How can we make intelligent decisions about our increasingly technology-driven lives if we don’t understand the difference between the myths of pseudoscience and the testable hypotheses of science? Pulitzer Prize-winning author and distinguished astronomer Carl Sagan argues that scientific thinking is critical not only to the pursuit of truth but to the very well-being of our democratic institutions.
Casting a wide net through history and culture, Sagan examines and authoritatively debunks such celebrated fallacies of the past as witchcraft, faith healing, demons, and UFOs. And yet, disturbingly, in today's so-called information age, pseudoscience is burgeoning with stories of alien abduction, channeling past lives, and communal hallucinations commanding growing attention and respect. As Sagan demonstrates with lucid eloquence, the siren song of unreason is not just a cultural wrong turn but a dangerous plunge into darkness that threatens our most basic freedoms.

Dazzling...A feast. Absorbing and elegantly written, it tells of theorigins of life on earth, describes its variety and charaacter, and culminates in a discussion of human nature and teh complex traces ofhumankind's evolutionary past...It is an amazing story masterfully told.
FINANCIAL TIMES (LONDON)
World renowned scientist Carl Sagan and acclaimed author Ann Druyan have written a ROOTS for the human species, a lucid and riveting account of how humans got to be the way we are. It shows with humor and drama that many of our key traits--self-awareness, technology, family ties, submission to authority, hatred for those a little different from ourselves, reason, and ethics--are rooted in the deep past, and illuminated by our kinship with other animals. Astonishing in its scope, brilliant in its insights, and an absolutely compelling read, SHADOWS OF FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS is a triumph of popular science.

Jeune astronome convaincue de l'existence d'une vie extraterrestre intelligente, Ellie Arroway doit faire face au scepticisme de la communauté scientifique à l'égard du projet "Argus", un programme d'écoute spatiale installé au Nouveau-Mexique qu'elle et son équipe tentent par tous les moyens de sauver. Jusqu'au jour où leurs ordinateurs captent un message rationnel émis non pas depuis la Terre, mais depuis Véga, une lointaine étoile. Ellie se lance alors à coeur perdu dans son déchiffrage, pour découvrir qu'il s'agit des plans d'un véhicule censé permettre à des humains de voyager dans l'espace afin de rencontrer ceux qui nous les ont adressés. Or ces êtres
semblent à présent impatients d'établir le contact : ils nous surveillent depuis longtemps, et le moment est peut-être venu pour eux de nous juger...

On the 10th anniversary of his death, brilliant astrophysicist and Pulitzer Prize winner Carl Sagan's prescient exploration of the relationship between religion and science and his personal search for God. <br /><br /> Carl Sagan is considered one of the greatest scientific minds of our time. His remarkable ability to explain science in terms easily understandable to the layman in bestselling books such as <i>Cosmos</i>, <i>The Dragons of Eden</i>, and <i>The Demon-Haunted World</i> won him a Pulitzer Prize and placed him firmly next to Isaac Asimov, Stephen Jay Gould, and Oliver Sachs as one of the most important and enduring communicators of science. In December 2006 it will be the tenth anniversary of Sagan's death, and Ann Druyan, his widow and longtime collaborator, will mark the occasion by releasing Sagan's famous "Gifford Lectures in Natural Theology," <i>The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God</i>. <br /><br /> The chance to give the Gifford Lectures is an honor reserved for the most distinguished scientists and philosophers of our civilization. In 1985, on the grand occasion of the centennial of the lectureship, Carl Sagan was invited to give them. He took the opportunity to set down in detail his thoughts on the relationship between religion and science as well as to describe his own personal search to understand the nature of the sacred in the vastness of the cosmos. <br /><br /> <i>The Varieties of Scientific Experience</i>, edited, updated and with an introduction by Ann Druyan, is a bit like eavesdropping on a delightfully intimate conversation with the late great astronomer and astrophysicist. In his charmingly down-to-earth voice, Sagan easily discusses his views on topics ranging from manic depression and the possibly chemical nature of transcendance to creationism and so-called intelligent design to the likelihood of intelligent life on other planets to the likelihood of nuclear annihilation of our own to a new concept of science as "informed worship." Exhibiting a breadth of intellect nothing short of astounding, he illuminates his explanations with examples from cosmology, physics, philosophy, literature, psychology, cultural anthropology, mythology, theology, and more. Sagan's humorous, wise, and at times stunningly prophetic observations on some of the greatest mysteries of the cosmos have the invigorating effect of stimulating the intellect, exciting the imagination, and reawakening us to the grandeur of life in the cosmos.

