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Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium Paperback – May 12, 1998
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These luminous, entertaining essays travel both the vastness of the cosmos and the intimacy of the human mind, posing such fascinating questions as how did the universe originate and how will it end, and how can we meld science and compassion to meet the challenges of the coming century? Here, too, is a rare, private glimpse of Sagan’s thoughts about love, death, and God as he struggled with fatal disease.
Ever forward-looking and vibrant with the sparkle of his unquenchable curiosity, Billions & Billions is a testament to one of the great scientific minds of our day.
Praise for Billions & Billions
“[Sagan’s] writing brims with optimism, clarity and compassion.”—Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
“Sagan used the spotlight of his fame to illuminate the abyss into which stupidity, greed, and the lust for power may yet dump us. All of those interests and causes are handsomely represented in Billions & Billions.”—The Washington Post Book World
“Astronomer Carl Sagan didn’t live to see the millennium, but he probably has done more than any other popular scientist to prepare us for its arrival.”—Atlanta Journal & Constitution
“Billions & Billions can be interpreted as the Silent Spring for the current generation. . . . Human history includes a number of leaders with great minds who gave us theories about our universe and origins that ran contrary to religious dogma. Galileo determined that the Earth revolved around the Sun, not the other way around. Darwin challenged Creationism with his Evolution of Species. And now, Sagan has given the world its latest challenge: Billions & Billions.”—San Antonio Express-News
“[Sagan’s] inspiration and boundless curiosity live on in the gift of his work.”—Seattle Times & Post-Intelligencer
“Couldn’t stay awake in your high school science classes? This book can help fill in the holes. Acclaimed scientist Carl Sagan combines his logic and knowledge with wit and humor to make a potentially dry subject enjoyable to read.”—The Dallas Morning News
- Print length320 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherBallantine Books
- Publication dateMay 12, 1998
- Dimensions5.5 x 0.84 x 8.3 inches
- ISBN-100345379187
- ISBN-13978-0345379184
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Editorial Reviews
Review
“Sagan used the spotlight of his fame to illuminate the abyss into which stupidity, greed, and the lust for power may yet dump us. All of those interests and causes are handsomely represented in Billions & Billions.”—The Washington Post Book World
“Astronomer Carl Sagan didn’t live to see the millennium, but he probably has done more than any other popular scientist to prepare us for its arrival.”—Atlanta Journal & Constitution
“Billions & Billions can be interpreted as the Silent Spring for the current generation. . . . Human history includes a number of leaders with great minds who gave us theories about our universe and origins that ran contrary to religious dogma. Galileo determined that the Earth revolved around the Sun, not the other way around. Darwin challenged Creationism with his Evolution of Species. And now, Sagan has given the world its latest challenge: Billions & Billions.”—San Antonio Express-News
“[Sagan’s] inspiration and boundless curiosity live on in the gift of his work.”—Seattle Times & Post-Intelligencer
“Couldn’t stay awake in your high school science classes? This book can help fill in the holes. Acclaimed scientist Carl Sagan combines his logic and knowledge with wit and humor to make a potentially dry subject enjoyable to read.”—The Dallas Morning News
From the Publisher
Mike Sudano
Business Development
About the Author
His Emmy- and Peabody–winning television series, Cosmos, became the most widely watched series in the history of American public television. The accompanying book, also called Cosmos, is one of the bestselling science books ever published in the English language. Dr. Sagan received the Pulitzer Prize, the Oersted Medal, and many other awards—including twenty honorary degrees from American colleges and universities—for his contributions to science, literature, education, and the preservation of the environment. In their posthumous award to Dr. Sagan of their highest honor, the National Science Foundation declared that his “research transformed planetary science . . . his gifts to mankind were infinite." Dr. Sagan died on December 20, 1996.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
With characteristic optimism in the face of harrowing ambiguity, Carl writes the final entry in a prodigious, passionate, daringly transdisciplinary, and astonishingly original body of work.
Mere weeks later, in early December, he sat at our dinner table, regarding a favorite meal with a look of puzzlement. It held no appeal. In the best of times, my family had always prided itself on what we call wodar, an inner mechanism that ceaselessly scans the horizon for the first blips of looming disaster. During our two years in the valley of the shadow, our wodar had remained at a constant state of highest alert. On this roller coaster of hopes dashed, raised, and dashed again, even the slightest variation in a single particular of Carl's physical condition would set alarm bells blaring.
