Carl Sagan's Cosmic Trip's Comic Strip.

Plain and true. I love you, Carl Sagan.

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"At one point in time, space travel only existed in science fiction, but with time and hard work, it eventually became a reality. In present day America, it seems impossible that we will ever rid our country of it's primitive, backwards, sociopathic gun culture, but just as sure as we evolved to be capable of space travel, we will also, one day, gain the wisdom to evolve past our current violent pupal stage.

Maybe not today, or tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow, or the day after that.... but one day.

I know these words might come as an insult to those unable to dream of a better world, or for those who cling to the status quo like a piss stained security blanket woven of rotten flesh and broken bones, but there have always been people whom insist that the world is flat, the center of the universe and mounted on the back of a great turtle.

Evolution is not easy, but evolve we must. If we are ever to have any hope of co-habitating on this tiny pale blue dot, it is the only path forward."

-Carl Sagan

(just kidding... kinda... but not really)

Its not a dilemma for me, I know exactly as much as you, or anybody else do about god: Nothing.

All you can say here is that you don't know anything about God. If you don't know anything about God, then how can you know what anyone else knows about God?

Remember, I'm not the one who believes in imaginary things.

You seem to state here that your assumption that God is imaginary is a fact, which is just the same as merely imagining something is true.

The fact that people like you THINK you can no something and comfortably believe in something for which there is not a shred of evidence, is first and foremost YOUR problem.

There are good reasons as to why someone could believe in a God, but I wouldn't believe in a God based on those reasons alone. I believe in God because of personal revelation. The scripture says that this is the way that God reveals Himself to everyone. My question to you is, could God reveal Himself in such a way to you that you could be certain that He is?

When it comes to grounds for making knowledge claims, well, in my view knowledge, like the universe and life itself, is a bottoms up thing, we start at zero, and then build gradually on sound arguments and evidence. Like Carl Sagan once put it: "science is a candle in the dark" and that candle is shining ever brighter. Newton said he was standing on the shoulders of giants, and now we can stand on Newtons shoulders and see even farther.

My question to you here is, how do you ever get past zero? The ground of the sound arguments and evidence that you're perceiving is your own reasoning power. How do you justify your reasoning as being sound without using circular reasoning?

I answer the question about whether there is a god in exactly the same way as I would about santa clause. I'm pretty sure, based on the aforementioned hard-earned knowledge we do have, combined with the fact that we have NO information suggesting there might be one, that there isnt one. But at the same time I recognize that we cannot be absolutely certain. I do regard it as a fact as good as any that there is no god.

There isn't a good reason to believe Santa Claus exists but there are good reasons to believe that the Universe was created by an all powerful being. The idea of God has explanatory power. The very question of whether the Universe has an intelligent causation is a rational question. My question to you is, how would you tell the difference as to whether the Universe was or wasn't designed? How could you tell which Universe you lived in?

Its not a dilemma for me, I know exactly as much as you, or anybody else do about god: Nothing.

Remember, I'm not the one who believes in imaginary things.

The fact that people like you THINK you can no something and comfortably believe in something for which there is not a shred of evidence, is first and foremost YOUR problem.

When it comes to grounds for making knowledge claims, well, in my view knowledge, like the universe and life itself, is a bottoms up thing, we start at zero, and then build gradually on sound arguments and evidence. Like Carl Sagan once put it: "science is a candle in the dark" and that candle is shining ever brighter. Newton said he was standing on the shoulders of giants, and now we can stand on Newtons shoulders and see even farther.

I answer the question about whether there is a god in exactly the same way as I would about santa clause. I'm pretty sure, based on the aforementioned hard-earned knowledge we do have, combined with the fact that we have NO information suggesting there might be one, that there isnt one. But at the same time I recognize that we cannot be absolutely certain. I do regard it as a fact as good as any that there is no god.

http://videosift.com/video/Carl-Sagan-s-Pale-Blue-Dot-with-new-video

I feel like this would be far more powerful with actual images of the cosmos, and not mere animations of the same... but alas, Sagan is still the man.

didn't sagan do something like this in the cosmos episode "who speaks for earth", but on a calendar? damn now i want to watch cosmos again.

Let's take things in stride here.
1. Al Gore has the highest electricity useage in the entire country in Tennessee. That kinda tells you all you need to know about what he says and does.

