Welcome to Litsy!

Fantastic book! Published in 1996 and it is still extremely relevant today. It is both comforting and terrifying that the same issues from 20+ years are issues we are dealing with today. Comforting because these issues are not new and people have long been pointing these issues out, terrifying because nothing is being done about them and things may start to fall apart. Yay.

Is Carl Sagan a scientist, author, or prophet? It's getting harder to tell the difference. This excerpt from a 1995 book by Carl Sagan & Ann Druyan #future

“If you grow up in a household where there are books, where you are read to, where parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, and cousins read for their own pleasure, naturally you learn to read. If no one close to you takes joy in reading, where is the evidence that it's worth the effort?” #cousin #QuotsyJul21

A must read

https://www.luulit.com/product/the-demon-haunted-world-science-as-a-candle-in-th...

How can we make intelligent decisions about our increasingly technology-driven lives if we don”t understand the difference between the myths of pseudoscience and the testable hypotheses of science?

Reading this next because I hope to read more non-fiction for the upcoming year.

[Quote not by Sagan, but I'm pretty sure he'd agree.]

“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we‘ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We‘re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It‘s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we‘ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.”

#screamathonphotochallenge @4thhouseontheleft
#Haunted

I thought I‘d try something a bit different for the #ChillingPhotoChallenge. Pick books I own in some format to answer each of the prompts....let‘s see how far I can get with that as my guide.

Up first: Haunted
Status: languishing in my TBR audio pile, I really should listen to it soon!

#Scarathlon
#TeamStoker @TheReadingMermaid

And if I‘ve read correctly, 1 pt

"I'm not superstitious, I'm just a little stitious." --Michael Scott

I like superstitions. I like science. I think the world is big enough for the two to coexist. I am a believer and a skeptic. It is possible to be both. Sidenote: this book is great.

#octoberxfiles #superstitions
@Cinfhen @Robothugs

“At the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes--an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counterintuitive they may be, and the most ruthless skeptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new. This is how deep truths are winnowed from deep nonsense.” #Skeptic #QuotsyOct18

“Casting a wide net through history and culture, Sagan examines and authoritatively debunks such celebrated fallacies of the past as witchcraft, faith healing, demons, and UFOs.” Sounds like a #monstermash of pseudoscience to me! (Recently purchased, still TBR.)

#octoberxfiles

.

Original pub in the 90s, the pleas for facts, scientific method, and science scholarship are timeless. I downloaded the audio because the narration duties are shared between Seth Macfarlane and Cary Elwes.

Sagan takes on many issues of pseudoscience, at times directly debunking, at other times suggesting the logical questions to ask that might lead to better conclusions. Alien abductions, UFOs, crop circles, fairies, etc.

#scienceseptember

This quote is feeling very relevant in today's United States.

This is the book that introduced me to the world of critical thinking. The chapter about Dr Sagan‘s “bullshit detector kit” is worth reading alone.

Science should be nurtured and healthy skepticism is important. Where I disagree with Mr Sagan is there are still many things people believe in that wether it is religiously based, supernatural or theories we just have not found the science or the proof. In the area of life forms outside our own I for one believe that we our not the only life forms out there. If anything it is a thought provoking if only your own beliefs.

There will never be another like Carl Sagan, and this is one of his best. #🔬 #emojimadness @Tiffy_Reads @JoeStalksBeck

The chief deficiency I see in the skeptical movement is its polarization: Us vs. Them — the sense that we have a monopoly on the truth; that those other people who believe in all these stupid doctrines are morons; that if you're sensible, you'll listen to us; and if not, to hell with you. This is nonconstructive. It does not get our message across. It condemns us to permanent minority status.

This book totally satisfied my Carl Sagan appetite.

The audiobook is awesome. It's narrated by Cary Elwes, who will always be Westley the Stable Boy to me! I could listen to him read the phone book and be happy. 😊

Just finished listening to @ReadingEnvy 093: Spewing Science. After listening to @JeffKoeppen talk about Carl Sagan I had to download and start listening to this immediately. I should be sleeping. 😴

So I saw this on Facebook and of course decided I must read this soon. I'm not sure why I haven't already came across this one before. Anyway, not much damage done $4.99 for the Kindle version. Must. Stop. Buying. Books. Who am I kidding? I'm gonna scroll Litsy for books to add to my already massive TBR...

Sagan was excellent at explaining the wonders of science to the masses. Some parts of this book are now a bit dated since in some chapters he uses data from the 80s and 90s; after all, it was written in the mid-90s, but it is still my favorite read / listen. To listen to this was a joy, with Cary Elwes reading most of the story, and Seth MacFarlane reading a few chapters as well. Ann Druyan read the introduction. Great, great narration.

A Candle in the Dark.

So many great quotes in this book. Words I live by.

My favorite book, just released in audiobook form with narration by Carl's widow, Ann Druyan, Seth MacFarlane, and Cary Elwes. Fantastic!

#truths #maybookflowers

A book that tells us why we need education, why we need to ask questions and why it's good to be skeptical. A little drawn out at times, but overall great information!

This read is rocky for me, but there are good passages.

The theologian Meric Casaubon argued—in his 1668 book, Of Credulity and Incredulity—that witches must exist because, after all, everyone believes in them. Anything that a large number of people believe must be true.

Although it‘s hard for me to see a more profound cosmic connection than the astonishing findings of modern nuclear astrophysics: except for hydrogen, all the atoms that make each of us up – the iron in our blood, the calcium in our bones, the carbon in our brains – were manufactured in red giant stars thousands of light years away in space and billions of years ago in time. We are, as I like to say, starstuff.

Pseudoscience speaks to powerful emotional needs that science often leaves unfulfilled

#Pseudoscience is easier to contrive than #science, because distracting confrontations with reality – where we cannot control the outcome of the comparison – are more readily avoided. The standards of argument, what passes for #evidence, are much more relaxed. In part for these same reasons, it is much easier to present pseudoscience to the general #public than science. But this isn‘t enough to explain its popularity.

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.

One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we‘ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We‘re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It‘s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we‘ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.

I look forward to this part of my day ❤️🤓💤

"It is morally as bad not to care whether a thing is true or not, so long as it makes you feel good, as it is not to care how you got your money as long as you have got it."

#truth

I finished Cosmos. I adore Sagan. He is a good influence. I stood and looked up at the moon for awhile tonight and thought how truly breathtaking it must be to stand on the moon and see the earth. Not just a picture of the earth from the moon, mind you-but to actually see it from that barren landscape, surrounded by darkness 😍or stars. I'm not sure which. The pictures always have black skies, but that might be because of the flash. 🤔

http://shelfjoy.com/shelfjoy/science-books-that-are-good-for-casual-reading

I found a bookish website! So many curated book lists by topic! I made my own shelf request at the bottom of the homepage. 😊📚

@Eggs

Books...permit us to interrogate the past with high accuracy; to tap the wisdom of our species; to understand the point of view of others, and not just those in power; to contemplate--with the best teachers--the insights, painfully extracted from Nature, of the greatest minds that ever were, drawn from the entire planet and from all of our history...Books are key to understanding the world and participating in a democratic society

This should be a compulsory read in all secondary schools.

It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness

I may need to re read this one. My Olympics time...