A beat of a look passed between us. I immediately began spinning a benign hypothesis to explain away this sudden lack of appetite. As usual I was arguing that this might have nothing to do with his illness. It was merely a fleeting disinterest in food that a healthy person might not even notice. Carl managed a little smile and just said, Maybe. But from that moment on he had to force himself to eat and his strength declined noticeably. Despite this, he insisted on fulfilling a long-standing commitment to give two public lectures later that week in the San Francisco Bay area. When he returned to our hotel after the second talk, he was exhausted. We called Seattle.
The doctors urged us to come back to the Hutch immediately. I dreaded having to tell Sasha and Sam that we would not be returning home to them the next day as promised; that instead we would be making yet a fourth trip to Seattle, a place that had become to us synonymous with dread. The kids were stunned. How could we convincingly calm their fears that this might turn out, as it had three times before, to be another six-month stint away from home or, as Sasha immediately suspected, something far worse? Once again I went into my cheerleading mantra: Daddy wants to live. He's the bravest, toughest man I know. The doctors are the best the world has to offer ... Yes, Hanukkah would have to be postponed. But once Daddy was better ...
The next day in Seattle, an X-ray revealed that Carl had a pneumonia of unknown origin. Repeated tests failed to turn up any evidence for a bacterial, viral, or fungal culprit. The inflammation in his lungs was, perhaps, a delayed reaction to the lethal dose of radiation that he had received six months before as preparation for the last bone marrow transplant. Megadoses of steroids only compounded his suffering and failed to repair his lungs. The doctors began to prepare me for the worst. Now, when I ventured out into the hospital hallway, I encountered a whole different species of expression on the too familiar faces of the staff. They either winced with sympathy or averted their eyes. It was time for the kids to come west.
When Carl saw Sasha it seemed to effect a miraculous change in his condition. Beautiful, beautiful, Sasha, he called to her. You are not only beautiful, but you also have enormous gorgeousness. He told her that if he did manage to survive it would be in part because of the strength her presence had given him. And for the next several hours the hospital monitors seemed to document a turnaround. My hopes soared, but in the back of my mind I couldn't help notice that the doctors didn't share my enthusiasm. They recognized this momentary rallying for what it was, what they call an Indian summer, the body's brief respite before its final struggle.
This is a deathwatch, Carl told me calmly. I'm going to die. No, I protested. You're going to beat this, just as you have before when it looked hopeless. He turned to me with that same look I had seen countless times in the debates and skirmishes of our twenty years of writing together and being wildly in love. With a mixture of knowing good humor and skepticism, but as ever, not a trace of self-pity, he said wryly, Well, we'll see who's right about this one.
Sam, now five years old, came to see his father for one last time. Although Carl was by now struggling for breath and finding it harder to speak, he managed to compose himself so as not to frighten his little son. I love you, Sam, was all he could say. I love you, too, Daddy, Sam said solemnly.
Contrary to the fantasies of the fundamentalists, there was no deathbed conversion, no last minute refuge taken in a comforting vision of a heaven or an afterlife. For Carl, what mattered most was what was true, not merely what would make us feel better. Even at this moment when anyone would be forgiven for turning away from the reality of our situation, Carl was unflinching. As we looked deeply into each others eyes, it was with a shared conviction that our wondrous life together was ending forever.
It had begun in 1974 at a dinner party given by Nora Ephron in New York City. I remember how handsome Carl was with his shirtsleeves rolled up and his dazzling smile. We talked about baseball and capitalism and it thrilled me that I could make him laugh so helplessly. But Carl was married and I was committed to another man. We socialized as couples. The four of us grew closer and we began to work together. There were times when Carl and I were alone with each other and the atmosphere was euphoric and highly charged, but neither of us made any sign to the other of our true feelings. It was unthinkable.
In the early spring of 1977, Carl was invited by NASA to assemble a committee to select the contents of a phonograph record that would be affixed to each of the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. Upon completion of their ambitious reconnaissance of the outermost planets and their moons, the two spacecraft would be gravitationally expelled from the Solar System. Here was an opportunity to send a message to possible beings of other worlds and times. It could be far more complex than the plaque that Carl and Carl's wife, Linda Salzman, and astronomer Frank Drake had attached to Pioneer 10. That was a breakthrough, but it was essentially a license plate. The Voyager record would include greetings in sixty human languages and one whale language, an evolutionary audio essay, 116 pictures of life on Earth and ninety minutes of music from a glorious diversity of the worlds cultures. The engineers projected a one-billion-year shelf life for the golden phonograph records.
