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Reads tagged with “Carl Sagan”

Encke’s Comet, Celestial Poetics, and the Dawn of Popular Astronomy: How Emma Converse Became the Carl Sagan of the 19th Century
Encke’s Comet, Celestial Poetics, and the Dawn of Popular Astronomy: How Emma Converse Became the Carl Sagan of the 19th Century

“The moment so long looked for may be nearer than we think, when, with a powerful grasp, like that of Newton, some watcher of the stars shall seize the secret of cometic history.”

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Carl Sagan on Moving Beyond Us vs. Them, Bridging Conviction with Compassion, and Meeting Ignorance with Kindness
Carl Sagan on Moving Beyond Us vs. Them, Bridging Conviction with Compassion, and Meeting Ignorance with Kindness

“In the course of looking deeply within ourselves, we may challenge notions that give comfort before the terrors of the world.”

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Carl Sagan on Humility, Science as a Tool of Democracy, and the Value of Uncertainty
Carl Sagan on Humility, Science as a Tool of Democracy, and the Value of Uncertainty

“Science is a way to call the bluff of those who only pretend to knowledge… It can tell us when we’re being lied to. It provides a mid-course correction to our mistakes.”

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Wonder-Sighting in the Medieval World: Stunning Sixteenth-Century Drawings of Comets, with Carl Sagan’s Poetic Meditation on Their Science
Wonder-Sighting in the Medieval World: Stunning Sixteenth-Century Drawings of Comets, with Carl Sagan’s Poetic Meditation on Their Science

“A comet is … a great clock, ticking out decades or geological ages once each perihelion passage, reminding us of the beauty and harmony of the Newtonian universe, and of the daunting insignificance of our place in space and time.”

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Cosmic Solitude: Polish Nobel Laureate Wisława Szymborska on How the Prospect of Being Alone in the Universe Can Make Us Better Stewards of Our Humanity
Cosmic Solitude: Polish Nobel Laureate Wisława Szymborska on How the Prospect of Being Alone in the Universe Can Make Us Better Stewards of Our Humanity

“Perhaps we wouldn’t talk so much nonsense, tell so many lies, if we knew that they were echoing throughout the cosmos…”

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Self-Refinement Through the Wisdom of the Ages: New Year’s Resolutions from Some of Humanity’s Greatest Minds
Self-Refinement Through the Wisdom of the Ages: New Year’s Resolutions from Some of Humanity’s Greatest Minds

Enduring ideas for personal refinement from Seneca, Thoreau, Virginia Woolf, Carl Sagan, Alan Watts, Emerson, Bruce Lee, Maya Angelou, and more.

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