You knew as soon as you opened Carl Sagan’s 1973 title The Cosmic Connection that you were leaving an Earth-centric view of the cosmos behind. The title page showed, spread across both it and the facing page, a spiral galaxy. The work of Sagan friend and collaborator Jon Lomberg, the illustration included reference to Type I, II and III civilizations, the Kardashev ranking that few laymen had heard about in those days, but which Sagan’s work would illuminate for an increasingly interested public.
The public would have been drawn first, though, to the cover of that first edition of The Cosmic Connection. A night landscape in black and white, a solitary tree outlined against the sky. But what a sky, filled with what looked like a galaxy — billions and billions of stars — rising. That image encapsulated so much of the book’s message. It juxtaposed our familiar terrain against something so vast, so filled with the potential other stars suggest, that you were forced to speculate on our place in the universe, and ponder all over again how unlikely it was that we might be alone.
Image: A bit dog-eared but still a prize possession, my copy of The Cosmic Connection.
I remember feeling these things when I bought the book in 1973, and find them reawakened as I look at that same copy on my desk this morning. The subtitle of the book is ‘An Extraterrestrial Perspective,’ and Sagan wasted no time in providing it, speculating in an early chapter on using a computer to view the sky as seen from Alpha Centauri:
We now ask the computer to draw us the sky from the nearest star to our own, Alpha Centauri, a triple-star system, about 4.3 light years from Earth. In terms of the scale of our Milky Way Galaxy, this is such a short distance that our perspectives remain almost exactly the same. From α Cen the Big Dipper appears just as it does from Earth. Almost all the other constellations are similarly unchanged. There is one striking exception, however, and that is the constellation Cassiopeia. Cassiopeia, the queen of an ancient kingdom, mother of Andromeda and mother-in-law of Perseus, is mainly a set of five stars arranged as a W or an M, depending on which way the sky has turned. From Alpha Centauri, however, there is one extra jog in the M; a sixth star appears in Cassiopeia, one significantly brighter than the other five. That star is the Sun. From the vantage point of the nearest star, our Sun is a relatively bright but unprepossessing point in the night sky. There is no way to tell by looking at Cassiopeia from the sky of a hypothetical planet of Alpha Centauri that there are planets going around the Sun, that on the third of these planets there are life forms, and that one of these life forms considers itself to be of quite considerable intelligence. If this is the case for the sixth star in Cassiopeia, might it not also be the case for innumerable millions of other stars in the night sky?
Indeed. Back then, speculations about the ‘Great Silence’ weren’t quite so hard-edged as they’ve become, and the belief that if a large-scale SETI search were mounted, it would produce results in short order seemed more than reasonable. It’s certainly what I believed at the time.
Reading Sagan’s book made the prospect of extraterrestrial intelligence not just accessible but thrillingly real. I was a graduate student in 1973, studying arcane medieval languages like Old Icelandic, Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, absolutely in love with the idea of re-creating a vanished past through words. I identified with Sagan not only because of my own long-standing interest in our place in the universe but also because he brought that same kind of passion to the study of space.
Passion was the ticket, and The Cosmic Connection was loaded with it. I can’t say it changed my life, because even as a kid I was obsessed with the questions it considers. But I know people whose life it and the later COSMOS series did change, people who went on to careers in various of the sciences because of the enthusiasm they gathered from Sagan’s work. On a broader scale, I know people who continued at their own careers in entirely other fields, but who retained a sense of the grandeur and awe of the universe that they first acquired by watching COSMOS or reading other Sagan books, particularly the absorbing Contact.
Back in 1973, I took my well-read copy of The Cosmic Connection around to my friends. We were, most of us, laboring in subjects far removed from the celestial, but the book got passed around, read, discussed at our innumerable coffee sessions in UNC-Chapel Hill’s Pine Room. It’s not as if we didn’t have other things to do, all of them on tight deadline. Now that’s skillful — to take subjects as vast as exobiology and astrophysics and render them with such transparent, supple style that amateurs like we all were then found ourselves excitedly weighing the prospects for other life in the cosmos, for missions to other stars. All of this while we were supposed to be parsing scribal errors in the Beowulf manuscript!
Making the technical accessible is one of the most difficult writing jobs there is. Sagan had the gift, but he coupled it with art (the exquisite designs of Lomberg), music, special effects, and photography from our space missions to create the classic COSMOS series. In a sense, his gift was more that of film director than writer, for a director works with a team, and not only with a script but with values of cinematography that transform written words into visual experience. His later books drew on the same values. No one in the cosmology game has equaled what Carl Sagan did with these tools, and it’s both humbling and empowering to remember how he used them on this eleventh anniversary of his death.
{ 25 comments… read them below or add one }
Not the point of this post but I think the whole “Great Silence” paradox is way overblown. Humanity has been transmitting on radio only for an infinitesimal amount of the total history of the universe.
Let’s presume we develop an alternate/ more advanced form of communication even within the next 500-1000 years (which certainly seems plausible). If a million civilizations throughout all time did the same thing we are still talking lottery odds that we’d be in the right place, at the right time, with the proper technology to detect one of them.
Am I the only one to find this a perfectly plausible (and more likely) scenario?
At 71, MIT Physicist is a Web star
New York Times, Dec. 19, 2007
Walter H. G. Lewin, 71, a physics professor who has long had a cult following at MIT, has now emerged as an international Internet guru with his videotaped physics lectures, free online on MIT’s OpenCourseWare.
MIT recently expanded its online classes by opening a site aimed at high school students and teachers.
Full article here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/19/education/19physics.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Rob, the situation you suggest is plausible. We’re already going silent in radio frequencies as we put more and more of our communications into cable and other technologies. That leaves other types of SETI via, for example, optical searches and who knows what else. Some of us, myself included, think intelligent life is extremely rare in the galaxy, but that’s little more than a guess at this point. I’d prefer to think you’re right, though it often seems to me that a Type III civilization should be detectable with the tools we currently have. And if there are no Type IIIs, the question becomes, why not?
Larry, I’m a great admirer of MIT’s move in open courseware, and I’m glad to know about Dr. Lewin’s lectures. I plan to take full advantage of these!
Carl Sagan’s ability to make an analytic subject so interesting is amazing. I think he had a rare mix of being a scientist plus an artist/philosopher. I still remember viewing Cosmos in the mid 1980′s when I was in high school; later, I got the Cosmos DVD’s and they are just amazing. Same with his “latest” book edited by Ann Druyan, “The Varieties of Scientific Experience, a personal view of the search for god”. It is worth a read, chapter 4 and 5 are devoted to (the search and implications) of Extraterrestrial Intelligence.
I’ve read quite a bunch of books from Paul Davies, David Grinspoon, Giancarlo Genta, and of course, Carl Sagan. I believe some day we will find evidence that life and ET Intelligence is widespread in the universe. I believe we are not unique, otherwise and quoting a famous movie: “it would be be a terrible waste of space”
Antonio, I assume from your message that the Giancarlo Genta book you’re referring to is his wonderful Lonely Minds in the Universe. I’m also a great admirer of David Grinspoon. Which of the Paul Davies books do you particularly recommend? I’ve read several, but he seems quite prolific!
Hello Paul,
Yes, P. Davies is quite prolific. I would recommend 3 books: “The 5th Miracle”, “Are We Alone?” And “The Mind of God”, in that order. What I like about Davies’ books is that he is clean, ideologically speaking.
As for Giancarlo Genta’s book, yes, I refer to Lonely Minds in the Universe. The book is OK to me, I would probably give it 3 starts in the Amazon scale. I found some sections too long and unfocused some times.
And for D. Grinspoon, yes, he is great. Even his family and Carl Sagan (as well as Isaac Asimov) were family friends, David disagrees on a couple of things with Carl, especially on the possible existence/presence of ET Intelligence in the Solar System, or even on earth.
