Quotes from Carl Sagan

Como es lógico, existe un ritmo constante y básico de extinciones. En nuestra época, las especies se extinguen cada año a consecuencia de las actividades humanas: la urbanización, la caza, la contaminación industrial o la destrucción de los bosques tropicales.

Paid product endorsements, especially by real or purported experts, constitute a steady rainfall of deception. They betray contempt for the intelligence of their customers

In the jury selection process, the court needs to be reassured that the verdict will be based on evidence.

Uno de los grandes mandamientos de la ciencia es: «Desconfía de los argumentos que proceden de la autoridad».

The left hemisphere seems to feel quite defensive-in a strange way insecure-about the right hemisphere; and, if this is so, verbal criticism of intuitive thinking becomes suspect on the ground of motive. Unfortunately, there is every reason to think that the right hemisphere has comparable misgivings -expressed nonverbally, of course- about the left.

Pre-scientific people are people. Individually they are as clever as we are. Field interrogation of informants from a different culture is not always easy.

La extinción es la regla. La supervivencia es la excepción.

El universo no fue hecho a medida del hombre; tampoco le es hostil: es indiferente.

Cuando dirigimos nuestra vista al espacio vemos reflejadas en él las múltiples variedades de nuestra naturaleza.

In addition to Ameslan, chimpanzees and other nonhuman primates are being taught a variety of other gestural languages. And it is just this transition from tongue to hand that has permitted humans to regain the ability-lost, according to Josephus, since Eden-to communicate with the animals.

Los viajes inaugurales son siempre los más peligrosos.

Out of all these contending propensities and child-rearing practices, some people emerge with an intact ability to fantasize, and a history, extending well into adulthood, of confabulation

we are privileged to live among brilliant and passionately inquisitive people, and in time when the search for knowledge is generally prized

The quantity of 200-proof alcohol in this single interstellar cloud was more than enough to maintain the present population of the Earth, if every adult were a dedicated alcoholic, for the age of the solar system.

A God of the Gaps is assigned responsibility for what we do not yet understand.

A sedução do maravilhoso embota nossas faculdades críticas.

Longevity is perhaps the best single measure of the physical quality of life. (If you're dead, there's little you can do to be happy.) This is a precious offering from science to humanity -nothing less than the gift of life.

Hipócrates escribió: «Los hombres creen que la epilepsia es divina, meramente porque no la pueden entender. Pero si llamasen divino a todo lo que no pueden entender, habría una infinidad de cosas divinas».

La búsqueda de configuraciones sin análisis crítico y la ostentación de un rígido escepticismo sin la búsqueda de configuraciones son las antípodas de una ciencia incompleta. La búsqueda efectiva del saber requiere la concurrencia de ambas funciones.

There is no doubt that right-hemisphere intuitive thinking may perceive patterns and connections too difficult for the left hemisphere; but it may also detect patterns where none exist. Skeptical and critical thinking is not a hallmark of the right hemisphere. And unalloyed right-hemisphere doctrines, particularly when they are invented during new and trying circumstances, may be erroneous or paranoid.

Pokochali?my gwiazdy tak czule, ?e nie musimy l?ka? si? nocy.

Otkako su ljudska bi?a zaposjela Zemlju, no?no je nebo bilo sudrug i nadahnu?e. Zvijezde su smirivale ?ovjeka. Nekima je nebo otvaralo put prema vjeri. Drugima je svemir pružao poticaj za najneobi?nija maštanja.

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. We

There is nothing which can better deserve our patronage than the promotion of science and literature. Knowledge is in every country the surest basis of public happiness. GEORGE WASHINGTON, address to Congress, January 8, 1790