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Carl Sagan Quotes (1934-1996)
Physicist, Author, Scientist
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About Carl Sagan
Carl Edward Sagan (9 November 1934 – 20 December 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on extraterrestrial life, including experimental demonstration of the production of amino acids from basic chemicals by radiation. Sagan assembled the first physical messages sent into space, the Pioneer plaque and the Voyager Golden Record, universal messages that could potentially be understood by any extraterrestrial intelligence that might find them. Sagan argued the hypothesis, accepted since, that the high surface temperatures of Venus can be attributed to, and calculated using, the greenhouse effect. He testified to the US Congress in 1985 that the greenhouse effect will change the earth's climate system.
Best Carl Sagan Quotes
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Explore our curated collection of the most famous and impactful Carl Sagan quotes.
“Nobody listens to mathematicians.”
“Anatomy is not destiny, but it is not irrelevant either.”
“With insufficient data it is easy to go wrong.”
“The laws of physics suffice, without supernatural intervention.”
“Jingoistic rhetoric and puerile self-congratulatory nationalism.”
“People are rarely grateful for a demonstration of their credulity.”
“The best antidote for pseudoscience, I firmly believe, is science.”
“It's hard to kill a creature once it lets you see its consciousness.”
“We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it's forever.”
“Astronomically, the U. S. S. R. and the United States are the same place.”
“Humans are very good at dreaming, although you'd never know it from your television.”
“Those at too great a distance may, I am well aware, mistake ignorance for perspective.”
“Many harebrained interpretations were also widely available, especially in weekly newspapers.”
Carl Sagan Quotes by Topic
Find exactly what you are looking for by browsing this categorized list of Carl Sagan quotes by topic.
Carl Sagan on Science 10 quotes
“The idea of science as a method rather than as a body of knowledge is not widely appreciated outside of science, or indeed in some corridors inside of science.”
Carl Sagan on Freethought 8 quotes
“When you make the finding yourself--even if you're the last person on Earth to see the light--you never forget it.”
Carl Sagan on Technology 6 quotes
“We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.”
Carl Sagan on Civilization 5 quotes
“In the vastness of the Cosmos there must be other civilizations far older and more advanced than ours.”
Carl Sagan on Solar System 5 quotes
“Once upon a time, we soared into the Solar System. For a few years. Then we hurried back. Why? What happened? What was 'Apollo' really about?””
Carl Sagan on Galaxy 4 quotes
“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 on Cosmos 4 quotes
“Whatever is inconsistent with the facts must be discarded or revised. We must understand the Cosmos as it is and not confuse how it is with how we wish it to be.”
Carl Sagan on Planet 3 quotes
“The size and age of the Cosmos are beyond ordinary human understanding. Lost somewhere between immensity and eternity is our tiny planetary home.”
Carl Sagan on Global catastrophic risk 3 quotes
“Every thinking person fears nuclear war and every technological nation plans for it. Everyone knows it's madness, and every country has an excuse.”
Carl Sagan on Books 3 quotes
“All of the books in the world contain no more information than is broadcast as video in a single large American city in a single year. Not all bits have equal value.”
Carl Sagan on Skepticism 3 quotes
“You can get into a habit of thought in which you enjoy making fun of all those other people who don't see things as clearly as you do. We have to guard carefully against it.”
Carl Sagan on Venus 3 quotes
“Some scientists believe that until about 500 million years ago the Venus surface was almost entirely devoid of landforms. Streams and oceans of molten rock were relentlessly pouring out of the interior filling in and covering over any relief that had managed to form.”
What Carl Sagan Said About Others
Discover personal opinions Carl Sagan shared regarding contemporaries.
Carl Sagan on Sigmund Freud 2 quotes
“Freud's view was that "at bottom God is nothing more than an exalted father."... The view here is that we start out with a sense that our parents are omnipotent and omniscient... There's a part of us that has been inducted into a dominance hierarchy and doesn't like the uncertainty of having to deal with things for ourselves. ...one of the many reasons that are given for the advantages of military life and other powerfully hierarchical societies is that it's not required to think for oneself very much. There's something calming about that. ...according to Freud, we then foist upon the cosmos our own emotional predispositions.”
