A moon in the dark night-Carl Sagan’s Last Interview: Science as a Candle in the Dark(May 27-1996)
During his 20 minute interview, Sagan discussed pseudo-science and religion, technology and exponential growth, politics and education, his personal love affair with science and his struggle with myelodysplasia, as well as other elements of his last book: The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
Favorite quote from Carl Sagan appears in this interview
“Science is more than a body of knowledge. It is a way of thinking; a way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility.
If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then, we are up for grabs for the next charlatan (political or religious) who comes rambling along.”
Here are some excerpts from this interview
Sagan expressed great concern that “if the general public doesn’t understand science and technology, then who is making all of the decisions about science and technology that are going to determine what kind of future our children live in, some members of congress? There are only a handful who have any background in science at all, and some of them don’t even want to know about it.”
We’ve arranged a society on science and technology in which nobody understands anything about science and technology, and this combustible mixture of ignorance and power sooner or later is going to blow up in our faces. I mean, who is running the science and technology in a democracy if the people don’t know anything about it.”
“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.”
Now do you feel like watching his interview below
