2007-09-10 18:04:01 · 15 answers · asked by ddemers46 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Erlichda!
2007-09-10 18:08:01 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I think he was an atheist if I heard correctly on Nova. I may be wrong. However, if you know the answer, why are you asking this question? Are you looking for an argument? I also am a Christian but what Carl Sagan believed or didn't believe makes no difference to me. He was a well known scholar and physicist but so what!
2016-05-17 04:29:09 · answer #2 · answered by ? 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Sagan wrote frequently about religion and the relationship between religion and science, expressing his skepticism about many conventional conceptualizations of God. Sagan once stated, for instance, that "The idea that God is an oversized white male with a flowing beard, who sits in the sky and tallies the fall of every sparrow is ludicrous. But if by 'God,' one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying... it does not make much sense to pray to the law of gravity."[19] Sagan is also widely regarded as a freethinker or skeptic; one of his most famous quotations as seen in Cosmos, was "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."
2007-09-10 18:12:52 · answer #3 · answered by magicalpossibilities 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
A lifelong atheist, Sagan did have mystical leanings (which you can tell from the quotes in "Cosmos"). I knew him casually as neighbors in Ithaca (he taught at Cornell). We didn't usually discuss religion but once his wife Anne volunteered that he was into meditation and stuff. Apparently somebody gave them a book on sex as a joke (it was by Osho), but he read it before he died, and thought it might offer a way to reconcile science with spiritualism.
I thought about telling her that only Jesus Christ can do that, because he has the Superest Consciousness ever, but refrained. After all, they were Jewish--it would be rude. I deeply regret not witnessing to them before Carl's death. (I wonder if the Holy Ghost led me there that day, but I blew it...?)
2007-09-10 22:43:08 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Dr. Sagan was polite about it, but he was an atheist. Whatever a 'secret religious society' may be, why on earth would he have been a member of it? He was a reputable scientist.
2007-09-10 18:18:53 · answer #5 · answered by Yank 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
No. He was an atheist. But he did have a reverence for the cosmos not unlike that of many pagans.
To o: Why would the opinion of a highly respected scientist not be worthwhile? Was the information he gave us on the atmosphere of Venus worthless, as well as his work on the viking spacecraft? Was his Pulitzer Prize not worth anything?
2007-09-10 18:12:20 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
You can say he almost revered the natural laws of science.
He may have believed in something like spinoza's god...
2007-09-10 18:32:13 · answer #7 · answered by Sapere Aude 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Who cares really.. His views on religion would not be relevant in my opinion.
2007-09-10 18:20:00 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
He is usually listed as a former atheist without dispute . I say former because he is dead .
2007-09-10 20:42:25 · answer #9 · answered by dogpatch USA 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
As far as I know he was a professing atheist.
2007-09-10 18:09:54 · answer #10 · answered by remy 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