Take a photo of a barcode or cover
jkanownik 's review for:
The Demon-Haunted World
by Carl Sagan
Worth reading despite the fact that it was a little disappointing. It goes on too long in parts and leaves many bare threads towards the end. High expectations were created by the prescient quote ending in "...The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance”. There is great insight in connecting the angels and demons of history with the aliens of recent times. The connection is more powerful now that the alien noise has died down but that quote remains more salient than ever today. We see first hand the damage that can be done when science is ignored or misunderstood.
The more important message of the book is the need for "adequate reason, coherent argument and rigorous standards of evidence and honesty." Unfortunately the connection to democracy is only teased in the beginning and not fully formed at the end. That is the part of this book that sorely needs to be expanded upon today. After recently reading the work of Yuval Noah Harari and seeing Hamilton I am growing more concerned about the fracturing of logical thought from a majority into competing factions of minorities that struggle to maintain coherence. Sagan condemns in this book the same Alien and Sedation Acts that Hamilton strongly supported. Sagan's strong support of democracy also goes against the republic structure that Hamilton and many founding fathers believed in. The problem may not be "a complete dumbing down of America." Rather, it is the inability of logical incoherence to provide unifying leadership and direction for the future. To solve that problem we need more than a candle.
The more important message of the book is the need for "adequate reason, coherent argument and rigorous standards of evidence and honesty." Unfortunately the connection to democracy is only teased in the beginning and not fully formed at the end. That is the part of this book that sorely needs to be expanded upon today. After recently reading the work of Yuval Noah Harari and seeing Hamilton I am growing more concerned about the fracturing of logical thought from a majority into competing factions of minorities that struggle to maintain coherence. Sagan condemns in this book the same Alien and Sedation Acts that Hamilton strongly supported. Sagan's strong support of democracy also goes against the republic structure that Hamilton and many founding fathers believed in. The problem may not be "a complete dumbing down of America." Rather, it is the inability of logical incoherence to provide unifying leadership and direction for the future. To solve that problem we need more than a candle.