263 quotes
We find a set of data that strongly implies the presence of complex organic molecules in the outer solar system.
The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God (2006)
The prediction I can make with the highest confidence is that the most amazing discoveries will be the ones we are not today wise enough to foresee.
They were realistic and practical, and at the same time motivated by high principles. They were not checking the pollsters on what to think this week.
The Demon-Haunted World : Science as a Candle in the Dark (1995)
Science is, at least in part, informed worship.
The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God (2006)
The search for patterns without critical analysis, and rigid skepticism without a search for patterns, are the antipodes of incomplete science. The effective pursuit of knowledge requires both functions.
The Dragons of Eden (1977)
I have...a terrible need...shall I say the word?...of religion. Then I go out at night and paint the stars.
Cosmos (1980)
I can remember the night that I suddenly realized what it was like to be crazy, or nights when my feelings and perceptions were of a religious nature.
Essay as "Mr. X (1969)
They were well educated. Products of the European Enlightenment, they were students of history. They knew human fallibility and weakness and corruptibility.
The Demon-Haunted World : Science as a Candle in the Dark (1995)
Much of human history can, I think, be described as a gradual and sometimes painful liberation from provincialism, the emerging awareness that there is more to the world than was generally believed by our ancestors.
Broca's Brain (1979)
It's hard to understand how “conservatives” could oppose safeguarding the environment—that all of us including conservatives and their children—depend on for our very lives. What exactly is it conservatives are conserving?
Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millenium (1997)
History is full of people who out of fear or ignorance or the lust for power have destroyed treasures of immeasurable value which truly belong to all of us. We must not let it happen again.
Cosmos: A Personal Voyage (1990)
Something dreadful happens to students between first and twelfth grades, and it's not just puberty.
Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.
Cosmos: A Personal Voyage (1990)
Evolving before our eyes has been a God of the Gaps; that is, whatever it is we cannot explain lately is attributed to God.
The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God (2006)
It is postjudice. That is, not a judgement made before examining the evidence but a judgement made after examining the evidence.
The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God (2006)
We have heard the rationales offered by the nuclear superpowers. We know who speaks for the nations. But who speaks for the human species? Who speaks for Earth?
Cosmos (1980)
The nature of life on earth and the quest for life elsewhere are the two sides of the same question: the search for who we are.
Cosmos: A Personal Voyage (1990)
Modern science has been a voyage into the unknown, with a lesson in humility waiting at every stop. Many passengers would rather have stayed home.
Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994)
It took the Church until 1832 to remove Galileo's work from its list of books which Catholics were forbidden to read at the risk of dire punishment of their immortal souls.
Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994)
If we crave some cosmic purpose, then let us find ourselves a worthy goal.
Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994)