How long is a billion years? In a billion years the continents of Earth would be so altered that we would not recognize the surface of our own planet. One thousand million years ago, the most complex life forms on Earth were bacteria. In the midst of the nuclear arms race, our future, even in the short term, seemed a dubious prospect. Those of us privileged to work on the making of the Voyager message did so with a sense of sacred purpose. It was conceivable that, Noah-like, we were assembling the ark of human culture, the only artifact that would survive into the unimaginably far distant future.
In the course of my daunting search for the single most worthy piece of Chinese music, I phoned Carl and left a message at his hotel in Tucson where he was giving a talk. An hour later the phone rang in my apartment in Manhattan. I picked it up and heard a voice say: I got back to my room and found a message that said Annie called. And I asked myself, why didn't you leave me that message ten years ago?
Bluffing, joking, I responded lightheartedly. Well, I've been meaning to talk to you about that, Carl. And then, more soberly, Do you mean for keeps?
Yes, for keeps, he said tenderly. Let's get married.
Yes, I said and that moment we felt we knew what it must be like to discover a new law of nature. It was a eureka, a moment in which a great truth was revealed, one that would be reaffirmed through countless independent lines of evidence over the next twenty years. But it was also the assumption of an unlimited liability. Once you were allowed into this wonderworld, how could you ever again be content outside of it? It was June 1, our loves Holy Day. Thereafter, anytime one of us was being unreasonable with the other, the invocation of June 1 would usually bring the offender to his or her senses.
Earlier I had asked Carl if those putative extraterrestrials of a billion years from now could conceivably interpret the brain waves of a meditator. Who knows? A billion years is a long, long time, was his reply. On the chance that it might be possible why don't we give it a try?
Two days after our life-changing phone call, I entered a laboratory at Bellevue Hospital in New York City and was hooked up to a computer that turned all the data from my brain and heart into sound. I had a one-hour mental itinerary of the information I wished to convey. I began by thinking about the history of Earth and the life it sustains. To the best of my abilities I tried to think something of the history of ideas and human social organization. I thought about the predicament that our civilization finds itself in and about the violence and poverty that make this planet a hell for so many of its inhabitants. Toward the end I permitted myself a personal statement of what it was like to fall in love.
Now Carl's fever raged. I kept kissing him and rubbing my face against his burning, unshaven cheek. The heat of his skin was oddly reassuring. I wanted to do it enough so that his vibrant, physical self would become an indelibly etched sensory memory. I was torn between exhorting him to fight on and wanting him freed from the torture apparatus of life support and the demon that had tormented him for two years.
Product details
- Publisher : Ballantine Books; Reprint edition (May 12, 1998)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 320 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0345379187
- ISBN-13 : 978-0345379184
- Item Weight : 10 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 0.84 x 8.3 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #114,087 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #156 in Cosmology (Books)
- #162 in Astronomy (Books)
- #348 in History & Philosophy of Science (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Carl Sagan was Professor of Astronomy and Space Sciences and Director of the Laboratory for Planetary Studies at Cornell University. He played a leading role in the Mariner, Viking, and Voyager spacecraft expeditions to the planets, for which he received the NASA medals for Exceptional Scientific Achievement. Dr. Sagan received the Pulitzer Prize and the highest awards of both the National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Foundation, and many other awards, for his contributions to science, literature, education, and the preservation of the environment. His book Cosmos (accompanying his Emmy- and Peabody Award-winning television series of the same name) was the bestselling science book ever published in the English language, and his bestselling novel, Contact, was turned into a major motion picture.
Photo by NASA/JPL [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
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This was the last book he wrote as he was dieing with a rare form of blood cancer. His wife Ann Druyan has 2 chapters she co wrote in the book as well as the Epilogue as Carl was dieing with pneumonia caused by his weakened immune system from chemotherapy against his blood cancer. She had to write the acknowledgements as Carl had passed away.
