Cosmos - Carl Sagan [4]
Because science is inseparable from the rest of the human endeavor, it cannot be discussed without making contact, sometimes glancing, sometimes head-on, with a number of social, political, religious and philosophical issues. Even in the filming of a television series on science, the worldwide devotion to military activities becomes intrusive. Simulating the exploration of Mars in the Mohave Desert with a full-scale version of the Viking Lander, we were repeatedly interrupted by the United States Air Force, performing bombing runs in a nearby test range. In Alexandria, Egypt, from nine to eleven A.M. every morning, our hotel was the subject of practice strafing runs by the Egyptian Air Force. In Samos, Greece, permission to film anywhere was withheld until the very last moment because of NATO maneuvers and what was clearly the construction of a warren of underground and hillside emplacements for artillery and tanks. In Czechoslovakia the use of walkie-talkies for organizing the filming logistics on a rural road attracted the attention of a Czech Air Force fighter, which circled overhead until reassured in Czech that no threat to national security was being perpetrated. In Greece, Egypt and Czechoslovakia our film crews were accompanied everywhere by agents of the state security apparatus. Preliminary inquiries about filming in Kaluga, U.S.S.R., for a proposed discussion of the life of the Russian pioneer of astronautics Konstantin Tsiolkovsky were discouraged—because, as we later discovered, trials of dissidents were to be conducted there. Our camera crews met innumerable kindnesses in every country we visited; but the global military presence, the fear in the hearts of the nations, was everywhere. The experience confirmed my resolve to treat, when relevant, social questions both in the series and in the book.
Science is an ongoing process. It never ends. There is no single ultimate truth to be achieved, after which all the scientists can retire. And because this is so, the world is far more interesting, both for the scientists and for the millions of people in every nation who, while not professional scientists, are deeply interested in the methods and findings of science. So, while there is little in the Cosmos book that has become obsolete since its first publication, there have been many significant new findings.
The Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft encountered the Saturn system and uncovered a host of wonders concerning the planet, its intricate ring system, and its swarm of attendant satellites. Perhaps most interesting of these is Titan, which is now known to have an atmosphere rather like that of the primitive Earth, a dense haze layer composed of complex organic molecules, and perhaps a surface ocean of liquid hydrocarbons. A range of observations have recently been made of rings of debris surrounding young stars. These rings may be in the process of coagulating into new planetary systems, and suggest that planets may be overwhelmingly abundant among the stars of the Milky Way galaxy. Life has been found unexpectedly nibbling on sulfur compounds in very high temperature vents on the Earth’s ocean floor. New evidence has accumulated suggesting that comets are periodically sprayed into the inner solar system, triggering the extinction of many species on Earth. Great regions of intergalactic space have been uncovered that seemingly are depleted in galaxies. New and important components of the universe bearing on the question of its ultimate fate have been suggested.
And the pace of discovery continues. Spacecraft of Japan, of the European Space Agency, and of the Soviet Union are scheduled to intercept Halley’s Comet in 1986. The U.S. Space Telescope, the largest orbiting observatory ever attempted, is scheduled to be launched before the end of the decade. Important opportunities for spacecraft missions to Mars, to other comets, to asteroids, and to Titan are emerging. The U.S. Galileo spacecraft, scheduled to arrive in the Jupiter system in 1988, is