Carl Sagan on Isaac Asimov
“The great explainer of our [technological] age.”
Carl Sagan on James Randi
Carl Sagan on James Clerk Maxwell
“Maxwell's equations have had a greater impact on human history than any ten presidents.”
Carl Sagan on Ronald Reagan
“Emerging from a particularly credulous Southern California culture, Nancy and Ronald Reagan relied on an astrologer in private and public matters — unknown to the voting public. Some portion of the decision-making that influences the future of our civilization is plainly in the hands of charlatans.”
Carl Sagan on Plato
“But why had science lost its way in the first place? What appeal could these teachings of Pythagoras and Plato have had for their contemporaries? They provided, I believe, an intellectually respectable justification for a corrupt social order. The mercantile tradition that had led to Ionian science also led to a slave economy. You could get richer if you owned a lot of slaves. Athens in the time of Plato and Aristotle had a vast slave population. All that brave Athenian talk about democracy applied only to a privileged few.”
Carl Sagan on Johannes Kepler
“Kepler was a brilliant thinker and a lucid writer, but he was a disaster as a classroom teacher. He mumbled. He digressed. He was at times utterly incomprehensible. He drew only a handful of students his first year at Graz; the next year there were none. He was distracted by an incessant interior clamour of associations and speculations vying for his attention. And one pleasant summer afternoon, deep in the interstices of one of his interminable lectures, he was visited by a revelation that was to alter radically the future of astronomy. Perhaps he stopped in mid-sentence. His inattentive students, longing for the end of the day, took little notice, I suspect, of the historic moment.”
Carl Sagan on Ann Druyan
“Ann Druyan suggests an experiment: Look back again at the pale blue dot of the preceding chapter. Take a good long look at it. Stare at the dot for any length of time and then try to convince yourself that God created the whole Universe for one of the 10 million or so species of life that inhabit that speck of dust. Now take it a step further: Imagine that everything was made just for a single shade of that species, or gender, or ethnic or religious subdivision. If this doesn't strike you as unlikely, pick another dot. Imagine it to be inhabited by a different form of intelligent life. They, too, cherish the notion of a God who has created everything for their benefit. How seriously do you take their claim?”
Carl Sagan on Thomas Paine
“The First Amendment to the United States Constitution encourages a diversity of religions but does not prohibit criticism of religion. In fact it protects and encourages criticism of religion. Religions ought to be subject to at least the same degree of skepticism as, for example, contentions about UFO visitations or Velikovskian catastrophism. I think it is healthy for the religions themselves to foster skepticism about the fundamental underpinnings of their evidential bases. There is no question that religion provides a solace and support, a bulwark in time of emotional need, and can serve extremely useful social roles. But it by no means follows that religion should be immune from testing, from critical scrutiny, from skepticism. It is striking how little skeptical discussion of religion there is in the nation that Tom Paine, the author of The Age of Reason, helped to found. I hold that belief systems that cannot survive scrutiny are probably not worth having.”
Quotes About Carl Sagan
Gain deeper perspective through quotes about Carl Sagan from others.
Ann Druyan on Carl Sagan 2 quotes
“"This is a deathwatch," Carl told me calmly. "I'm going to die." "No," I protested. "You're going to beat this, just as you have before when it looked hopeless." He turned to me with that same look I had seen countless times in the debates and skirmishes of our twenty years of writing together and being wildly in love. With a mixture of knowing good humor and skepticism, but as ever, not a trace of self-pity, he said wryly, "Well, we'll see who's right about this one." Sam, now five years old, came to see his father for one last time. Although Carl was by now struggling for breath and finding it harder to speak, he managed to compose himself so as not to frighten his little son. "I love you, Sam," was all he could say. "I love you, too, Daddy," Sam said solemnly. Contrary to the fantasies of the fundamentalists, there was no deathbed conversion, no last minute refuge taken in a comforting vision of a heaven or an afterlife. For Carl, what mattered most was what was true, not merely what would make us feel better. Even at this moment when anyone would be forgiven for turning away from the reality of our situation, Carl was unflinching. As we looked deeply into each other's eyes, it was with a shared conviction that our wondrous life together was ending forever.”
