At this moment of very low human self-esteem, I wanted to envision a future that we can still have if we get our act together, if we wake up from our sleepwalking and refuse to be led by people who deny reality. This is why we're telling these stories. We hope these stories will inspire other people to act accordingly. " Q: The show introduces grand projects that are in the very beginnings of being realized — for example, Breakthrough Starshot and the 50 billion-mile telescope. It's almost as if you are presenting these concepts as inspirations, as things that have not yet been done but could be done by a future generation. A: "Yes, because we understand the science and technology required. We know how to do these things now, and we're in the process of actively pursuing them. What I love about Starshot is that it's a flotilla of small and unobtrusive nano-craft. They're going out not to claim territory but to see, to sense, to experiment, and to send back information. I think that's what a spacefaring civilization does.
– Carl Sagan "It pays to keep an mind, but not so open your brain falls out. " – Carl Sagan "We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever. " – Carl Sagan "Books permit us to voyage through time, to tap the wisdom of our ancestors. " – Carl Sagan "We judge our progress by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers, our willingness to embrace what is true rather than what feels good. " – Carl Sagan "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 "The universe is a pretty big place. If it's just us, seems like an awful waste of space. " – Carl Sagan "You're an interesting species. An interesting mix. You're capable of such beautiful dreams, and such horrible nightmares. you feel so lost, so cut off, so alone, only you're not. See, in all our searching, the only thing we've found that makes emptiness bearable is each other. "
We are made of star-stuff. " – Carl Sagan "Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality. " – Carl Sagan "One glance at a book and you hear the voice of another person, perhaps someone dead for 1, 000 years. To read is to voyage through time. " – Carl Sagan "If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe. " – Carl Sagan "For me, it is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring. " – Carl Sagan "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. " – Carl Sagan "Who is more humble? The scientist who looks at the universe with an open mind and accepts whatever the universe has to teach us, or somebody who says everything in this book must be considered the literal truth and never mind the fallibility of all the human beings involved? " – Carl Sagan "Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were, but without it we go nowhere. " – Carl Sagan "For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love. "
They're not looking for lunch. They're looking to know more about the cosmos. " Embed from Getty Images Q: It's been almost two decades since we spoke about the challenges we were facing in the wake of the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001. The question I asked then was, "What would Carl say? " What's the lesson we could learn if Carl were around? So I have to ask again: What would Carl say, and what would you say? How do we get out of this situation we find ourselves in, which is arguably as dire as what we saw after 9/11? A: "Well, in some ways it's more dire, and in some ways it's less. Life doesn't usually go where you expect it to go, and that's what's really terrible and what's really great about it. "I can't speak for Carl. But sometimes I wonder, because of his impressive and thrilling growth as a human being, that maybe he could have helped us avert the situation we find ourselves in. "Even though I know I'm never going to talk to him again, I am also frequently, mentally interested in the notion that I am going to catch him up on all the crazy things that have happened since December 20, 1996, when he died.
It's going to be hard to tell him about 9/11, because we had our wedding reception on the roof of the World Trade Center, at Windows on the World. The idea that that is in some sense a void, where we celebrated that joyous day with our family … it's really painful, the loss of life. If I were ever to talk to Carl, I don't think I would have the heart to tell him where we are. "I know history is not a linear progression. It's two steps forward, one step back. That's the way it goes. It's not just a line on a chart, but progress is on the upward trajectory. It's meandering, and it always has been. I hope Carl would be saying what all of us who worked on 'Cosmos' would say: 'Awaken! Awaken to the romance of life in the cosmos, and act to protect it. ' That's what I think he would say. "
"I was inspired by a quote from Albert Einstein that I discovered while surfing YouTube one night. Einstein was given 700 words to explain cosmic rays to the 200, 000 people who were gathered in the rain for the opening of the 1939 New York World's Fair. And in addition to explaining cosmic rays, he used up some of those 700 words to tell the audience that cosmic rays had been discovered by an immigrant whom the United States had welcomed to its shores. He said that was absolutely critical to the success of the United States. "Then he said, 'If science, like art, is to perform its mission truly and fully, its achievements must enter not only superficially, but with their inner meaning into the consciousness of people. ' Albert Einstein – 1939 New York World's Fair from Science Planet on Vimeo. "I thought that was a brilliant observation. I was blown away, because it had been the dream of 'Cosmos' to fulfill the mission of science to penetrate as widely as possible to the greatest possible audience.
And then the other thought I had in conceiving the series was that our vision of the future is so dystopian. It's a reflection of reality. It's a reflection of the grave challenges that we face. "Another inspiration for me was the drawing of the evolution of interstellar flight that Carl Sagan did when he was 11 or 12. That was a kid living in a very modest apartment in Brooklyn in 1945, who never met a scientist. But he saw this great future for us in exploring the cosmos. He lived to be a leading participant in an interstellar mission, at a time when nothing he'd ever touched had left the planet. "What an ambitious dream that was! That gives me inspiration, as do the stories that we tell about people who at critical moments have stood up for science, for what they thought was true — every one of them feeling that reality mattered. "You can't lie your way to Mars. At every step of the mission, people have to tell the truth, to be accurate and true to reality in order to accomplish the greatest things to be done.
Last Updated on December 11, 2019 Around the 70's and 80's, the world was still in the process of discovering a lot of the things we now know to be true. It was a completely different era, a time when a lot of things still seemed impossible. This is why the astronomer Carl Sagan made such a huge impact in the lives of those who longed for a deeper understanding of life and the universe. He saw the universe in ways we never saw before, opening up people's minds to a lot of possibilities far from what they knew back then. To give you a clear glimpse of how Carl Sagan's mind worked, here are a few of his quotes that ultimately leads to the awakening of anyone's yearning to understand the world and the universe better. Carl Sagan Quotes about the Cosmos "Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. " – Carl Sagan "Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another. " – Carl Sagan "The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars.
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