Carl Sagan Quotes - Page 5

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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. A sharp distinction between humans and 'animals' is essential if we are to bend them to our will, make them work for us, wear them, eat them — without any disquieting tinges of guilt or regret. It is unseemly of us, who often behave so unfeelingly toward other animals, to contend that only humans can suffer. The behavior of other animals renders such pretensions specious. They are just too much like us.

  Carl Sagan

  Pain, Regret, Compassion

  "Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors". Book by Ann Druyan and Carl Sagan, 1992.

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• Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep thoughts can be winnowed from deep nonsense.

  Carl Sagan

  Atheist, Mean, Science

  Carl Sagan (1979). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”, Random House Inc

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• In the fabric of space and in the nature of matter, as in a great work of art, there is, written small, the artist's signature.

  Carl Sagan

  Art, Nature, Space

  "Contact". Book by Carl Sagan. Chapter 24, p. 431, 1985.

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• We should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit.

  Carl Sagan

  Atheist, Children, Teaching

  Carl Sagan (2011). “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.434, Ballantine Books

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• We are, in the most profound sense, children of the Cosmos.

  Carl Sagan

  Children, Profound, Cosmos

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• Life is but a momentary glimpse of the wonder of this astonishing universe, and it is sad to see so many dreaming it away on spiritual fantasy.

  Carl Sagan

  Dream, Spiritual, Atheist

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• The cosmic calendar compresses the local history of the universe into a single year. If the universe began on January 1st it was not until May that the Milky Way formed. Other planetary systems may have appeared in June, July and August, but our Sun and Earth not until mid-September. Life arose soon after. 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

  June, July, August

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

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• National boundaries are not evident when we view the Earth from space. Fanatical ethnic or religious or national chauvinisms are a little difficult to maintain when we see our planet as a fragile blue crescent fading to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and citadel of the stars.

  Carl Sagan

  Religious, Stars, Science

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

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• The nuclear arms race is like two sworn enemies standing waist deep in gasoline, one with three matches, the other with five.

  Carl Sagan

  Two, Race, Enemy

  92 Copy quote

• Ask courageous questions. Do not be satisfied with superficial answers.

  Carl Sagan

  Answers, Courageous, Superficial

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• When you realize that no one really knows what they are doing and that everyone is doing the best they can according to their own level of consciousness, life gets a lot easier.
  Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep thoughts can be winnowed from deep nonsense.

  Carl Sagan

  Mean, Deep Thought, Levels

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• For me, the most ironic token of [the first human moon landing] is the plaque signed by President Richard M. Nixon that Apollo 11 took to the moon. It reads, ‘We came in peace for all Mankind.’ As the United States was dropping seven and a half megatons of conventional explosives on small nations in Southeast Asia, we congratulated ourselves on our humanity. We would harm no one on a lifeless rock.

  Carl Sagan

  Moon, Rocks, Humanity

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• An atheist has to know a lot more than I know. An atheist is someone who knows there is no god. By some definitions atheism is very stupid.

  Carl Sagan

  Atheist, Agnostic, There Is No God

  "A Tribute to Carl Sagan: The Sagan File" by Joel Achenbach, The Skeptic Magazine, Vol 13, No. 1, www.skeptic.com. 2006.

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• The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. On this shore, we've learned most of what we know. Recently, we've waded a little way out, maybe ankle-deep, and the water seems inviting. Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to return, and we can, because the cosmos is also within us. We're made of star stuff. We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.

  Carl Sagan

  Stars, Ocean, Long

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

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• 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.

  Carl Sagan

  Children, Kids, Science

  Psychology Today Interview, www.psychologytoday.com. January 1, 1996.

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• For all our conceits about being the center of the universe, we live in a routine planet of a humdrum star stuck away in an obscure corner ... on an unexceptional galaxy which is one of about 100 billion galaxies. ... That is the fundamental fact of the universe we inhabit, and it is very good for us to understand that.

  Carl Sagan

  Stars, Humility, Political

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• An extraterrestrial being, newly arrived on Earth - scrutinizing what we mainly present to our children in television, radio, movies, newspapers, magazines, the comics, and many books - might easily conclude that we are intent on teaching them murder, rape, cruelty, superstition, credulity, and consumerism. We keep at it, and through constant repetition many of them finally get it.

  Carl Sagan

  Children, Book, Teaching

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.66, Ballantine Books

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• Extraordinary claim requires extraordinary proof.

  Carl Sagan

  Claims, Proof, Extraordinary

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• We are the product of 4.5 billion years of fortuitous, slow biological evolution. There is no reason to think that the evolutionary process has stopped. Man is a transitional animal. He is not the climax of creation.

  Carl Sagan

  Animal, Men, Thinking

  Carl Sagan (1973). “Carl Sagan's Cosmic Connection: An Extraterrestrial Perspective”, p.5, Cambridge University Press

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• My view is that if there is no evidence for it, then forget about it. An agnostic is somebody who doesn’t believe in something until there is evidence for it, so I’m agnostic.

  Carl Sagan

  Believe, Views, Agnostic

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• We are star stuff harvesting sunlight.

  Carl Sagan

  Stars, Stuff, Sunlight

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• Your religion assumes that people are children and need a boogeyman so they'll behave. You want people to believe in God so they'll obey the law. That's the only means that occurs to you: a strict secular police force, and the threat of punishment by an all-seeing God for whatever the police overlook. You sell human beings short.

  Carl Sagan

  Children, Believe, Mean

  Carl Sagan (1997). “Contact”, p.251, Simon and Schuster

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• All civilizations become either spacefaring or extinct.

  Carl Sagan

  Science, Civilization

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• Science ... looks skeptically at all claims to knowledge, old and new. It teaches not blind obedience to those in authority but to vigorous debate, and in many respects that's the secret of its success.

  Carl Sagan

  Secret, Looks, Old And New

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• War is murder writ large.

  Carl Sagan

  War, Murder

  "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Book by Carl Sagan, p. 326, 1980.

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