二十世紀最受歡迎的天文學家薩根博士，在《宇宙•宇宙》書中帶領我們搭乘各種飛船，橫跨宇宙的一百三十億年、地球的四十六億年、現代人類的三千年歷史，從德謨克利特、哥白尼、克卜勒、牛頓、惠更斯到愛因斯坦的創見，探訪人類科學與文明的發展歷程，再回溯地球生命的起源，更將視野擴展至恆星的生與死、星系的創生與舞動、直至宇宙的開展與變化，原來當宇宙中的原子與塵埃一次次轉化為星球之際，星球上的原子也緩慢演化成地球上繽紛美好的生命，當然包括我們人類在內。
因此，人類由宇宙中應運而生，我們應當更加珍惜生命與地球家園，而這趟時空之旅同時也是人類漫長悠遠的自我尋根之旅。本書之同名電視影集是全球最多人觀賞的公共電視節目之一，曾獲艾美獎等多項美國電視影集獎項，與本書同為天文科學普及教育的典範與里程碑。

“Fascinating . . . memorable . . . revealing . . . perhaps the best of Carl Sagan’s books.”—The Washington Post Book World (front page review)

In Cosmos, the late astronomer Carl Sagan cast his gaze over the magnificent mystery of the Universe and made it accessible to millions of people around the world. Now in this stunning sequel, Carl Sagan completes his revolutionary journey through space and time.

Future generations will look back on our epoch as the time when the human race finally broke into a radically new frontier—space. In Pale Blue Dot, Sagan traces the spellbinding history of our launch into the cosmos and assesses the future that looms before us as we move out into our own solar system and on to distant galaxies beyond. The exploration and eventual settlement of other worlds is neither a fantasy nor luxury, insists Sagan, but rather a necessary condition for the survival of the human race.

“Takes readers far beyond Cosmos . . . Sagan sees humanity’s future in the stars.”—Chicago Tribune

A Revelation of the Planet Venus in Fact and Fiction by Arthur C. Clarke - C.S. Lewis - Olaf Stapledon - Poul Anderson and many others.
The swirling clouds of mystery that cloak the planet Venus have exercised an unrivaled fascination for the most powerful imaginations of our day. Now at last their most dazzling flights have been gathered together.

Contents:

I. CLOUDED JUDGEMENTS
Destinies of the Stars by Svante Arrhenius
Last and First Men by Olaf Stapledon
Pirates of Venus by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Perelandra by C.S. Lewis

II. "VENUS IS HELL!"
Exploring the Planets by V.A. Firsoff
The Big Rain by Poul Anderson
Intelligent Life in the Universe by Carl Sagan

III. BIG SISTER
Escape to Venus by S. Makepeace Lott
Sister Planet by Poul Anderson
Before Eden by Arthur C. Clarke

IV. THE OPEN QUESTION
Some Mysteries of venus resolved by Sir Bernard Lovell
Dream of Distance by Anonymous
Venus Mystery for Scientists by John Davy

Pulitzer Prize-winning author and astronomer Carl Sagan imagines the greatest adventure of all—the discovery of an advanced civilization in the depths of space.

In December of 1999, a multinational team journeys out to the stars, to the most awesome encounter in human history. Who—or what—is out there? In Cosmos , Carl Sagan explained the universe. In Contact , he predicts its future—and our own.

In Cosmos , the late astronomer Carl Sagan cast his gaze over the magnificent mystery of the Universe and made it accessible to millions of people around the world. Now in this stunning sequel, Carl Sagan completes his revolutionary journey through space and time.

Future generations will look back on our epoch as the time when the human race finally broke into a radically new frontier—space. In Pale Blue Dot, Sagan traces the spellbinding history of our launch into the cosmos and assesses the future that looms before us as we move out into our own solar system and on to distant galaxies beyond. The exploration and eventual settlement of other worlds is neither a fantasy nor luxury, insists Sagan, but rather a necessary condition for the survival of the human race.

¿Estamos al borde de una nueva edad oscura de irracionalismo y superstición? En este libro conmovedor, el incomparable Carl Sagan demuestra con brillantez que el pensamiento científico es necesario para salvaguardar nuestras instituciones democráticas y nuestra civilización técnica. El mundo y sus demonios es el libro más personal de Sagan, y está lleno de historias humanas entrañables y reveladoras. El autor, con las experiencias de su propia infancia y la apasionante historia de los descubrimientos de la ciencia, muestra cómo el método del pensamiento racional puede superar prejuicios y supersticiones para dejar al descubierto la verdad, que, con frecuencia, resulta sorprendente.

Carl Sagan’s prophetic vision of the tragic resurgence of fundamentalism and the hope-filled potential of the next great development in human spirituality The late great astronomer and astrophysicist describes his personal search to understand the nature of the sacred in the vastness of the cosmos. Exhibiting a breadth of intellect nothing short of astounding, Sagan presents his views on a wide range of topics, including the likelihood of intelligent life on other planets, creationism and so-called intelligent design, and a new concept of science as “informed worship.” Originally presented at the centennial celebration of the famous Gifford Lectures in Scotland in 1985 but never published, this book offers a unique encounter with one of the most remarkable minds of the twentieth century.