"Sagan" as a Unit of Measurement

Carl Sagan was an American cosmologist, astronomer, and absolute tireless champion of the sciences in the public sphere. He was the author, co-editor, or editor of almost two dozen science books, and the host the award-winning 1980 television series Cosmos. Sagan was well known for his excitement in talking about science, especially cosmological issues, and would strongly enunciate the M sound in millions and the B sound in billions to emphasize just how big the numbers were and properly diff...

 The Seismograph is like the Spectroscope in Importance

Just as the spectroscope opened up a new astronomy by enabling the astronomer to determine some of the constituents of which distant stars are composed, so the seismograph, recording the unfelt motion of distant earthquakes, enables us to see into the earth and determine its nature with as great a certainty, up to a certain point, as if we could drive a tunnel through it and take samples of the matter passed through.

 Herschel's Heterodox Opinions

Laplace’s cool confidence in avowing atheistical sentiments was legendary. The story was told that after Napoleon had inspected a copy of Laplace’s Systéme du Monde, he challenged the astronomer about his beliefs. ‘Monsieur Laplace! Newton has frequently spoken of God in his book. I have already gone over yours, and I have not found His name mentioned a single time.’ To this Laplace made the magnificent and disdainful reply: ‘Citizen First Consul, I have no need of that hypothesis....

 Science Virtue and its Impact on History

So proud men have thought, in all walks of life, since Giordano Bruno was burned alive for his cosmology on the Campo de' Fiori in 1600. They have gone about their work simply enough. The scientists among them did not set out to be moralists or revolutionaries. William Harvey and Huygens, Euler and Avogadro, Darwin and Willard Gibbs and Marie Curie, Planck and Pavlov, practised their crafts modestly and steadfastly. Yet the values they seldom spoke of shone out of their work and entered their...