Carl Sagan Quotes, Science Quotes, Thinking Quotes

I'd like the [Cosmos] series to be so visually stimulating that somebody who isn't even interested in the concepts will just watch for the effects. And I'd like people who are prepared to do some thinking to be really stimulated.

5 years ago

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Some racists still reject the plain testimony written in the DNA that all the races are not only human but nearly indistinguishable. . . .

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Don't judge everyone else by your own limited experience.

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If you want to make a [rhubarb] pie from scratch, first you have to create the universe.

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...the idea of a spiritual part of our nature that survives death, the notion of an afterlife, ought to be easy for religions and nations to sell. This is not an issue of which we might anticipate widespread skepticism. People will want to believe it, even if the evidence is meager to nil... compelling testimony ... provides that our personality, character, memory ... resides in the matter of the brain, it is easy not to focus on it, to find ways to evade the weight of the evidence.

5 years ago

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Spiritual Quotes , Memories Quotes

It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Death Quotes , Witty Quotes

What a splendid perspective contact with a profoundly different civilization might provide! In a cosmic setting vast and old beyond ordinary human understanding we are a little lonely, and we ponder the ultimate significance, if any, of our tiny but exquisite blue planet, the Earth.... In the deepest sense the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is a search for ourselves.

5 years ago

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Lonely Quotes , Blue Quotes

Our loyalties are to the species and the planet. We speak for Earth. Our obligation to survive is owed not just to ourselves but also to that Cosmos, ancient and vast, from which we spring.

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We live on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam

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Clutching our crystals and religiously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in steep decline, unable to distinguish between what's true and what feels good, we slide, almost without noticing, into superstition and darkness.

5 years ago

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Feel Good Quotes , Darkness Quotes

You mustn't think of the Universe as a wilderness. It hasn't been that for billions of years," he said. "Think of it more as... ..cultivated.

5 years ago

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Thinking Quotes , Years Quotes

A single message from space will show that it is possible to live through technological adolescence. . . . It is possible that the future of human civilization depends on the receipt of interstellar messages.

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Moon Quotes , Space Quotes

Writing a novel is like trying to solve a very long mathematical equation. Changing anything can change everything else.

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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.

5 years ago

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Suicidal Quotes , Science Quotes

A general problem with much of Western theology in my view 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 of a universe.

5 years ago

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Views Quotes , World Quotes

Every kid starts out as a natural-born scientist, and then we beat it out of them. A few trickle through the system with their wonder and enthusiasm for science intact.

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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.

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Self Quotes , Dumb Quotes

I never said it. Honest. Oh, I said there are maybe 100 billion galaxies and 10 billion trillion stars. It's hard to talk about the Cosmos without using big numbers. I said "billion" many times on the Cosmos television series, which was seen by a great many people. But I never said "billions and billions." For one thing, it's too imprecise. How many billions are "billions and billions"? A few billion? Twenty billion? A hundred billion? "Billions and billions" is pretty vague. When we reconfigured and updated the series, I checked-and sure enough, I never said it.

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , Stars Quotes , Numbers Quotes

Any civilization that doesn't develop space travel dies.

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The prediction of nuclear winter is drawn not, of course, from any direct experience with the consequences of global nuclear war, but rather from an investigation of the governing physics.

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Tags : Carl Sagan Quotes , War Quotes , Winter Quotes