What an amazing book... and author! Carl Sagan is, himself, a candle in the dark. He had such a child-like wonder. What a shame that he died so young, only 62, in 1996, the year this book was published.

At that time, computers would just beginning to appear in people's homes. (I remember my first PC at an office job in ~1993 and how astonishing the internet seemed to us then.) Carl often mentioned the distraction of TV but, unfortunately for us, he never saw how the online world would take over our lives. I would have liked his comments. He would have been disheartened by all the demon-haunted lies spreading like fire on social media.

The book was a bit long at 434 pages of text. The people who most need to read this will probably not make the effort. Perhaps a lighter, condensed version would reach more readers.

He covered too many topics to list. But his ending words are worth repeating:

"In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness."

Highly recommended to all! ( )

Outstanding. Any my eldest offspring was ecstatic to find it in my collection. ( )

This book was written by a savage emerging from savagery. Billions and Billions was written by this guy enlightened. ( )

Published in 1996.
This should be required reading in our schools especially in this time of rampant conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, magical thinking, , propaganda and lies, misinformation and disinformation, the politicalization of fundamental religion, and the continued dumbing down of education being employed to destroy democracy and replace it with an oligarchy composed of rich, white, "Christian" males for the benefit of ONLY rich, white, "Christian" males.. ( )

Really thought-provoking work. Sagan's even-handed, open-minded approach to all streams of thought is refreshing and thoroughly engaging. He writes with a truly infectious sense of the beauty inherent in a cogent, thoughtful worldview. I won't bother speaking in a lot of detail about the book, but I will highly recommend it. ( )