In Billions and Billions we see a picture of both the late Johnnie Carson( a serious amateur astronomer) and Carl laughing on the Tonight Show. Carl says he never used the term Billions and Billions but that it became linked to him as a possible description of all the stars in the galaxies.
Carl did it all. Co founder and past president of the Planetary society I belong to. He had over 20 honorary degrees from various colleges and universities bestowed on him. He was a fantastic author of many books and scientific articles including the highly successful Cosmos TV series, the book Contact and more. He had the uncanny ability to write difficult scientific ideas in ways for the average layman to understand in an enjoyable reading session. He also helped in the NASA Viking Mars robot landing mission, the gold plated disc that is supposed to last a billion years sent out into deep space with Voyager having mankind's descriptions, music and more, as well as helping to understand the Venus Greenhouse effect that has Venus at almost 900F is hot enough to melt lead and tin with an atmosphere 90 times as dense as Earth's.
He was much more optimistic than me on the possibility of many different kinds of life in the universe in some very harsh environments. Carl tried not to put down others scientific theories and ideas but wanted data in the open for all to test. Not closed data and wishful thinking.
In Billions and Billions again we see his ease of handling huge numbers by scientific notation. There was a very interesting chapter on the destruction of the Ozone layer and the steps we have taken to repair it before its too late and what more needs done. Then there is a chapter on Global warming and a warning that he hopes it not too late and more must be done to get off fossil fuels as soon as possible before we have a runaway greenhouse effect like planet Venus. His biggest fears is the 70,000 plus hydrogen bombs/weapons stockpiled by the US and ex Soviet Union. Carl explains there are so many nuclear weapons that could cause a mankind extinction level event. He says the risk is too great and all countries must disarm now. He even gave a speech to both the US government and Soviet leaders about the need to trust one another to disarm before its too late.
Carl writes about having to go to the head cancer center in Seattle 4 times to battle his reoccurring blood cancer and his repeated bone marrow transplants from his younger sister Cari. His battle for me was heartbreaking and I had much empathy for him. I shed a few tears reading the later part of the book. He tells his kids including Sasha and youngest 5 year old Sam he loves them all. Anne Druyan's closing remark on the back cover made me shed a tear too. It was emotional to me and I got choked up.
Carl's wonderful family and wife Annie was there for him in the end at his bed side.Dr. Carl Sagan a great scientist/astronomer who helped so many to partially understand the wonders of the universe and fought long and hard against nuclear weapons, global warming and the Ozone layer depletion. A wonderful father and husband. Again as a 40 plus year amateur astronomer I miss him and even though he never knew of me, I'm glad to call him my friend. 5 stars a great book.
This wonderful book is organized into three parts. Part one (The power and beauty of quantifications) covers the following: Billions and billions, the Persian chessboard, Monday-night hunters, the gaze of God and the dripping faucet, four cosmic questions and so many suns, so many worlds. The second part (What are conservatives conserving?) deals with the world that came in the mail, the environment, Croesus and Cassandra, a piece of the sky is missing, ambush: the warming of the world, escape from ambush and religion and science: an alliance. The final part (Where hearts and minds collide) focuses on the common enemy, abortion: is it possible to be both “Pro-life” and “pro-choice”? The rules of the game, Gettysburg and now, the twentieth century and the valley of the shadow.
Even though I do not agree with everything Carl Sagan writes about in this book; nevertheless, the vast majority of material is timely and thought provoking. His thoughts on his life and realizing his health was failing makes this a must book to read for fans of Carl Sagan.
In one respect, Carl Sagan will live on through his many classic books.
Rating: 5 Stars. Joseph J. Truncale (Author: Never Trust a Politician: A critical review of politics and politicians).
Peter Payne is also right in that this book is wonderful, and I enjoyed it very much, but that other books by Sagan ( The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence , Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science , The Demon-Haunted World , Pale Blue Dot , Cosmos , and others, prove his genius a lot more. This is why I give it four stars, as this work is Sagan at his most readable, does not give the same kind of learning and reading simultaneously.
This work's first and third parts are the most enjoyable! Like "Very Enjoyable," the second part is takes a lot of patience on the reader's part by the end.
Please forgive my use of other's reviews to make a point, but to comment on each would be the same as is written here, and that would be as scratching on the patience as the second part of this work! Thank you so very much! WilesWales
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Reviewed in Brazil on February 25, 2019