Cosmos - Carl Sagan [5]
On a project of this magnitude it is impossible to thank everyone who has made a contribution. However, I would like to acknowledge, especially, B. Gentry Lee; the Cosmos production staff, including the senior producers Geoffrey Haines-Stiles and David Kennard and the executive producer Adrian Malone; the artists Jon Lomberg (who played a critical role in the original design and organization of the Cosmos visuals), John Allison, Adolf Schaller, Rick Sternbach, Don Davis, Brown, and Anne Norcia; consultants Donald Goldsmith, Owen Gingerich, Paul Fox, and Diane Ackerman; Cameron Beck; the KCET management, particularly Greg Andorfer, who first carried KCET’s proposal to us, Chuck Allen, William Lamb, and James Loper; and the underwriters and co-producers of the Cosmos television series, including the Atlantic Richfield Company, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the British Broadcasting Corporation, and Polytel International. Others who helped in clarifying matters of fact or approach are listed at the back of the book. The final responsibility for the content of the book is, however, of course mine. I thank the staff at Random House, particularly my editor, Anne Freedgood, for their capable work and their patience when the deadlines for the television series and the book seemed to be in conflict. I owe a special debt of gratitude to Shirley Arden, my Executive Assistant, for typing the early drafts of this book and ushering the later drafts through all stages of production with her usual cheerful competence. This is only one of many ways in which the Cosmos project is deeply indebted to her. I am more grateful than I can say to the administration of Cornell University for granting me a two-year leave of absence to pursue this project, to my colleagues and students there, and to my colleagues at NASA, JPL and on the Voyager Imaging Team.
My greatest debt for the writing of Cosmos is owed to Ann Druyan and Steven Soter, my co-writers in the television series. They made fundamental and frequent contributions to the basic ideas and their connections, to the overall intellectual structure of the episodes, and to the felicity of style. I am deeply grateful for their vigorous critical readings of early versions of this book, their constructive and creative suggestions for revision through many drafts, and their major contributions to the television script which in many ways influenced the content of this book. The delight I found in our many discussions is one of my chief rewards from the Cosmos project.
Ithaca and Los Angeles
May 1980
and July 1984
CHAPTER I
THE SHORES OF THE COSMIC OCEAN
The first men to be created and formed were called the Sorcerer of Fatal Laughter, the Sorcerer of Night, Unkempt, and the Black Sorcerer … They were endowed with intelligence, they succeeded in knowing all that there is in the world. When they looked, instantly they saw all that is around them, and they contemplated in turn the arc of heaven and the round face of the earth … [Then the Creator said]: “They know all … what shall we do with them now? Let their sight reach only to that which is near; let them see only a little of the face of the earth!… Are they not by nature simple creatures of our making? Must they also be gods?”
—The Popol Vuh of the Quiché Maya
The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually