Just started reading this finally, after having it staring at me at the top of my book pile for a couple months.
31 pages in, and it's already excellent.
Sagan's already essentially made all the points I have on this blog about the dangers of superstition and credulity, and the importance of science in just the first couple chapters.
I suppose I could have saved a lot of typing by just telling people "read Demon Haunted World", but, you tell people to read books, they more often than not don't.
Or, they pull "*sneer* yeah, you tell me to read some book, rather than have anything to say in your own words", like that's some upper-hand giving argument.
Well, I said it all in my own fucking words.
So shaddap.
But Sagan is better.
Read "Demon Haunted World".
Dammit.
CBS Cancels “CSI: Vegas,” “Todd”
2 hours ago
9 comments:
That is an EXCELLENT book. One of my all-time favorites.
Sagan could get his point across effortlessly. What a loss when he died.
Previous comment(s) [not quite sure what happened there, I thought there was only one] of mine deleted for crass spelling error reasons...
Anyway...
As so sadly often, I have, alas, posted in haste here: I also meant to say in relation to your:
Well, I said it all in my own f***ing words:
Yes you did, and, furthermore, quite marvellously so, too...
Hooray!
Mark_W
Hmm...I seem to have deleted too many comments. The first one was agreeing with MattR and Lanz about how great, and what a sad loss, Sagan was...
Mark_W
*Sigh* posting drunk again eh?...
(Pasted from my e-mail notice)
Yes, you (and MattR and Lanz) are quite right, Demon Haunted World is (to quote Keats) a thing of beauty, and, therefore, a joy forever...
Like Sagan's life itself, in fact...
Mark_W
*Sigh* posting drunk again eh?... .
Alas, at least to some extent, I fear so. I actually have a post-it note on my computer which reminds me that an electronic "opening port" notification is, in fact, not an instruction to start drinking, but there are occasions, in and out, when I find it rather too easy to ignore, unfortunately...
:-)
Mark_W
I read "The Demon-Haunted World" a long time before I got to Dawkins' stuff. I thought that it wasn't so much mind-blowing as more a rational call to reason in the face of increasing superstition and pseudoscience.
Then Dawkins came along and "The God Delusion" blew away any left-over questions I had on faith. Maybe Sagan didn't go far enough in tackling the superstitious foundations of religion, but I loved the way he described the world's wonders when viewed through the lens of science.
No need for fairies in the garden then :)
Post a Comment