Showing posts with label Carl Sagan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Carl Sagan. Show all posts

November 9 - Carl Sagan Day

 Posted on November 9, 2021


This is an update of my post published on November 9, 2010:




(NOTE: Some groups and people celebrate this holiday on the Saturday closest to Sagan's November 9th birthday.)

Carl Sagan was an astronomer, author, and popularizer of science. He was born in Brooklyn, 
New York, on this date in 1934. For more information on Sagan, see this earlier post. 

To celebrate Sagan, read or watch something written by him. Some popular choices are Contact (a science fiction book and a movie starring Jodie Foster), Cosmos (a book and a multi-part television show on science, available on DVD - perhaps at your library?), and Pale Blue Dot (a book and audio book). One of my favorite Sagan books is The Demon-Haunted World. On You Tube there are lots of free videos that are little clips of various Sagan productions.

Here's a taste of Carl Sagan:




Some people enjoy the Symphony of Science videos. Here is one that features Sagan and other eminent scientists.



Make and eat an apple pie...
and as you do so, contemplate Carl Sagan's words:




This video splices Sagan's voice onto images from the movie The Matrix. It really cracks me up. 




Also on this date...In 1965, the Great Northeast Blackout:


At 5:27 p.m., there was a massive blackout that left about 30 million people in eight U.S. states and two Canadian provinces without power. For some, the power was out all night—around 12 hours. In New York City this power outage trapped thousands and thousands of people (some sources say almost a million people) underground in the subway system, in office buildings, and in elevators. Apparently there was pretty much no rioting, violence, or looting. Instead, New Yorkers and other people spent the night helping each other out—volunteering to direct traffic, taking food and coffee to people trapped underground, and so forth.

Interestingly enough, a mere 12 years later, there was another long-lasting power outage in New York, and this time there was a lot of violence and looting. Why do some disasters bring out the best in people, and others bring out the worst?


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November 9, 2011 - Sagan Day / Banneker's Birthday



This is the third annual Sagan Day, a chance to remark on and remember the contributions of the astronomer and science communicator Carl Sagan. He was one of my heroes (I use past tense here because he is, sadly, deceased – but I suppose that he still IS one of my heroes, really!), so I have to give his special day a shout-out. Find out more about him on this or this other post.

and...
I had to find another astronomer and scientist to honor on Sagan Day. So let's give warm birthday wishes to Benjamin Banneker!

Born on this day in 1731, Benjamin Banneker didn't have the cushiest life. The grandson of a slave and (possibly) an indentured servant, and the son of a runaway slave, Banneker may have been taught to read and observe the night sky by his grandmother, Molly. He was given a bit of formal education by a Quaker farmer who ran a small school, but when he was old enough to help on his own family's farm, his formal education was over. However, the Quaker man was nice enough to loan Banneker books, and Banneker taught himself math and astronomy by reading borrowed textbooks. Later, as an adult, Banneker continued to study astronomy using books and equipment loaned to him by another Quaker neighbor.

Banneker was hired as a surveyor and eventually was part of a survey team creating the boundaries of the District of Columbia, land that Maryland and Virginia ceded to the federal government of the U.S. for the purpose of building the capital city (Washington, D.C.). Banneker was able to use astronomical observations that helped the team figure out the starting point of the survey, and he maintained a clock used to relate points on the land to positions of certain stars at specific times. All his life, Banneker predicted solar and lunar risings and settings and also solar and lunar eclipses; over the years he compiled several almanacs containing these predictions, weather forecasts, and other important information.

It is interesting to note that, although Banneker was an accomplished man—and certainly for his race at that time!—the truth didn't seem to be enough for people. There have been a lot of stories told about Benjamin Banneker that have made him part myth or even urban legend. For example, here is a great little story:

As I said, Banneker worked on the survey team that created the boundaries for Washington, D.C. The architect/designer/planner of the city was Pierre L'Enfant, who was said to have had a bit of a temper. When changes were made to L'Enfant's plan, he threw a fit and was fired from the job. The story goes that L'Enfant was so angry that he took the completed plans with him, and that the architects and builders would have to start from scratch again—except Banneker saved the day! He was able to recreate the plans from memory and thus saved the new U.S. government a lot of money!