As far as the Fermi Paradox… I suspect that we already have picked up very faint and non-repeatable signals, not beacons and not aimed at us, but due to scintillation. Perhaps we should abandodn the search for beacons and focus on a different radio frequency than the “watering hole” and it’s multiples. The most powerful signals that our K type 0.6 civilization sends out are the radar pulses to detect asteroids and map moons and planets surfaces. I do not know what frequencies our pulses are sent out at; to avoid the Earth’s atmosphere’s distortion we may have to put a radio telescope in orbit (or better yet the moon’s far side).
One thing to consider about the possibility of Type III civilizations in the Universe is our own history- it hasn’t been a steady, upward climb. Early man was nearly annihilated in the now-famous “bottleneck” genetic study that revealed there were only about 10,000 homo sapiens left after a supervolcano eruption in Indonesia some 75,000 years ago, and there have been a number of other natural as well as man-made dark ages that have periodically impeded human progress. Extrapolating the same unfortunate circumstances to alien civilization, it’s possible that Type III civilizations are *extremely* rare or even nonexistent. The high level of scientific knowledge, technical ability and long-term sociological “steady state” required to achieve and maintain a Type III might be such an odd occurrence in the Universe that for most civilizations, it remains forever out of reach- a tantalizing, elusive goal constantly thwarted by circumstances, either beyond their control or of their own making. There’s also the possibility that if we do find a Type III, what we’re observing is its remnants, with either nobody home due to some catastrophe, or its remaining occupants de-evolved to a point that they no longer fully comprehend the astonishing achievements of their ancient ancestors, alien squatters whose knowledge has descended into myths and legends shared around alien campfires.
Just something to consider.
stargazerdude
seti claims the ATA-350 array will be able to detect signals like that out to 1000 light years.
According to this Web page piece written by Ann Druyan:
http://anndruyan.typepad.com/the_observatory/2007/12/20-december-200.html
“One such effort, his 1980 “Cosmos” television series, has
now been seen by a billion people worldwide. Parts of it will
be broadcast in North America at 8 pm EST on Christmas Day
on the Discovery Science Channel. On Tuesday evenings at 9
pm EST, starting January 8, 2008 the whole series will begin to
run again. “Cosmos’” enduring world-wide appeal is another
testament to his prophetic vision.”
I loved that book. I recently re-read it and posted a review here:
http://texasbestgrok.mu.nu/archives/227924.php
A sequel to Cosmos is in the works:
http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/12/20/528690.aspx
fred ljk – i have read cosmos twice also and own the dvd’s which i have watched quite afew times!! a sequel!!!??? like to know more kinda doubt it could be as good ESPECIALLY without carl sagan!!!!!!!! thank you your friend george
Proposed Carl Sagan commemorative stamps unveiled
at Ithaca Sciencenter
By Anne Ju
A movement to immortalize famed Cornell astronomer
Carl Sagan with a U.S. postage stamp was launched
Feb. 11 for local media at the Ithaca Sciencenter.
Patrick Fish, founder of the Utica-based grassroots Sagan
Appreciation Society, and Charles Trautmann, executive
director of the Sciencenter, unveiled four renderings by
three artists or artist teams of proposed Sagan memorial
stamps that the society plans to submit to the U.S. Postal
Service for commissioning.
“As Carl was America’s science popularizer, it seems fitting
that he be bestowed with a populist kind of honor,” Fish said.
“Carl wasn’t just an astronomer, physicist and the world’s
pre-eminent science teacher. He was arguably the first
exobiologist, one of the fathers of global-warming awareness,
a peacemaker and a brilliant author who could make science
sound like poetry.”
Trautmann read a statement by Sagan’s widow, author Ann
Druyan, at the media launch. She described how Sagan had
been an avid stamp collector as a boy and how that interest
was perhaps early evidence of his “passion for the diversity
of Earth’s cultures.”
