Quotes from Carl Sagan

Los dioses no vienen a componer las cosas que nos salieron mal. Fíjese en la historia del hombre, y se dará cuenta de que siempre estuvimos solos

The fact that atoms are composed of three kinds of elementary particles—protons, neutrons and electrons—is a comparatively recent finding. The neutron was not discovered until 1932. Modern physics and chemistry have reduced the complexity of the sensible world to an astonishing simplicity: three units put together in various patterns make, essentially, everything.

However, in part for reasons of organizational convenience, modern societies are structured as if all humans had the same sleep requirements; and in many parts of the world there is a satisfying sense of moral rectitude in rising early. The amount of sleep required for buffer dumping would then depend on how much we have both thought and experienced since the last sleep period.

For thousands of years humans were oppressed - as some of us still are - by the notion that the universe is a marionette whose strings are pulled by a god or gods, unseen and inscrutable.

Evrim bir kuram deÄŸil bir olgudur.

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 he stars.

En basit yap?l? tek hücreli organizma bile en mükemmel cep saatinden daha karma??k bir makinedir.

But deep down, the the molecular heart of life, the trees and we are essentially identical.

Pero los humanos tenemos talento para engañarnos a nosotros mismos. El escepticismo debe ser un componente de la caja de herramientas del explorador, en otro caso nos perderemos en el camino. El espacio tiene maravillas suficientes sin tener que inventarlas.

70 milyon y?l, bunun ancak milyonda birine eÅŸit bir süre yaÅŸayabilen insan için ne ifade eder? Yaln?zca bir güncük uçan ve günü sonsuzmuÅŸ gibi alg?layan kelebeklere benziyoruz

La búsqueda de inteligencia extraterrestre —que todos abreviaban con las siglas SETI

All that we have seen is something of a vast and intricate and lovely universe. There is no particular theological conclusion that comes out of an exercise such as the one we have just gone through. What is more, when we understand something of the astronomical dynamics, the evolution of worlds, we recognize that worlds are born and worlds die, they have lifetimes just as humans do, and therefore that there is a great deal of suffering and death in the cosmos if there is a great deal of life.

For their surface area, insects weigh very little. A beetle, falling from a high altitude, quickly achieves terminal velocity: air resistance prevents it from falling very fast, and, after alighting on the ground, it will walk away, apparently none the worse for the experience… In contrast, human beings are characteristically maimed or killed by any fall of more than a few dozen feet: because of our size, we weigh too much for our surface area.

As we identify the planets of other stars, as we find other words of roughly the size and mass of Earth, we will scrutinize them for life.

If the laws of nature are unpredictably reassorted at the cusps (the transition from contraction to expansion of the universe), then it is only by the most extraordinary coincidence that the cosmic slot machine has this time come up with a universe consistent with us.

Göz önünde tutmak'' anlam?ndaki Ä°ngilizce ''consider'' sözcüÄŸünün köken anlam? ÅŸudur: ''Gezegene bakarak konuÅŸmak.'' Gezegenlere bakarak konuÅŸmaksa oldukça ciddi bir iÅŸti.

explorations that are exhilarating to consider. They remind us that humans have evolved to wonder, that understanding is a joy, that knowledge is prerequisite to survival.

El secreto, con pocas excepciones, es profundamente incompatible con la democracia y la ciencia.

While the content of many dreams seem haphazard, others are remarkably well structured; these dreams have a remarkable resemblance to drama.

Perhaps if one less dragonfly had drowned in the Carboniferous swamps, the intelligent organisms on our planet today would have feathers and teach their young in rookeries. The pattern of evolutionary causality is a web of astonishing complexity; the incompleteness of our understanding humbles us.

Can we, who have made such a mess of this world, be trusted with others?

In the vastness of space and the immensity of time, it is my joy to share a planet and an epoch with Annie

And if our naïve self-confidence is a little undermined in the process, is that altogether such a loss? Is there not cause to welcome it as a maturing and character-building experience?

Those mothers with hereditary large pelvises were able to bear large-brained babies who because of their superior intelligence were able to compete successfully in adulthood with the smaller-brained offspring of mothers with smaller pelvises.