  Heart, Science, Kepler

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• As the ancient myth makers knew, we are children equally of the earth and the sky.

  Carl Sagan

  Children, Sky, Earth

  "Cosmos". p. 318. Book by Carl Sagan, 1980.

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• There are naive questions, tedious questions, ill-phrased questions, questions put after inadequate self-criticism. But every question is a cry to understand the world. There is no such thing as a dumb question.

  Carl Sagan

  Self, Dumb, Criticism

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• My deeply held belief is that if a god of anything like the traditional sort exists, our curiosity and intelligence are provided by such a god. We would be unappreciative of those gifts (as well as unable to take such a course of action) if we suppressed our passion to explore the universe and ourselves. On the other hand, if such a traditional god does not exist, our curiosity and our intelligence are the essential tools for managing our survival. In either case, the enterprise of knowledge is consistent with both science and religion, and is essential for the welfare of the human species.

  Carl Sagan

  Passion, Hands, Survival

  Carl Sagan, Jerald F. TerHorst, Allan J. Mayer, Sharon S. McKern, Laurence J. Peter (1980). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”

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• The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir.

  Carl Sagan

  Light, Flames, Darkness

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.50, Ballantine Books

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• The way to find out about our place in the universe is by examining the universe and by examining ourselves - without preconceptions, with as unbiased a mind as we can muster.

  Carl Sagan

  Mind, Unbiased, Way

  Carl Sagan, Jerald F. TerHorst, Allan J. Mayer, Sharon S. McKern, Laurence J. Peter (1980). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”

  7 Copy quote

• All colours are arbitrary.

  Carl Sagan

  Arbitrary, Colour

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