"I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges near, pseudoscience and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive.
Where have we heard it before? Whenever our ethnic or national prejudices are aroused, in times of scarcity, during challenges to national self-esteem or nerve, when we agonize about our diminished cosmic place and purpose, or when fanaticism is bubbling up around us - then, habits of thought familiar from ages past reach for the controls.
The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir."
Thanks ABQ for reminding me
April 22, 2006
A note from Carl Sagan
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In the 18 century the Pat Robertson's of the world discredited Malthus and his writings on populations/and human nature because of this paragraph:
The Offending Paragraph of Malthus:
"A man who is born into a world already possessed, if he cannot get substance from his parents on whom he has a just demand, and if the society do not want his labour, has no claim of right to the smallest portion of food, and, in fact, has no business to be where he is. At nature's mighty feast there is no vacant cover for him. She tells him to be gone, and will quickly execute her own orders, if he does not work upon the compassion of some of her guests. If these guests get
up and make room for him, other intruders immediately appear
demanding the same favour. The report of a provision for all that
come, fills the hall with numerous claimants. The order and harmony
of the feast is disturbed, the plenty that before reigned is changed into scarcity; and the happiness of the guests is destroyed by the spectacle of misery and dependence in every part of the hall, and by the clamorous importunity of those, who are justly enraged at not
finding the provision which they had been taught to expect. The
guests learn too late their error, in counter-acting those strict
orders to all intruders, issued by the great mistress of the feast,
who wishing that all guest should have plenty, and knowing she could
not provide for unlimited numbers, and humanely refused to admit
fresh comers when her table was already full."
Today the Pat Robertson's are again speaking of the end days - well they have that about right, but not the reasons for the end days- selling salvation will be about as hot of a market as gold and silver are.
Don't be fooled AGAIN!!!!!!!!! There is not a heaven nor hell people - get over it!!!
Bottom line - the go forth be fruitful and multiply way of thinking - well is just plain INSANITY -
Of course there is a hell, many people create it for themselves out of thin air. RE speculators in Phoenix are a perfect example!
I really don't care what others believe about a guiding force or principle for this existence as God is a personal thing for me. When asked about a proper place for worship, Jesus replied that the kingdom of God is within us all. Free Will gives us the choice to ignore it if we want.
I am bothered by people who feel it's their duty to denegrate or harass others who see a spiritual dimension in the world. Usually they are young and lack the physical and emotional scars that a few decades of life add. Or perhaps they've never witnessed the special bond that exists between a mother and her child. Fortunately most of them mature and experience their own awakening.
Carl Sagan? IMO an intelligent guy who never really grew up. He went from academia to the media spotlight but according to many of his students and coworkers, he was an aloof, mean-spirited man who lacked inner peace (aka grace). Too bad.
"pseudoscience and superstition" known these days as 'faith based'
As in "Our faith based government".
bluzer -- the word "God" never appears in the Constitution, so give it a rest already. If you have an open mind and want to learn something, take a look at an article by Halton Arp titled "What Has Science Become?". Arp is an astronomer working at the Max Planck Institute and the article compares practices in modern science to the religions of yore. He makes a good case that in many regards, there isn't a lot of difference in the way they are practiced.
Just as in Galileo's day, scientists who dare reject the orthodoxy of mainstream "science" are exiled and shunned. But instead of the Catholic church, it's the Church of Big Science that does the deed and punishes the heretics.
Carl Sagan was a big science proponent who often trashed the work of others without giving it any consideration. A good example was a study of Venus done by an amateur astronomer in the 1960s which quantified the length of Venus' day (no small feat since you can only see cloud tops). Sagan blew off this guy's careful observations and work over many years and said no one should trust the work of some pitiful amateur. Fast forward ten years -- when NASA finally dropped a spacecraft into orbit around Venus, it took data that confirmed the the rotation was within 5% of the number the "pitiful" amateur had measured years before. I doubt Sagan had the grace to apologize to the guy let alone admit his mistake.
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