The Demon-Haunted World_ Science as a Candle in the Dark - Carl Sagan [163]
I hold that popularization of science is successful if, at first, it does no more than spark the sense of wonder. To do that, it is sufficient to provide a glimpse of the findings of science without thoroughly explaining how those findings were achieved. It is easier to portray the destination than the journey. But, where possible, popularizers should try to chronicle some of the mistakes, false starts, dead ends and apparently hopeless confusion along the way. At least every now and then, we should provide the evidence and let the reader draw his or her own conclusion. This converts obedient assimilation of new knowledge into personal discovery. When you make the finding yourself - even if you’re the last person on Earth to see the light - you never forget it.
As a youngster, I was inspired by the popular science books and articles of George Gamow, James Jeans, Arthur Edding-ton, J.B.S. Haldane, Julian Huxley, Rachel Carson and Arthur C. Clarke - all of them trained in, and most of them leading practitioners of science. The popularity of well-written, well-explained, deeply imaginative books on science that touch our hearts as well as our minds seems greater in the last twenty years than ever before, and the number and disciplinary diversity of scientists writing these books is likewise unprecedented. Among the best contemporary scientist-popularizers, I think of Stephen Jay Gould, E.O. Wilson, Lewis Thomas and Richard Dawkins in biology; Steven Weinberg, Alan Lightman and Kip Thorne in physics; Roald Hoffmann in chemistry; and the early works of Fred Hoyle in astronomy. Isaac Asimov wrote capably on everything. (And while requiring calculus, the most consistently exciting, provocative and inspiring science popularization of the last few decades seems to me to be Volume I of Richard Feynman’s Introductory Lectures on Physics.) Nevertheless, current efforts are clearly nowhere near commensurate with the public good. And, of course, if we can’t read, we can’t benefit from such works, no matter how inspiring they are.
I want us to rescue Mr ‘Buckley’ and the millions like him. I also want us to stop turning out leaden, incurious, uncritical and unimaginative high school seniors. Our species needs, and deserves, a citizenry with minds wide awake and a basic understanding of how the world works.
Science, I maintain, is an absolutely essential tool for any society with a hope of surviving well into the next century with its fundamental values intact - not just science as engaged in by its practitioners, but science understood and embraced by the entire human community. And if the scientists will not bring this about, who will?
20
House on Fire*
{* Written with Ann Druyan.}
The Lord [Buddha] replied to the Venerable Sariputra: ‘In some village, city, market town, country district, province, kingdom, or capital there lived a householder, old, advanced in years, decrepit, weak in health and strength, but rich, wealthy, and well-to-do. His house was a large one, both extensive and high, and it was old, having been built a long time ago. It was inhabited by many living beings, some two, three, four, or five hundred. It had one single door only. It was thatched with straw, its terraces had fallen down, its foundations were rotten, its walls, matting-screens, and plaster were in an advanced state of decay. Suddenly a great blaze of fire broke out, and the house started burning on all sides. And that man had many young sons, five, or ten, or twenty, and he himself got out of the house.
‘When that man saw his own house ablaze all around with the great mass of fire, he became afraid and trembled, his mind became agitated, and he thought to himself: “I, it is true, have been competent enough to run out of the door, and to escape from my burning house, quickly and safely, without being touched