This is my second year for the Carl Sagan Blogathon.
In fact, it’s the second year for the Blogathon itself.
Yay, I got in on the ground floor!
December 20th, 2007 is the 11th anniversary of Carl Sagan’s death. It is also the 10th anniversary of the release of “Contact”, the science-fiction flick based on Carl Sagan’s only work of fiction. Sadly, the astronomer did not live to see the debut of the film.
I have a confession to make; I have never read “Contact”. When the novel first came out, in 1985, Dr. Sagan was at a peak of his popularity, and I had long been a fan of his pop science books and of “Cosmos”, the television series he created. But for some reason, the idea of this man of science writing genre fiction did not sit well with me.
Don’t think that I was above reading sci-fi. Not at all. I read it. It was most of what I read, if by “most” you mean “99.9993%”. Larry Niven was my fav, if I recall correctly.
But could an actual scientist write a good story?
Little did I know that science and the pursuit of science lends itself particularly well to crafting a good story. There are so many scientists who write, I am now well aware. And, in fact, I was even aware of those authors back in 1985: Isaac Asimov, who was a professor of biochemistry at Boston University. Arthur C. Clarke. a mathematician and physicist. Rudy Rucker, a mathematician who taught at many schools, before retiring from San Jose State University.
The difference was, I knew them as authors first, and as scientists second.
Carl Sagan was always a scientist in my mind. And that meant that I never even considered his work of fiction, Contact.
So my first experience with Dr. Sagan’s gift for sincere, hopeful, human storytelling about relationships, was the Jody Foster movie. Seeing the character of Ellie Arroway butt heads with bureaucrats and politicians to try to get some science done, and seeing her fondness for her father, showed me a side of Carl Sagan I had not previously understood. Carl Sagan knew people, just as much as he seemed to know astrophysics.
After seeing “Contact”, I had a new-found appreciation of the book he co-authored with his wife, Ann Druyan, “Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors: A Search for Who We Are”, shows how compassionate and insightful an atheist could be towards the only species we know of that has evolved intelligence… and how close that species (us) is to the rest of life on this planet.
Re-reading “Dragons of Eden” after seeing “Contact” only reinforced the view; Carl Sagan knew people. He knew the lows to which they could sink, and the heights to which they could rise. And he strove towards the latter. In public view, he was always positive, and cheerful, even when pointing out the terrible mistakes he saw humanity making.
And as I noted last year, Carl Sagan was able to admit his own mistakes and failings.
Carl Sagan is one of my intellectual heroes. This is not a sad day. Dr. Sagan’s legacy is that we should continue to reach for the stars.