2. Super Storm Sandy doesn't mean anything is necessarily happening anymore than the fact that California hasn't had any major earthquakes or storms for approximately 5 years. The south aka Katrina and such largest storms were in CA and the East got almost nothing

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2010/0211/Behind-mid-Atlantic-snowstorms-a-rare-weather-pattern

http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/indicators/weather-climate/index.html

Please realize there are many other articles out there that point this pattern out.

None of that means that we shouldn't be good stewards of the land and such. However, Mr. Chomsky and anyone over the age of 40 has been alive for the death by heat in the 60's, the ice age of the 70's, the Sagan predictions of over population death of us all, to the Al Gore death of climate change heat, to the newly recognized studies put out in Europe about how the temperature actually declining and the high's were 13 years ago.

The simple fact of the matter is this: We have many more safeguards in place and to say that our rivers, streams, automobiles hell, even airplanes don't burn cleaner and more efficiently is just plain not paying attention.

In 1981, Frank Tipler[3] put forth an argument that extraterrestrial intelligences do not exist, based on the absence of von Neumann probes. Given even a moderate rate of replication and the history of the galaxy, such probes should already be common throughout space and thus, we should have already encountered them. Because we have not, this shows that extraterrestrial intelligences do not exist. This is thus a resolution to the Fermi paradox—that is, the question of why we have not already encountered extraterrestrial intelligence if it is common throughout the universe.

A response[4] came from Carl Sagan and William Newman. Now known as Sagan's Response, it pointed out that in fact Tipler had underestimated the rate of replication, and that von Neumann probes should have already started to consume most of the mass in the galaxy. Any intelligent race would therefore, Sagan and Newman reasoned, not design von Neumann probes in the first place, and would try to destroy any von Neumann probes found as soon as they were detected. As Robert Freitas[5] has pointed out the assumed capacity of von Neumann probes described by both sides of the debate are unlikely in reality, and more modestly reproducing systems are unlikely to be observable in their effects on our Solar System or the Galaxy as a whole.

Another objection to the prevalence of von Neumann probes is that civilizations of the type that could potentially create such devices may have inherently short lifetimes, and self-destruct before so advanced a stage is reached, through such events as biological or nuclear warfare, nanoterrorism, resource exhaustion, ecological catastrophe, pandemics due to antibiotic resistance.

A simple workaround exists to avoid the over-replication scenario. Radio transmitters, or other means of wireless communication, could be used by probes programmed not to replicate beyond a certain density (such as five probes per cubic parsec) or arbitrary limit (such as ten million within one century), analogous to the Hayflick limit in cell reproduction. One problem with this defence against uncontrolled replication is that it would only require a single probe to malfunction and begin unrestricted reproduction for the entire approach to fail — essentially a technological cancer — unless each probe also has the ability to detect such malfunction in its neighbours and implements a seek and destroy protocol.

wikipedia my friend

Neil deGrasse Tyson: Rest in peace, Dr. Sagan, someone's got your back.

@hpqp
I am not at all ashamed of my verbose, self-indulgent dross, so here we go!

Something has to be extra-physical, as least based on our current model. I can fully accept that a brain by itself can receive sensory input, process it against memory, and thus act in a completely human way indistinguishable from a conscious human, but on its own can literally be no more "conscious" than a river flowing down a mountain. Our current view of the physical universe does not tolerate any rational physical explanation of consciousness. Any given moment of human experience - the unified sensory experience and stream of consciousness - does not exist in a single place at a single instant. To suggest that the atoms\molecules\proteins\cells of the brain experience themselves in a unified manner based on their proximity to or electrochemical interaction with each other is magical thinking. Atoms don't do that, and that's all that's there, physically.
I disagree that consciousness is subordinate to cognition in terms of value. Cognition is what makes us who we are and behave as we do, but consciousness is what makes us different from the rest of the jiggling matter in the universe.

A couple of posts back, you challenged my statement about abstinence education as demonstrating a lack of pragmatism. I didn't really address it in my reply, but I'd prefaced it with the understanding that it's not a magical incantation. I know people are still going to have sex, but I suggested that has to be a part of education. People have to know that you can still get pregnant even if you're using the contraceptives that are available. They have to at least know the possibility exists. It's one more thing for them to consider. People are still going to drive recklessly even if you tell them they can crash and kill themselves despite their airbags, seatbelts, and crumple zones, but that doesn't mean it's not worth it to educate them about the possibility. I fail to see how that's not pragmatic.

