To me, Dr. Sagan represents unbounded curiosity and a zeal for truth that combined with his ability to communicate complex ideas to lay people, made him much more than a national treasure, he was a human treasure.

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I've read many of Dr. Sagan's books and remember when Cosmos first aired on our PBS station and how much I looked forwared to each new episode. I treasure his books in my collection. When I first watched the movie "Contact" and the ending credits came up there was just two words on the screen, "For Carl". As I walked out of the theater I had to keep wiping away the tears. Dr. Sagan was one of the most articulate and passionate men of science in any century and most certainly this one. He opened up the minds of so many people to the sheer vastness and incredible beauty of the universe we live in. If our intellects are candles, Dr. Sagan is the match that lights the wick.

So we're going to see billions and billions of blog entries, yes? :)

Carl should've been included in the Star Trek The Next Generation Episode where Data is playing poker with Einstein, Newton and Hawking on the holodeck.

I read and watch everthing I can about the master.I can prove mathematically what is dark energy is and dark matter is,all I want is recognition.

Sagan first became an influential figure in my life in the summer after his death, when the grossly underrated film Contact hit the screens and as Pathfinder was exploring the strange Martian landscape. Carl had the amazing ability to present the mystery and wonder of the cosmos in a way that captured our hearts and imaginations like no scientist before him. He lauded the progress of our evolution as a species and gave us a bright vision of the future, while simultaneously reminding us of the dangers of self-destruction. Though he was a truly remarkable astronomer, he will be remembered for countless generations to come as a humanist above all else, whose words and depth of vision inspired scores of scientists around the world to look beyond our petty political and cultural differences and embrace the reality that only as one united race can we progress as a civilization beyond this pale blue dot, adrift in the cosmos.

Visionary,astronomer,scientist,humanist,writer and entertainer. I must admit that time has somewhat erased the emotional wonder of Carl Sagan; simply because he was of the 70's and 80's. A time when the moon landings were relatively recent events, high technology was in childhood and questions of the future of space and humanities place in it was a hot topic. Carl achieved a "pop-star" status and made his vision real. All high profile space explorations to date have been fashioned to this vision. May it all grow to the intended potential.

Condensing my tribute down to the essentials, Carl Sagan was simply one of those extremely rare indiduals who one can call a genuine genius. They occur every hundred years or so, but infrequently (unlike Carl) reach out to the man and woman in the street. He was (and still is) to science, what over 200 years ago Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart became to music. His legacy to the whole of mankind will be equal to the latter in its longevity.

How weird is this! I visit the CosmicLog most every day. I am at home reading Discover magazine's article about 25 best science books and see "The Cosmic Connection: An Extraterrestrial Perspective" by C.S. book listed, so I go onto eBay and buy a copy of the 1973 book. Then I come here and see this article about him. All in the course of an hour.

I only know Carl Sagan from the Cosmos series on television, through these programs I continue to be allowed to see the universe through eyes of understanding, awe and wonder.  His love and passion were transparent, and I became enamored with our existence in this miracle that is exploding, moving and changing at all times.

My amazement with the way he was able to explain, teach, and enliven my thoughts were a legacy unto its own.  That he has touched so many with his insights and gifts is as it was meant to be.  He found his purpose and he lived it well.

There are so many that have been touched by his insights, zeal and understanding, and the ripple of these will be felt throughout the unfolding of time as we know it, as those that follow will continue to ponder questions of the Cosmos.

22 years ago, I was a rebellious dropout and teen runaway.  As such, you can probably imagine how much I hated any and ALL notions of going back to school or to college to learn something from some authoritarian teacher.  I had only average grades and held a rather lackluster department store job.  In the backdrop of this was my childhood love for space science and documentaries like Cosmos, which I saw as a boy.

With no cable TV and only three channels of reception, I took to signing out Cosmos videotapes from the library.  To me it was nothing to pass the time playing each episode five or more times, only to repeat the process over again six months latter.  Maybe it was the hypnotic opening music that lured me in time and again, but there was just something so timeless and awe inspiring about what Carl said and how he said it.  To put it bluntly, I was hooked.  It was a passion!  

