What was carl sagan known for

But who was Carl Sagan? Scientist, celebrity, writer, professor, skeptic, and free-thinker, he was much more than the narrator of a TV series. Morrison marveled both at Sagan's breadth of accomplishments and his lack of self-importance.

He had a tremendous appetite for his work," says Poundstone. But there was a lot more to him. As a scientist, Sagan made a real mark on planetary science in the early s as a young Harvard professor, "at a time when planetary science was a bit of a backwater," Poundstone says. Sagan first predicted that the greenhouse effect made the atmosphere of Venus hot enough to melt lead, at a time when some scientists still speculated that its clouds might hide oceans, says Morrison.

Sagan also identified dark-shaded regions on Mars as highlands and identified lighter areas as desert plains marked by dust storms.

On the two Voyager missions launched in to explore Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, Sagan was a member of the imaging science team. Sagan led the team that put together the "golden records" attached to the Voyager mission's two spacecraft. The records sent along with phonograph needles included cuts of everything from Bach to "Johnny B. Goode," along with greetings and natural sounds from Earth.

To a large extent, Poundstone says, Sagan benefited from filling a scientific niche, planetary science, that was set to explode with new knowledge as a result of NASA's line of planetary probes exploring the solar system starting in the s.

Reporters gravitated toward Sagan on those missions, Poundstone says. Parodied by Carson for his consonant-rolling pronunciation of "bill-ions and bill-ions" in the series, Sagan indeed thought big, even opening a line of Cosmos-themed stores that anticipated the museum-themed stores in malls today.

He was getting death threats; he had to travel in limousines and keep a closed schedule," Morrison said. The death threats partly derived from Sagan's work on the U. Sagan was a big proponent of the likelihood of life existing elsewhere in the universe, however.

Sagan also waded into one of the wellsprings of today's global warming debate, as the senior author on a Science journal study of "nuclear winter. He had angered both UFO fans and belligerent critics of the nuclear winter report. Morrison recalls that after Sagan received threats, "they hid his office number at Cornell and he used a back door to get to work. It's a way of thinking, a way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility," Sagan said in his last, interview with PBS's Charlie Rose.

He died that same year from cancer. The power of skeptical thinking infused his book, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark , which sought to explain the scientific method to general readers. It included a "baloney-detection kit" for skeptics. Sagan wasn't skeptical about everything: He was also a marijuana advocate, appearing as "Mr. By: Laurie L. Dove Updated: Nov 9, Handsome, articulate and witty, Sagan wasn't a man about town.

He was a man about the cosmos. A tireless proponent of the universe, he was a pioneer in bridging the gap between science and nonscientists. Sagan was a giant among his peers, too. He received 22 honorary degrees from colleges and universities throughout the U. NASA explorations eventually proved he was right. Sagan was born in and grew up in Brooklyn, New York. He graduated from the University of Chicago in with a doctorate in astronomy and astrophysics, then taught at Harvard and Cornell, where he became the director of Cornell's Laboratory for Planetary Studies and the David Duncan Professor of Astronomy and Space Sciences.

Some of Sagan's most memorable contributions occurred outside the classroom. During the s and s, he was NASA's astronaut whisperer. He offered advice to the Apollo crew before their journeys to the moon and conceived experiments for other planetary expeditions, including an interstellar record designed to greet the unknown inhabitants of deep space. And that's just one cool thing on our list. For 10 years, it was the channel's most-watched show in the U.

It showcased Sagan's ability to explain complex principles in a way that viewers could easily understand. The show won over millions of viewers, too. Thanks to million fans tuning in from 60 different countries, "Cosmos" still reigns as the world's most-watched series from American public television.

His overemphasis of the "b" in "billions" was deliberate; to make sure the word was not mistaken for "millions. It was Johnny Carson, host of "The Tonight Show," who cemented Sagan's relationship with "billions and billions" of galaxies. Sagan appeared as a show guest more than two dozen times, and Carson's popular impersonation of him repeating the phrase, made a lasting impression — one Sagan was never able to shake. It was copied by other comedians and satirized in a Frank Zappa song.

In Sagan's perhaps sarcastically titled book, " Billions and Billions ," he wrote, "Oh, I said there are maybe billion galaxies and 10 billion trillion stars. It's hard to talk about the Cosmos without using big numbers But I never said 'billions and billions.

For a while, out of childish pique, I wouldn't utter or write the phrase even when asked to. But I've gotten over that. So, for the record, here goes: 'Billions and billions. Perhaps taking the meaning of "high in the sky" to another level, Sagan secretly then not-so-secretly advocated that marijuana use was beneficial. In an essay he authored in at age 35 under the name "Mr. X," Sagan outlined marijuana's positive effects on his sensibilities.

Marijuana, wrote Sagan, made music, art, food and sex better [source: Wing ]. It wasn't until three years after Sagan's death that the author of " Carl Sagan: A Life " revealed him as the author of the pro-pot post. However, Sagan had already revealed himself as a marijuana advocate years earlier. During at least one interview , Sagan said he supported the legalized use of marijuana by the terminally ill. It seems madness to say, 'We're worried that they're going to become addicted to marijuana.

And then these celestial-bound twin craft did something even more extraordinary: They transported our message to the universe. The spacecraft were part of the Voyager Interstellar Mission , and each carried a gold-plated disc designed to survive for a billion years in the hopes an alien civilization might receive it as a greeting. The recorded sounds spanned many possibilities, including the first words uttered to a newborn, greetings in 59 different languages, and music from new and ancient civilizations.

He authored hundreds of popular articles and more than two dozen books, and he frequently appeared in Time magazine — landing the cover on Oct. In , Sagan began work on the television series "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage," serving as writer and presenter. The first show aired on the Public Broadcasting Service in October of Between new episodes and reruns, the show was the most widely watched series on U.

The show won an Emmy and a Peabody award and was broadcast around the world. Sagan's book of the same name Random House, stayed on The New York Times best-seller list for 70 weeks and was the best-selling science book ever published in the English language at the time.

In addition to "Cosmos," Sagan also appeared as a guest on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" 26 times, calling it "the biggest classroom in history. At Sagan's request, NASA commanded its Voyager 1 spacecraft to turn its camera on Earth, creating an image that came to be known as the " Pale Blue Dot ," one of the most famous pictures of Earth from space ever taken.

Sagan used that name as the title of another book. The sequel to "Cosmos," Sagan's "The Pale Blue Dot" Random House, toured the solar system and the galaxy , arguing for the necessity of planetary science and the exploration of Earth's closest neighbors.

This book, too, was widely well-received by the general public. The story revolved around interactions between the human race and an advanced civilization of extraterrestrials. The novel sold over a million copies in its first two years of publication, and in , it was released as a major motion picture starring Jodi Foster as main character Ellie Arroway who was inspired by real-life SETI astronomer Jill Tarter.

Entertainment Inc. The production company hasn't released any details about the movie since the initial announcement. In Sagan's New York Times obituary , then-President of the National Academy of Sciences Bruce Alberts said, "Carl Sagan, more than any contemporary scientist I can think of, knew what it takes to stir passion within the public when it comes to the wonder and importance of science.

It would be an epochal event in human history.