Full article here:
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/Feb08/sagan.stamps.aj.html
ljk,a stamp for carl sagan? great idea!! you know who reminds me of dr sagan today? neil degrasse tyson the black gentleman who runs the hyden planetarium.he also appears with great regularity on the new series universe. i have had the honor of exchanging e mails with him twice,he is a great guy! if they need somebody to be the voice of the new cosmos series i think he would be the logical choice.thank you,your friend george
Hi ljk;
This is an interesting article. My Dad was an avid Postage Stamp collector and a stamp dealer as his second retirement career right up until the time of his death. He always liked artistic commemorative type stamps and would no doubt find these Carl Sagan stamps beautiful. As a result of his postage stamp activities, I had found an appreciation for fine commemorative modern postage stamps and although so many were produced so that they are not worth much, they are none-the-less often beautiful works of art.
Thanks;
Your Friend Jim
In the Orion’s Arm realm around one Dyson Shell is a
Jupiter Brain named after Carl Sagan:
http://www.orionsarm.com/downloads/sagan.jpg
The Lewin physics lectures
Walter Lewin has been teaching physics at MIT since 1972.
He employs large doses of fun with large-scale demonstrations
in his classes. These include charging himself using a Vandergraph
generator, and swinging from the end of a giant pendulum. He also
employs practical jokes and puzzles. As well as mention in The New
York Times 100 of Walter Lewin’s lectures can be found online.
Full transcript here:
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/scienceshow/stories/2008/2234064.htm
Carl Sagan’s companion book to Cosmos is online here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/3573701/Carl-Sagan-Cosmos
In 1977, John Denver guest hosted NBC’s The Tonight Show.
One of his guests was Carl Sagan:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qho15vV3Lz8
The science of talking so people want to listen
June 19, 2009 | 8:45 am
If you study high-energy particle physics, the importance and excitement of neutrinos is obvious. But how do you convey that to an auditorium of students, a member of Congress, or your neighbor?
If you’re Michael Turner, a University of Chicago astrophysicist, you borrow a plot line from the classic Christmas movie, It’s a Wonderful Life. “What if neutrinos had never existed?” Turner asked in a recent public outreach lecture. Then he showed the audience a world without the subatomic particles, just as the movie showed life minus the main character George Bailey.
“No neutrinos,” Turner said. “That means no atoms, no Earth, and no us.”
Connecting science to everyday experiences in jargon free terms is key to science outreach, something Turner excels at doing. He shared his insights and tips from more than a decade worth of talks with scientists at Fermilab’s annual Users’ Meeting this month.
The meeting featured a special Outreach Workshop with talks to help scientists adjust to a changing climate that requires every scientist be able to explain the value of research in language a banker with no science background would understand.
Full article here:
http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/breaking/2009/06/19/the-science-of-talking-so-people-want-to-listen/
To quote:
“What we do is intrinsically interesting and important,” Turner said. “You have to work hard to make it boring.”
Heaven’s Touch
From Killer Stars to the Seeds of Life, How We Are Connected to the Universe
James B. Kaler
To read the entire book description or a sample chapter, please visit:
http://press.princeton.edu/titles/8991.html
Did you know that as you read these words showers of high-speed particles from exploding stars are raining down on you? As you gaze into the starry sky, you might feel isolated from the Universe around you–but you’re not. This book reveals the startling ways life on Earth is touched by our cosmic environment, and demonstrates why without such contact, life itself wouldn’t be possible.
Carl Sagan excerpts from Cosmos episodes set to music:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2009/10/14/autotuned-sagan/
Oddly enough, it works.
At Home in the Cosmos with Annie Druyan
In more entertainment news, CSI fellow, SKEPTICAL INQUIRER contributor, and Carl Sagan’s last wife Ann Druyan has a new video podcast available, detailing intimate accounts of her life with Carl Sagan.
At Home in the Cosmos with Annie Druyan includes reflections on Druyan’s and Sagan’s childhoods, the story of an unmade version of the film Contact, a show and tell of important personal objects from the couple’s home, a never-before-seen video tour of Sagan’s archives, and graveside footage of Druyan discussing her own philosophy on life and death.
http://www.podjockey.com/members/cosmos/