Hi Manics

Thanks for the video .. I've pasted below again. It brought back fond memories of my student days. Carl Sagan was easily one of the best science presenters of his generation. 

He, his team and his programs made it effortless for everyone, scientist or not, to enjoy some fascinating programs about who we are and where we are in space and time.

The day he died prematurely from cancer was a sad day in my life. That was a great loss.

how about this one Bizhan!?

jacob bronowski...

Hi,

I would go a step further than that, Bizhan: Carl Sagan was categorically the best science presenter of his generation and could well be the best ever. He enveloped science in poetry. This was all done when nobody in the academic world was doing this kind of thing. Nowadays, public outreach is part of the contract for anyone with a tenured research position: there is popular science everywhere and more blogs from academics than it is possible to keep track of. In 1980 it was the reverse: scientists sat in their offices and did calculations, that was all. Having done this is known to have brought Sagan some ridicule/scorn/piss-taking from his peers. I don't know to what extent, but the fact that it happened at all is relevant. When Cosmos came on TV in about 1982 nobody had seen anything like it before -- it was really that ground-breaking. It's was recently re-published on a load of DVDs and, despite being 30 years old but addressing a field that changes every five years, it's still pretty relevant. Maybe not so much terms of its literal content, but for the presentation. For the fact that there is someone that was able to put the magnitude and the passion into words.

Carl Sagan day (9 November) is celebrated throughout the skeptical community. Here is 13 hours of Cosmos, condensed into 5 minute, and shoved through a phase vocoder.

Thanks hayes ...

You don't seem nearly old enough to remember the original series but yes you are so right about Carl Sagan and Cosmos.

To be fair there have been some other briliant people such as William Woollard who was a tremendously effective communicator. He was a presenter on the BBC's Tomorrow's World. TW's mandate was of course broad based and brought science and technology to the public.

But still Carl Sagan is certainly a legend and a well deserved one for all his contribution to humanity. May his legacy long live as a role model to all of us.

There are the rushing waves
mountains of molecules
each stupidly minding its own business
trillions apart
yet forming white surf in unison.

Ages on ages
before any eyes could see
year after year
thunderously pounding the shore as now.
For whom, for what?
On a dead planet
with no life to entertain.

Never at rest
tortured by energy
wasted prodigiously by the sun
poured into space.
A mite makes the sea roar.

Deep in the sea
all molecules repeat
the patterns of another
till complex new ones are formed.
They make others like themselves
and a new dance starts.

Growing in size and complexity
living things
masses of atoms
DNA, protein
dancing a pattern ever more intricate.

Out of the cradle
onto dry land
here it is standing
atoms with consciousness
matter with curiosity.

Stands at the sea
wondering:
I
a universe of atoms
an atom in the universe.

Richard Feynman (1918-1988)
1965 Nobel Prize in Physics

"The Value of Science", address to the National Academy of Sciences (Autumn 1955).

You don't seem nearly old enough to remember the original series but yes you are so right about Carl Sagan and Cosmos.

That's true enough... Cosmos came to British TV when I was five or six. It's not like memories of this are exactly clear... But I certainly do remember it on some level.

To be fair there have been some other briliant people such as William Woollard who was a tremendously effective communicator. He was a presenter on the BBC's Tomorrow's World. TW's mandate was of course broad based and brought science and technology to the public.

Oh... Tomorrow's World. It'd be hard to imagine a nerdier kid than I was. Yeah, I kind of realised that I was being a bit narrow, and I completely ignored broadcasters - it's a bit unfair when there are people like David Attenborough around. But this was a sideline for CS, his job was to teach in a university.

Manics - Thanks. As soon as I get home to watch your second video, I certianly will and will give you my feedback.

OmegasMan - beautiful - not you, the poetry of course . Amazing how some peole see so far into the future ... I guess that's they invented the label "visionery".

Hayes - oh yes, I forgot about Sir David (or is it Lord A, now? ... I know Richard is Lord Attenborough .. nevermind, both are super talented and both are credits to their society). Well, young as you are & were, you certainly did some overtime to catch up with the past as well as keep up with your own era - all credit to you.

hey fellas look at this!!!

Miss you Carl.

We've always been deceived by other earth creatures. They have always told us "the sky is the limit!" well accordin to my fuzzy and fizzy math (depending on the occasion) ive come up with the conclusion that the sky is not the limite and you can go a liitle bit further...im sure professor Bizhan would agree...society always wants us 2 be squares, triangles or cones..mind u cones are doggy!

Ok the piss takin aside 4  just a moment: here is another tribute 2 the GREAT man , Dr.Carl Sagan "the skeptic agnostic and free thinker" special thanx 2 manics 1984 for bringin this up! good job.

Enjoy the video 

Whaddup yo! 

FYI, Carl Sagan was the subject of this week's Great Lives on BBC Radio 4. It's done by Brian Cox who is also pretty ace (for a Manc) and coincidentally works around these parts. Anyway, if you're interested: blammo!