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by Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Ballantine Books (1997-02-25)
ISBN: 0345409469
EAN: 9780345409461
Dewy Decimal #: 001.9
Paperback: 480 pages
Release Date: 1997-02-25
SKU: 092108001
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: ...no markings or highlighting...
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
"A glorious book . . . A spirited defense of science . . . From the first page to the last, this book is a manifesto for clear thought."
*Los Angeles Times
"POWERFUL . . . A stirring defense of informed rationality. . . Rich in surprising information and beautiful writing."
*The Washington Post Book World
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.
"COMPELLING."
*USA Today
"A clear vision of what good science means and why it makes a difference. . . . A testimonial to the power of science and a warning of the dangers of unrestrained credulity."
*The Sciences
"PASSIONATE."
*San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle
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Amazon.com Review
Carl Sagan muses on the current state of scientific thought, which offers him marvelous opportunities to entertain us with his own childhood experiences, the newspaper morgues, UFO stories, and the assorted flotsam and jetsam of pseudoscience. Along the way he debunks alien abduction, faith-healing, and channeling; refutes the arguments that science destroys spirituality, and provides a "baloney detection kit" for thinking through political, social, religious, and other issues.
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Customer Reviews
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Sagan is one of the greatest of Americans
Rating  (5)
Date: 2008-11-10
Carl Sagan's love for science and for rational thought, expressed in this work and in many others is downright infectious. Critical thinking is one of mankind's greatest assets and this work should be required reading for every English speaking person who wants to understand the world not as an unconnected series of mystical events, but rather as a part of an understandable, rational universe.
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Don't believe Fundamentalist Propaganda!
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-11-03
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Reading Sagan's book made me realize the loss I'd suffered in not exploring it sooner. When I was a fundamental Christian (for far too long), Sagan was called "Carl SATAN" in our churches and we were gleefully told from the pulpit how he's writhing in Hell right now. Of course, this is nonsense; may rest in peace while the treasure of reason he left endure the test of time.
When one actually reads the book, you find that Sagan has respect and understanding for religious beliefs...he simply lets the facts fall where they may and that makes fervent believers uneasy. One must ask himself why the truth would not be welcome in a belief system? Sagan, as the book title declares, merely uses sound thinking to illuminate ignorance, but he does not do it from a "high and mighty" viewpoint. Science has made mistakes as well, and he readily confesses this. But science improves with time while religion, and other mystic beliefs such as astrology, are hopelessly locked in the past.
The most liberating principle I take away from the read is that science, indeed, is not "God". It is a METHOD for determining truth and learning from the discovery process. He actually acknowledges how wonderful Heaven would be and that it may in fact exist...only that it's not provable and given observation, the odds of it are very low.
Sagan also touches upon other odd beliefs such as psychics, etc. as example of surrendering to illogical thought processes. This is a great tutorial on rational thinking and I strongly encourage everyone from teens on up to read it!
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Bland and uninspiring
Rating  (2)
Date: 2008-10-18
2 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
If you're already a hardened skeptic, skip this book. The book briefly touches on a number of topics that tend to suck in gullible people (e.g. aliens, crop circles), but is unlikely to provide any new material to anyone even minimally acquainted with the subjects.
Who is this book aimed at? As far as preaching to the choir, it's hopelessly boring and stale. Hoping to convert new people to the ideals of skepticism? Hardly. Even from that perspective, it's not terribly interesting or involving - there's no sense of great revelation here. Besides, are the people that *need* to be reading this book actually going to buy and read it? No.
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Skepticism as a tool to protect our freedoms
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-10-17
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
What is the biggest danger facing our society today? Here, Sagan presents a compelling argument that it is our failure to teach a proper appreciation for the scientific mindset, which combines a sense of curiosity and wonder with a strong dose of skepticism. Sagan attacks the credulity of our media in presenting a wide range of pseudo-sciences as having equal merit with the physical sciences, and argues that our schools are stripping our students of their love of learning and leaving them without the tools they need to properly evaluate problems they will face in life.
There is so much in this book that is interesting, but I found myself most drawn to Sagan's arguments that combination of curiosity and skepticism that define the mindset of a scientist are also important in maintaining a free society. Without these traits, people are likely to blindly follow any leader that tells them what they want to hear, surrendering freedoms along the way. It is only by carefully and skeptically evaluating what our leaders tell us that we can ensure that we protect ourselves from this trap.
This is a truly impressive book, one that should be read by everyone, especially those who don't appreciate the value of skepticism.