Although this was a very narrow focus unrelated to much of anything, “the desire to learn” still more about astronomy sparked one day when mom said—almost in passing—that our local college had an astronomy class…  in a heartbeat college no longer sounded like torture and I was enrolled the next day (at the age of 26).  

To my surprise, learning was not only fun, it was contagious.  I maintained a 3.8 GPA, was asked by professors to tutor for them, and ended up in a seven-year mainframe-programming career before even graduating!  An understandable miracle from the path I was on and all because of a simple and honest desire to learn astronomy.  Science—when presented passionately and with perspective—truly does have a power to inspire!  It keeps your mind active and fills your heart with hope, not endless—earthbound—negativity.  

As people cite its modest budget as being better spent on more earthy problems, I can’t help but think of how priceless hope and simple inspiration are.  After 3.5 billion years of evolution, shall we throw up our arms and say we care not for learning what’s out there?  Science is a contagious inspiration.  It affects us in ways we don’t even realize.  Carl’s take on it—his intuitive and timeless perspective—has been a guiding light throughout my life.  His fear of nuclear war…  His disappointment with our caretakership of earth…  The backdrop of history, which added still more perspective…  oh, and dare I forget that damn hypnotic opening music that would calm Godzilla into placidity…  whatever the magic was…  IT WORKED!

As a person who considers themselves a man of science, as well as a conservative and a Christian, I often felt myself at agreement and at odds with Dr. Sagan.  I loved the Cosmos series, it being full of everything I had interests in.

I agree with him on his views of the world’s religions, “the religions of works,” I call them, while I also agree with him that there is something greater than ourselves, and for me that is God.  Even though Sagan’s views were liberal, I yet oddly was in agreement with most of what he said, including everything he talked about with nuclear war, including his quote -

If we're willing to live with the growing likelihood of nuclear war, shouldn't we also be willing to explore vigorously every possible means to prevent nuclear war?

Which history tells us we did, with the great Ronald Reagan.

He also talked about how we were destroying the earth, which I can understand how he could see that.  Right along lines of his thinking of that there is something greater than ourselves,  people who think we are great enough to destroy the earth are putting themselves up there equal with God and, well, we are able to destroy like God?

You have to have a lot of faith to believe there is no God.

Carl Sagan even posed the challenge to unbelievers.  He had stated that if anyone doubts the existence of a higher being or creator all one had to do was look up at the night's sky filled with stars. Was it a random act or was it purposely designed and created by a superior intelligence, an infinite being we call God?

Carl Sagan also talked much of intelligent extraterrestrial life.  I foresee in perhaps the not too distant future us making contact with beings from another world, and wouldn’t it amaze everyone if they too did believe in God.

Carl Sagan had the ability as few intelligent people have to make the complex understandable.  And in some way, could even make a strict conservative like myself  understand the liberal politics he believed.  He may be gone in body, but he will live on with all of us forever.

Science and life's mysteries became an enigma to me thanks to Cosmos. I was a lucky one to be given a ticket into the theater of science, beliefs in highe power, and imagination. To this day, as an accomplished professional engineer, I try of unfold some new benefitial science of my own and give back to this blue dot floating in time and space. Thanks Carl for making my life a journey of discovery and mystery among the life and death of stars.

I was a student of Carl's at Harvard in the late 60's.  I first interviewed with Carl as a prospective Astronomy grad student in the late summer of 1965, and was admitted to the department in Sept 1966.  I took a course in Planetary Astronomy from Carl in 1968, and this led to writing 2 published papers with Carl as co-author, on the microwave spectrum of Venus.  When Carl was unceremoniously forced out of the Astronomy dept at Harvard, and left for Cornell (after which the rest is well documented history), I came very close to following.  But, I regret to admit, I decided to remain at Harvard, and ultimately received my PhD in Solar Physics, in 1972.