I didn't reply to your comment about adoption vs abortion because I'm not sure there's anything else to add on either side. As I've said, my beliefs on this are such that even a grossly flawed adoption\orphan care system is preferable to the alternative, even if it means that approximately 10 times the number of children would enter the system than have traditionally been adopted each year. (1.4M abortions annually in the US, ~140K adoptions, but there are several assumptions in that math that wouldn't hold up to scrutiny.) Many right and just things have unpleasant consequences that must be managed. (The typical counter here is that Pro-Lifers tend to also be fiscal\social conservatives and won't fund social services to care for these new individuals they've "protected" into existence. That's just another issue of taking responsibility for the consequences of choices. If they get what they want, they need to be held to account, but it's a separate issue. A related issue, but a separate issue.)

Criminalizing\prohibiting almost any activity results in some degree of risky\dangerous\destructive behavior. Acts must be criminalized because there are individuals who would desire to perform those acts which have been determined to be an unnecessary imposition on the rights of another. Criminalization does not eliminate the desire, but it adds a new factor to consideration. Some will decide the criminalization\prohibition of the act is not sufficient deterrent, but in proceeding, are likely to do so in a different manner than otherwise. The broad consideration is whether the benefits of criminalization\prohibition outweigh the risks posed to\by the percentage who will proceed anyway. Prohibition of alcohol failed the test, I expect the prohibition of certain drugs will be shown to have failed the test..eventually. Incest is illegal, and the "unintended" consequence is freaks locking their families in sheds and basements in horrific conditions, but I think most of us would agree the benefits outweigh the detriment there.

Is putting all would-have-been-aborteds up for adoption abhorrent or absurd? The hump we'll never get over is asking "is it more abhorrent than aborting all of them", because we have different viewpoints on the relative values in play. But is it even a valid question? They won't all be put up for adoption. Some percentage (possibly 5-10 percent) will spontaneously miscarry\abort anyway and some percentage would be raised by a birth parent or by the extended family after all. An initially unwanted pregnancy does not necessarily equate to an unwanted child, for a number of reasons. I do not have statistics on what proportion could be expected to be put up for adoption. Would you happen to? It seems like that would be difficult to extrapolate.

The "'potential' shtick" carries weight in my view because of the uniqueness of the situation. There is no consensus on the "best" way to define when elective abortion is "acceptable". Sagan puts weight on cognition as indicative of personhood. As he states, the Supreme Court set its date based on independent "viability". (More specifically, I feel it should be noted, "potential" viability.) These milestones coincide only by coincidence.
Why is it so easy for us, as you say, to retroproject? And why is this any different from assigning personhood to each of a million individual sperm? For me, it's because of those statistics on miscarriage linked above. The retroprojected "potential" is represented by "percentages". At 3-6 weeks, without deliberate intervention 90% of those masses of cells will go on to become a human being. At 6-12 it's 95%. This is more than strictly "potential", it's nearly guaranteed.

I expect your response will be uncomfortable for both of us, but I wish you would expound on why my "It Gets Better" comparison struck you as inappropriate. Crude, certainly - I'll admit to phrasing it indelicately, even insensitively. I do not think it poorly considered, however. The point of "It Gets Better" is to let LGBT youth know that life does not remain oppressive, negative, and confusing, and that happiness and fulfillment lie ahead if they will only persevere.
It's necessary because as humans, we aren't very good at imagining we'll ever be happy again when surrounded by uncertainty and despair, or especially recognizing the good already around us. We can only see torment, and may not see the point in perpetuating a seemingly-unending chain of suffering when release is so close at hand, though violence against self (or others).
This directly parallels the "quality of life" arguments posed from the pro-choice perspective. They take an isolated slice of life from a theoretical unplanned child and their mother and suggest that this is their lot and that we've increased suffering in the universe, as if no abused child will ever know a greater love, or no poor child will ever laugh and play, and that no mother of an unwanted pregnancy will ever enjoy life again, burdened and poverty-stricken as she is.
As you said, we're expecting a woman to reflect "on what would her and the eventual child’s quality of life be like", but we're so bad at that.
And all that quality-of-life discussion is assuming we've even nailed the demographic on who is seeking abortions in the U.S.
Getting statistics from the Guttmacher Institute, we find that 77% were at or above the federal poverty level and 60% already had at least one child.