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A Classic About How Science Does (and Does Not) Work!
Rating  (4)
Date: 2008-10-17
Carl Sagan will most surely go down as one of the most poetic, and prolific, science popularizers of all time. This book, the last of his published before his death, is a brilliant enconium to science, and warning against pseudoscience.
The book can be divided into three seperate "sections": the first part of the book focuses on exploring all types of pseudoscience and showing how its proclomations are sloppy when compared with the scientific method. the second section focuses more on explaining how science works, and how we can use its method in our everyday lives. The third section is a warning against the "anti-intellectual" trend in schools, and cautions us to teach students from an early age the virtue of asking questions, being skeptical, and being innovative.
If the first "section" of the book - that debunking pseudoscience - had been written in the past five years, it most surely would have concentrated on psychics and clairvoyants. This pseudoscience has witnessed a great popularity of late. As it was written in 1995/96, however, Sagan's focus is primarily on the then-in-vogue pseudoscience of UFO's and belief in extra-terrestrial existence. While this makes the book feel somewhat dated (as beilef in ET is far less prevalent today), Sagan does a GREAT job walking us through the sloppy thinking involved, and why ET is not a sceince.
Sagan's focus on debunking psueodscientific belief in ET is also an interesting choice because Sagan was somewhat of a sympathizer with belief in ET. He certainly thought it was possible, and spent a large part of his career advocating the search for life on other planets. He is not railing against belief in ET, but hasty belief in ET without good evidence.
The section "section" of the book consists of one of the best explanations of the scientific process and how sceince works that I have ever seen outside of the abstruse philosophy of science texts. This is where the real "money is made," and one criticism I have of the book is that, as strong as this section is, it may have made more sense to put this section first and the excoriation of pseudoscience after.
Two chapters stand out from this section of the book. First, there is "The fine art of baloney detection," where Sagan lays down the "rules" of science - rules that, when followed, make it near impossible for bad "science" to make it through the steps of the scientific method. The second stand-out chapter is, "The marriage of skepticism and wonder," a philosophical reflection on the seeming conflict between sceintists' needs to be creative and accepting of new ideas, and scientists' need to stay conservative and skeptical. The best they can do, it seems, is to remind themselves of the necessity of both mindsets, so that if they find themselves favoring the one too much, they can quickly temper it. (Sagan does suggest, though, that a scientist is better off too skeptical than too gullible.)
Teh third "section," about the "anti-intellectual" trend in education and culture - is somewhat lackluster, probably because we have heard it so many times since 1996. It is hard to disagree with many of Sagan's conclusions, but as an astronomer, one does feel that Sagan steps far outside of his specialty. (I am a high school educator, and while I agree with many of Sagan's points, one cannot see some of them as completely unworkable. A science class relying exclsuively on lab experiments CAN lead to "hands on, minds off." I have seen it. One needs ot memorize facts in order to know waht to extract from labs.)
There are only a few criticisms I have of this book. First, as I mention earlier, the book may have done better by explaining what science is before excoriating things that are not sceince. Second, the book is quite meandering at times, and while Sagan may start a chapter talking about x, he often ends talking about z. This gets annoying over several hundred pages, and leads to an unfocused approach. Lastly, there are so many chapters dealing with the same or similar themes (many chapters on belief in UFO's, a few on belief in first-hand testimony), that the book suffers from a bit of redundancy at times.
Other than these, I whole-heartedly reccomend this book to anyone who wants to read a sparkling explanation of what science is, why it is important (albeit imperfect, like anything else), and why straying from it is always a risk.
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by Carl Rider
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Piatkus Books (1988-09-30)
ISBN: 0861887751
EAN: 9780861887750
Hardcover: 176 pages
SKU: 071608060
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: ...some slight shelf wear.......No noticeable Underlining or Highlighting...
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Astrologer and psychic expert Carl Rider gives simple guidelines and teach-yourself exercises for successful psychic development, including clairvoyance, dream experiments, supernatural perception and telling fortunes.
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by Carl Rider
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Piatkus Books (1988-09-30)
ISBN: 0861887751
EAN: 9780861887750
Hardcover: 176 pages
SKU: 071608060
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: ...some slight shelf wear.......No noticeable Underlining or Highlighting...
More Product Infomation
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Astrologer and psychic expert Carl Rider gives simple guidelines and teach-yourself exercises for successful psychic development, including clairvoyance, dream experiments, supernatural perception and telling fortunes.
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