Leggere Sagan è - mutatis mutandis - come leggere Montaigne: in mezzo allo sfacelo del mondo, alla disfatta dell'Homo Sapiens Sapiens, ci si rende conto di come, quando possono esistere persone così, ci sia ancora qualche speranza di riscatto, una salvezza forse ancora possibile, una candela accesa che taglia il buio. ( )

Have you ever read something that filled you with such furvor that you wanted to write your own thoughts along those same lines, but whenever you tried you found you did nothing but repeat the original article?

That's been me all over the place with The Demon-Haunted World. I want to ramble about the wonder of science, the importance of skepticism, the fact that school all but completely robbed me of any desire to learn, the dangers of pseudoscience, the intrinsic value of basic research even if it doesn't lead to a specific application right away...but Sagan says it all, and he says it better than I ever could. This is one of those amazing books that made me think long and hard about a lot of things. It made me want to know more about the universe, to revisit old assumptions and condescensions, to step back a moment and drink it all in.Sagan speaks as one with a giddy love for the scientific process, one whose healthy skepticism does not make him stodgy or closed to new ideas. Much of the first half of the book is spent more or less on aliens - not only explanations for much of what is attributed to extraterrestrial activity, but why people assume aliens at all. He does grump a little about the dumbing-down of American entertainment and its lack of accurate science, but coming from someone who prizes knowledge so highly, I can understand his disappointment at the popularity of shows like "Beavis & Butthead" and "Dumb & Dumber." Likewise his unhappiness with dwindling popular and government support of science research and education.

This book is absolutely astounding. It's one of the few that I recommend to anyone, even (and perhaps especially) if it challenges some of your closely held viewpoints. It did mine. ( )

Excellent book! It is fun to read Sagan's view on how (and why) people believe different things. Very well written and filled with interesting ideas! Now I just want to read a good novel!!!!!!!!!!! ( )

Carl Sagan does a great job explaining how science works and why some beliefs (such as alien abductions) may have other foundations than commonly accepted. His writing is easy to understand for the non-scientist, but good for the scientist as well. ( )

Within 50 pages I wanted to buy a copy for everyone I know. Sagan explains why I love science perfectly.I wish there were half stars. This is definitely a 4.5. I dropped it from a 5 just because I think some of it reads a little smug/condescending which kind of defeats the purpose of persuasion and popularization. But I also took a bunch of notes from it. ( )