On a moral level, absolutely, eugenics is very different debate.
On a practical level, the eugenics angle is relevant because it's indistinguishable from any other elective abortion. Someone who is terminating a pregnancy because their child would be a girl, or gay, or developmentally disabled can very easily say "I'm just not ready for motherhood." And who's to say that's not the mother's prerogative as much as any other elective abortion, if she's considering the future quality of life for herself and the child? "It sucks for girls\gays\downs in today's society and I don't think I can personally handle putting them through that," or more likely "My family and I could never love a child like that, so they would be unloved and I would be miserable for it. This is better for both of us."
Can we write that off as hopefully being yet another edge case? (Keep in mind possibly 65% of individuals seeking abortion declare as Protestant or Catholic, though other statistics show how unreliable "reported religious affiliation" is with regard to actual belief and practice.)

_{"Argumentation"? I have learned a new word today, thanks to hpqp. High five!}

@ReverendTed
I will try to be brief, because I can’t wait for the “we solved abortion” party, and because @kymbos has made me self-conscious '. There is much to be said on the subject of your tangent, but I will keep it at this:

a) nothing is “extra-physical” (or meta-physical, or supernatural, etc.)
b) consciousness is subordinate to cognition and the treatment of sensory input, as even your illustration of consciousness testifies (see also: how blind-from-birth people dream)

A brain which has never received/treated sensory input is nothing more than a muscle-regulator. I am very grateful to @Tojja for linking the Sagan piece, because I now have a great mind backing my own intuitions.


Now back to the problem of regulating/prohibiting abortion. I take your lack of response to my rebuttal of the adoption “solution” as your agreeing with me (tell me if I’m wrong), in which case it illustrates what I argued concerning the lack of pragmatism on the pro-life side. Because let’s face it, the following are constants:

a) people will have sex, sometimes leading to unwanted pregnancy
b) people will want/need abortions, whether legal or not
c) criminalising abortion (be it on the doctor’s or the woman’s side) results in risky practices, especially by the most at risk (poor/uneducated)
d) putting all would-have-been-aborteds up for adoption is abhorrent and absurd

So what to do about it?

I notice that your argumentation goes back to the whole “potential” shtick, including the emotionally manipulative retroprojection of human individuality on a ball of cells in the example of how pro-lifers think. Sagan argues against the whole “potential” thing better than I do, so I’ll leave it at that, but I do take issue with the “good comes from bad” argument. Yes, undesired kids can grow to have great lives, just as the contrary can happen. But in a case opposing an individual who is and one who might be (but is not yet), it is the former’s choice that takes precedence (yes, we’re pro-choice, not pro-abortion or abortion-tolerant). Don’t forget, many unexpected pregnancies end in chosen births, not abortions. The important thing is not whether it is unexpected, but whether or not it is undesired. It is the choice of the woman, usually based on reflexion on what would her and the eventual child’s quality of life be like, to let what is at that stage only potential become an actual human individual.

Do you ever miss what you were like before you existed? That nothingness before life and after death is all an aborted foetus ever gets, because it never reaches the stage of cognition that allows for consciousness and thus for identity. As an aside, I must admit I found your comparison between the pro-life stance and the It Gets Better campaign rather crude, insensitive and not well-thought-through at all. I’ll let you figure out why. As for eugenics, that is another debate entirely, whose crux is not “can a woman chose to pursue/terminate a pregnancy” but instead “can (a) parent(s) chose to pursue/terminate a pregnancy based on discriminatory criteria”. The difference should be easy to spot.

_{We seem to agree on humanitarian aid, so high-fives all round}

>> ^Tojja:

Missed the boat a little, but for those who want to read the most intelligent summary of the salient scientific considerations associated with abortion, have a read of an article by Carl Sagan himself (co-written by Ann Druyan). Absolutely thought provoking and relevant: http://2think.org/abortion.shtml
Thanks for the link! I especially appreciate that Sagan brings the science and facts to bear in his consideration, and it's impossible to argue with his methodology. I have to say there's something personally gratifying in that we've trodden some of the same ground in our little dialectic.


Sure, I disagree with his ultimate conclusion, but that's because I believe there's a distinction between human cognition and human consciousness (or "ensoulment" as he terms it).