In my daily journey through the Internet, in my usual visit to the excellent blog of "Luis Alfonso Gámez" I remembered something I had heard several days ago an article of Javier Armentia: today, Carl Sagan, would have turned 70 years old, born prematurely did not tell leukemia 8 years ago.
On this day 70 years ago saw the light a singular figure, Carl Sagan.
Excellent communicator, had it not been for their active dissemination of science, probably would not have marked both. Many critics have said the figure was a scientist just mediocre. Great mistake.
A personality like his, which he displayed a prodigious scholarship, could not be a bad scientist. Sagan
be considered, with permission of Eugene Shoemaker, a parent of what is now known as planetary science. Committed to the scientific exploration of space from the very beginning of the space race, driving the Mars program, a student of the climate of Venus, the first to propose with Mullen a solution to the paradox of the cold sun, president of the Planetology Section of the American Geofísca Union ... all are reason enough to be considered a notable scientist. As part of the reason may have its detractors, is that based solely on its merits as a scientist, probably would not have reached significance reached.
But is that what Sagan did for science beyond their field of study, overshadows all the above and any work done by other scientists for many years. And is that Sagan was, first and foremost a communicator.
Buried in his idea of \u200b\u200bbringing science to the general public achieved something that very few scientists were able to: break through the barriers of science to become a social icon of his era, the Space Age. His thin body, his broad smile and carefree air became the stereotype of science for those born under the sign of the great exploits space, carving his name in golden letters in the collective memory of generations of a society, whose welfare rests in part on the technological achievements made in the insistent search beyond our Earth. In life
criticized by many, admired by many after his death enshrined and remembered with nostalgia and melancholy of all, this is a dignity only attainable for geniuses into its own.
Criticized by some because their deeds were too simple, very simplified, because it contained no complicated theories, because when talking about controversial subjects exposed only the prevailing theory, ignoring alternatives ... You're right. But you speak so clear because it has no real concept of what is popular science. His books were not intended for scientific audience, because they do not need training. His books were intended for the man in the street, the street person. In all that vast majority of people who did not have enough scientific knowledge, and therefore, did not look good eye to the incomprehensible (in part due to the inability of scientists to connect to the layman) science, they were giving back to science, taking refuge in superstition, in the ideas disseminated by, he called, "manufacturers of paradoxes. "As he took care to remember, was that scientists debt owed to the taxpayer, whose money for the continuity of scientific research. In this sense, like all artists, Sagan's literary creation is the daughter of his time, but also, as in the great geniuses of literature, his works were capable of transcending the barriers of space and time, surviving, even today with virtually the same effect 30 years ago. His works exude the smell of known better, but do not use their superiority to humiliate, but to help others achieve their status. He did not write books about science with the aim of seeking notoriety, or to stand out on their colleagues, but to bring science to a society that depended on it but, paradoxically, regarded her with suspicion.
His rhetoric, his language, his ability to introduce the reader squarely in what he said and awakening passion for science, its enviable eloquence, his overwhelming eclecticism, making it a unique artist with an ability to captivate've only never seen, sensed, in the work of two great geniuses of the disclosure, as were Isaac Asimov and Stephen Jay Gould.
of human formation, thus enjoyed a body of knowledge and a vision of his time hardly achievable by a scientist of the current science "ultraespecializada." He made science a way of understanding life, and spreading a contagious allegation of his ideas and attitude.
was a founding member of CSICOP, the first company skeptical world in which warfare, among others, Gould, Gardner and Asimov. And one of the problems that worried him most was the term they were getting into society as pseudoscientific and the lack of critical thinking in society. This concern gave us great jewels such as "Broca's Brain" or "The Demon-Haunted World." The explanations offered in the first of these books to the premonitory dream, or replication makes the wild theories of Velikovsky have no waste. He became a bastion of critical thinking, and the rejoinder of the skeptical movement figures like Von Daniken or Kolosimo.
Father "ideological" SETI, it is therefore not surprising that NASA would entrust to him the purpose of preparing a message to possible alien civilizations, to incorporate into the probe "Voyager", the first device human leave the Solar System. Founder of the Planetary Society, in the pages of the magazine of the organization held a discussion with the biologist Ernst Mayr about the appropriateness or otherwise of the SETI project, which came out triumphant and victorious with an admirable elegance. Say
Carl Sagan, is science talk in capital letters, and talk about his death, is talking about the death of a very important part of the thinking of the late twentieth century.
In short, Sagan's greatest achievement may not be his important work as a scientist, not even his enormous literary creation. Probably the most important have been all those hundreds, perhaps thousands, perhaps billions scientists, it is because children were amazed at the words so captivating that came from the mouth of this charismatic character.
Finally, as not believe I can express myself better than him, this humble disciple goes to one of his teachers: "The most exciting time, satisfying and stimulating to live is one in which we move from ignorance to knowledge of these fundamental issues , the time we begin to understand and finish marveling. In the 4000 million year history of life on our planet, within the 4 billion year history of the human family, there is one privileged generation that can experience this unique moment of transition: our "**
And this generation has been blessed with an exceptional writer. His name was Carl Sagan. -------------------------------------------------
------ * The idea of \u200b\u200bthe title is taken from Francisco Anguita, the title of the last chapter of the book "Chronicles of the Solar System, Ed Sirius.
** "Broca's Brain Carl Sagan, Ed Critica. Translated by D. Brgadà and J.
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