Carl Sagan

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. (Pale Blue Dot) ...

the value of science In 1955 Richard Feynman (1918-1988) had one essay, The Value of Science, published in Volume XIX of Engineering and Science. My favorite quote from Feynman is as follows: ** Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. ** Carl Sagan in his book, The demon-haunted world, said something similar: ...