Sagan — a Demon in a Candle Lit World
Please read My Sagan Obsession over at Yard Sale of the Mind by one of my fellow alumni from St John College in Annapolis. I like the purple prose, and, better yet, I agree with him. Here is a snippet from the middle:
I believe that, far from belittling science, knowing the gory details helps one appreciate just how wonderful science is. When what seems like a crazy theory – plate tectonics, say, or relativity, or the revolution of the earth on its axis – a theory that defies what seems to be obviously true – turns out to be demonstrated as true based on a growing mountain of observation, experiment and argument, and over the egos and back-stabbing and pettiness of the people involved – well, THAT’s a triumph to celebrate. But science as presented by Sagan – we enlightened few, harmoniously united by our pure love of the Truth, who for completely selfless reasons, and armed with nothing but argument and integrity, battle the execrable ignorance of the unwashed, superstitious Many, eventually leading them, however dull and imperfectly, to accept the Brave New World we scientists have, despite their opposition, created for them – gag me.
It gets worse. I’ve read more than once someone call Sagan a ‘great scientist’. You mean, like Einstein, Faraday, and Newton? Guys whose contributions to science reverberate to this day and are incorporated into technologies used daily around the world? THAT kind of ‘great scientist’? The dude was a college professor and tireless self promoter who, even according to his fans, made only trivial, work-a-day contributions to his field such as any competent college professor of astronomy might make. What’s more, and more telling, his name is attached to at least two very dubious bits of pseudoscience – SETI and Nuclear Winter. In the first case, he championed the Drake Equation – a hopeless bit of fantasy masquerading as science, and in the second, he championed conclusions which the science itself hardly supported. At best, Nuclear Winter is an alarming theory that *might* happen IF a huge number of unknowns were determined to simultaneously fall toward the worse-case end of the spectrum. In both cases, Carl championed causes that not only did not improve our scientific understanding but concretely set the standard for using smoke and mirrors to promote political agendas.
But these projects sure did raise Sagan’s public profile.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
