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Cosmos: Possible Worlds QUOTES

Cosmos: Possible Worlds QUOTES

1 " The “pale blue dot” image and Carl’s prose meditation on it have been beloved the world over ever since. It exemplifies just the kind of breakthrough that I think of as a fulfillment of Einstein’s hope for science. We have gotten clever enough to dispatch a spacecraft four billion miles away and command it to send us back an image of Earth. Seeing our world as a single pixel in the immense darkness is in itself a statement about our true circumstances in the cosmos, and one that every single human can grasp instantly. No advanced degree required. In that photo, the inner meaning of four centuries of astronomical research is suddenly available to all of us at a glance. It is scientific data and art equally, because it has the power to reach into our souls and alter our consciousness. It is like a great book or movie, or any major work of art. It can pierce our denial and allow us to feel something of reality—even a reality that some of us have long resisted.
A world that tiny cannot possibly be the center of a cosmos of all that is, let alone the sole focus of its creator. The pale blue dot is a silent rebuke to the fundamentalist, the nationalist, the militarist, the polluter—to anyone who does not put above all other things the protection of our little planet and the life that it sustains in the vast cold darkness. There is no running away from the inner meaning of this scientific achievement. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

2 " A world that tiny cannot possibly be the center of a cosmos of all that is, let alone the sole focus of its creator. The pale blue dot is a silent rebuke to the fundamentalist, the nationalist, the militarist, the polluter—to anyone who does not put above all other things the protection of our little planet and the life that it sustains in the vast cold darkness. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

3 " This is one of the things I love about science. When the evidence for a slightly older universe was discovered, there were no scientists who sought to suppress it. As soon as the new data were verified, this revision in our understanding was embraced by the whole scientific community. That permanently revolutionary attitude, that openness to change, at the heart of science is what makes it so effective. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

4 " Science, like love, is a means to that transcendence, to that soaring experience of the oneness of being fully alive. The scientific approach to nature and my understanding of love are the same: Love asks us to get beyond the infantile projections of our personal hopes and fears, to embrace the other’s reality. This kind of unflinching love never stops daring to go deeper, to reach higher.
This is precisely the way that science loves nature. This lack of a final destination, an absolute truth, is what makes science such a worthy methodology for sacred searching. It is a never ending lesson in humility. The vastness of the universe—and love, the thing that makes the vastness bearable—is out of reach to the arrogant. This cosmos only fully admits those who listen carefully for the inner voice reminding us to remember we might be wrong. What’s real must matter more to us than what we wish to believe. But how do we tell the difference?
I know a way to part the curtains of darkness that prevent us from having a complete experience of nature. Here it is, the basic rules of the road for science: Test ideas by experiment and observation. Build on those ideas that pass the test. Reject the ones that fail. Follow the evidence wherever it leads. And question everything, including authority. Do these things and the cosmos is yours. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

5 " What I love about science is that it demands of us a tolerance for ambiguity. It requires us to live with humility regarding our ignorance, withholding judgment until the evidence comes in. That needn’t prevent us from using the little we do know to search for and decrypt new languages of reality. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

6 " To know what is real, one must subject one’s ideas to the rigorous, error-correcting mechanism of science, seeking verification that can be expressed mathematically. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

7 " What distant star had to explode to seed our world with inspiration? "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

8 " This is the essence of emergence: tiny units of matter operating collectively to become something much more than themselves, to enable the cosmos to know itself. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

9 " Is DNA destiny? "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

10 " Over the next 400 million years, the cyanobacteria—taking in carbon dioxide and giving back oxygen—turned the sky from "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

11 " a person bound to the facts can never hope to best the rabble-rouser in the arena. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

12 " Dreams are maps. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

13 " the future depends on seeing reality clearly. But for some reason, we are easily manipulated and deceived. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

14 " Cosmos: "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

15 " Lethal heat waves, droughts, and runaway wildfires of unprecedented magnitude, check. The scientists warned us. The corporations with vested interests in the fossil fuel industry and the governments they supported acted just like the tobacco companies. They pretended the science was unsettled and stalled for precious years. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

16 " If the series of pilgrimages toward understanding our actual circumstances in the universe, the origin of life, and the laws of nature are not spiritual quests, then I don’t know what could be. I "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

17 " If God is the author of natural law, should not God be best apprehended in those laws? "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

18 " What good is it to know of a danger if you don’t do anything about it? Maybe it’s better not to know. Knowing can be a curse. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

19 " Oh mighty King, you, who are so powerful you can take hundreds of thousands of lives at your whim. Show me how powerful you really are-give back just one life you've taken." Asoka (pg 82). "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds

20 " Науката, подобно на любовта, е средство за достигане на тази трансцеденталност, на онова извисяващо преживяване - целостта да бъдеш напълно жив. научният подход към природата и моето разбиране за любовта са еднакви: любовта ни приканва да преминем отвъд инфантилните проекции на нашите лични надежди и страхове, да прегърнем реалността на другия. Този вид безстрашна любов никога не спира да се осмелява да отиде по-надълбоко, да достигне по-високо. "

― Ann Druyan , Cosmos: Possible Worlds