Sylvia Earle on Carl Sagan
“Astronomer Carl Sagan noted that even when it is viewed from so far away that it is a pale dot, Earth is discernibly blue.”
Elizabeth Kolbert The Sixth Extinction on Carl Sagan
“Inspired by the impact hypothesis, a group of astrophysicists led by Carl Sagan decided to try to model the effects of an all-out war and came up with the concept of "nuclear winter," which, in turn, generated its own wave of media coverage.”
Seth MacFarlane on Carl Sagan
“The work of Carl Sagan has been a profound influence in my life, and the life of every individual who recognizes the importance of humanity's ongoing commitment to the exploration of our universe.”
Stanley A. Rice on Carl Sagan 2 quotes
“As astronomer Carl Sagan thought about what Fermi said [Fermi paradox], he began to be alarmed. ...This could only mean that advanced civilizations destroy themselves before they get that far, a viewpoint Sagan published in 1966.”
Nassim Nicholas Taleb on Carl Sagan
“Carl Sagan... examined the cures from cancer that resulted from a visit to Lourdes... where people were healed by a simple contact with the holy waters, and found... that, of the total cancer patients who visited... the cure rate was, if anything, lower than the statistical one for spontaneous remissions. It was lower than the average for those who did not go to Lourdes. Should a statistician infer that... odds of survival deteriorate after a visit..?”
Neil deGrasse Tyson on Carl Sagan
“I was applying to colleges in high school and I already knew I wanted to study the universe at age seventeen because I knew at age nine. So my applications were dripping with the universe. I was accepted at Cornell, and it's time to decide what school you go to, and a set of other schools as well. The admissions office, unknown to me, sent my application to Carl Sagan. He was already famous. He was already on Johnny Carson, Tonight Show. To get him to just comment on it. Carl Sagan then sent me a letter, hand signed, saying, 'I understand you're considering Cornell. If you come by and visit I'd be happy to show you the lab.' And I said, 'Is this Carl Sagan?' I showed it to mom, dad, I said, 'Could this be?' And it was. I wrote back and I said, 'Yeah, I'll go up in two weekends.' He met me on a Saturday morning in the snow, gave me a tour of his lab. I'm in his office, he reaches back, pulls out one of his books, signs it to me. It's time for me to leave, he drives me to the bus station, snowing a little heavier. He writes his home phone on a sheet of paper, says, 'If the bus can't get through, call me, spend the night at our place.' And I thought to myself, who am I? I'm just some high school kid. And to this day, to this day, I have this duty to respond to students who are inquiring about the universe as a career path, to respond to them in the way that Carl Sagan had responded to me.”
Colin Wilson on Carl Sagan
“I do not regard the late Carl Sagan as any kind of authority. On the contrary, as this book will show, I regard him in many ways as a dubious publicity seeker and careerist, more concerned to maintain his reputation as the brilliant and sceptical representative of hard-headed science than to look squarely and honestly at the facts. In short, a bit of a crook.”
Misattributed Quotes
Quotes mistakenly credited to Carl Sagan
“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”
“Atheism is more than just the knowledge that gods do not exist, and that religion is either a mistake or a fraud. Atheism is an attitude, a frame of mind that looks at the world objectively, fearlessly, always trying to understand all things as a part of nature.”
“We can judge our progress by the courage of our questions and the depths of our answers, our willingness to embrace what is true rather than what feels good.”
About Carl Sagan
Carl Edward Sagan (9 November 1934 – 20 December 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on extraterrestrial life, including experimental demonstration of the production of amino acids from basic chemicals by radiation. Sagan assembled the first physical messages sent into space, the Pioneer plaque and the Voyager Golden Record, universal messages that could potentially be understood by any extraterrestrial intelligence that might find them. Sagan argued the hypothesis, accepted since, that the high surface temperatures of Venus can be attributed to, and calculated using, the greenhouse effect. He testified to the US Congress in 1985 that the greenhouse effect will change the earth's climate system.