Which is great, except for the fact that apparently it didn't happen. According to historical evidence, Banneker left the job by the time L'Enfant was completing his plans, several people had copies of the plans at the time of L'Enfant's dismissal, and Banneker never saw the plans, let alone recreated them from memory.

Almost everything about this piece is wrong.
Thomas Jefferson didn't suggest Banneker for
the commission, nor was he on the commission.
Banneker did made a clock, but it wasn't the first clock in
America, not by a long shot!
There are other exaggerations and fictions told about Banneker. Which seems strange to me, since the reality of Benjamin Banneker is already very interesting and wonderful!

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November 9, 2009

Happy Birthday, Carl Sagan
(November 9, 1934 – December 20, 1996)


Broward College in Florida celebrated the first annual Carl Sagan day on Saturday (November 7), but today would have been the astronomer's actual 75th birthday, if cancer hadn't taken him too young. Sagan is best known as the co-writer and presenter of the TV series Cosmos and author of the book Contact, which was made into a movie starring Jodie Foster; Sagan did a lot to popularize astronomy and inspire a new generation of astronomers. He was a professor at Cornell University, worked with NASA on the space program, made many discoveries about the planets, and helped jump-start the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence. His contributions to science and science education are far too many to list!

Make a List
Carl Sagan is one my heroes. Try making a list of your own heroes. Keep in mind that a hero is not just someone you like, he or she is someone you want to be like.

Enjoy Sagan's Works
  • The TV show Cosmos is available on iTunes, Netflix, and FREE on Hulu! (http://www.hulu.com/search?query=cosmos&st=0)
  • The movie Contact is available on Netflix and in many DVD/video stores.
  • Cosmos and Contact are available as books, too. Two of Sagan's other books are The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark and Pale Blue Dot.

Enjoy Sagan's Words
For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love.

I try not to think with my gut. If I'm serious about understanding the world, thinking with anything besides my brain, as tempting as that might be, is likely to get me into trouble.


Carl Sagan was popular enough, during his lifetime, to be impersonated by comedians, and he became associated with the catch phrase billions and billions. Whenever a comedian appeared in a tan blazer and dark wig and began talking about billions and billions of galaxies, each with billions and billions of stars, everyone thought, “Ah, Carl Sagan.” But Carl Sagan never said the phrase billions and billions, and he never wrote the phrase either! (He did use the phrase billions upon billions in the book Cosmos.)

One word he did use is numinous. It's one of my favorite words. Numinous means “appealing to the higher emotions or sense of beauty,” and Sagan used it as he described the amazing complexity of life and enormity of the universe. It's a great adjective for things that create a sense of awe in us.

Think about your own favorite words. Are the meanings or the sounds of your favorite words more important to you? Do you actually use your favorite words?

Here are some favorite words of some people I know: ginormous, synergy, uber, ubiquitous, and skulking.

Do You Speak Alien?


.

One thing Carl Sagan wondered about is how we can ever communicate with aliens, if we ever meet them. The things we will have in common with aliens from other planets and solar systems is science and (probably) math. Sagan and others created metal plates with pictures and symbols that describe our planet and ourselves; these plates were affixed to the Pioneer and Voyager spacecraft that were then sent into space and that have, by now, left the solar system. The Voyager spacecraft also carried a golden phonograph record that holds many different sorts of music along with whale songs. It is unlikely, in a universe that is so unimaginably huge, that anyone will ever find these messages. Still, they are our first attempts to deliberately communicate with E.T.s, as if we were putting messages into bottles and throwing them into the vast ocean.
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