Carl was an outstanding professor and mentor, and I learned a great deal, studying with him while he was at Harvard

I was thinking about this a bit more and felt neglect not to mention Carl's strong advocation of "open and free inquiry?"  Ever see the Cosmos episode on 17th-century Holland and how they prospered with such an open society?

The scientific method almost reminds me of some Star Trek-like prime directive.  We dare not suppress an idea no matter how estranged it may be to us.  It's hard not to become rigid (or complacent) over time.  We essentially have to think we know it all (or alternately believe strongly in what we think).  Otherwise, we'd never bother to investigate in the first place.  That being said, "change" is probably the only real constant in the universe and invariably new and better ideas arise.  Even scientists are prone to not wanting to change, being bias, or not fully embracing good judgment (i.e. the recent Pluto/Charon planet de-classification which--to me--was an insult, biased, and a distasteful off-the-hip vote).

Society becomes so ingrained in its way of thinking that the Chinese actually had a way to tell if you had a good idea.  They said, the more that what you say makes others angry, the more you know your right!  Ha-ha!  This hints at how societies invariably become complacent over time and, therefore, agitated when confronted with change.  Einstein himself echoed this very same sentiment when he said, “If at first an idea is not considered absurd, it has no chance of succeeding,” which again shows how a complacent society often reacts to change.

Anyway... hope this adds to the debate.

Why was Carl "forced out of Harvard?" Who ever decided to do that must surely have regretted it later!

After my dad died in the summer of 2001, I picked up A Pale Blue Dot and began to read it throughout my first semester at college. His description of Voyager's view of Earth is something I will never forgot. "The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena...think of all those rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot."

It certainly puts you in your place, we're all in it together. When people begin to understand the connections between each other and the world, things will be much better for us all.

Carl Sagan graduated from Rahway High School in 1951, as did my sister, while I graduated the year later, so we both knew him, but my sister more than I. His brilliance even then was obvious. However brilliant, however, he was human and subject to human error as witnessed by his signing my sister's yearbook on her picture rather than his. Years later he corrected the mistake by signing over his own picture, so my sister has the only year book in the universe signed over both pictures.

My lifelong thanks to the man who first piqued my interest in Astronomy and all of science with "Cosmos" and whose "Dragons of Eden" opened up the universe more fully for me. Gone but never forgotten, I have quoted Dr. Sagan in every paper I ever wrote in college as there was always a relevancy to any subject in his work.

On a somewhat humorous note, when Carl said, "we should be willing to explore vigorously every possible means to prevent nuclear war?”  I kind of don't think he had Ronald Reagan in mind...  I actually just watched this very moving episode again and I feel very small in my ability to help humanity avert such disasters.  Much like with any disaster, being more self-sufficient on a very local level can and would certainly help.  Having studied warfare, I've tried to tell myself that not all such weapons would be used (as there are backups to backups) and tactical weapons might never be fired in a global conflict.  Ultimately I am a very defensive person who'd rather air on the side of caution.  I'd like to see society aptly braced for ANY and ALL such potential disasters with a robust undertow of disaster response systems in place: not static/immobile bunkers but dynamic and highly capable systems that allow us to pick up the pieces before things get really bad.  

I'd love to see the UN restructured so that no member has a veto power.  And--despite my long-term dislike for the idea--I think there might be a place for an "international" Star Wars anti-missile system.  I also hold out strong hope that the European Union will provide not only stability but also the technology we well need to confront the challenges that lie ahead.  Their experiment in unity is probably the most positive step towards peace I’ve seen even more so than the end of the cold war itself.  

I grew up with Carl Sagan and Johnny Carson; I remember going to college and doing my study at night while watching the Johnny and Carl. I became an avid science aficionado and even though my professional carrer does not involve science, Mr. Sagan's clear explanations of complicated issues made me open my horizons. I wonder if after Johnny's death last year, they have met to compare notes!

We get tired of continuous Bush Bashing and negative reporting.  I have seen a video on this computer that shows our fighting men as winning - something never reported on News TV.

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