Carl Sagan Quotes
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Evolving before our eyes has been a God of the Gaps; that is, whatever it is we cannot explain lately is attributed to God.
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Something dreadful happens to students between first and twelfth grades, and it's not just puberty.
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A general problem with much of Western theology... is that the God portrayed is too small. It is a god of a tiny world and not a god of a galaxy, much less a universe.
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If a marker were to be erected today, it might read, in homage to his scientific courage: 'He preferred the hard truth to his dearest illusions.'
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The prediction I can make with the highest confidence is that the most amazing discoveries will be the ones we are not today wise enough to foresee.
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I've written a number of books that have to do with the evolution of humans, human intelligence, human emotions.
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Do we, holding that the gods exist,deceive ourselves with insubstantial dreamsand lies, while random careless chance andchange alone control the world?
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This image of four spectra is taken from one of Huggins's publications. ...You can see that the Comet Winnecke resembles olive oil more than it does Comet Brorsen.
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Advances in medicine and agriculture have saved vastly more lives than have been lost in all the wars in history.
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Not explaining science seems to me perverse. When you're in love, you want to tell the world.
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The history of science-especially physics-has in part been the tension between the natural tendency to project our everyday experience on the universe and the universe's noncompliance...
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I try not to think with my gut. If I'm serious about understanding the world, thinking with anything besides my brain, as tempting as that might be, is likely to get me into trouble. Really, it's okay to reserve judgment until the evidence is in.
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Astronomically, the U. S. S. R. and the United States are the same place.
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There is no question that religions have historically played the role of making people contented with their lot. ...such a doctrine would be very appealing to the ruling classes of a society. ...Many societies, for this reason alone, encourage the contentment with your lot that the religious premise of heaven affords.
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Most of the people that I deal with are human. So I've had a lot of experience with that.
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It’s hard to kill a creature once it lets you see its consciousness.
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If we long for our planet to be important, there is something we can do about it. We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers.
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Every thinking person fears nuclear war and every technological nation plans for it. Everyone knows it's madness, and every country has an excuse.
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If we crave some cosmic purpose, then let us find ourselves a worthy goal.
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The sky calls to us. If we do not destroy ourselves, we will one day venture to the stars.
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The fossil record implies trial and error, an inability to anticipate the future, features inconsistent with an efficient Great Designer.
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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.
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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.
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The old man made himself look hard at the Raven and saw that it was not a great bird from the sky but the work of men like himself. This first encounter turned out to be peaceful. The men of the La Pérouse expedition were under strict orders to treat with respect any people they might discover, an exceptional policy for its time and after.