The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God in Atheists and Skeptics

Sep 04, 2014 Stefany GG rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, thinkful

Me gusta cuando transcriben las conferencias de los grandes pensadores a modo de libro, de esta forma están a tu alcance y te permiten formar parte de ellas aunque no estuviste ahí.

Carl Sagan fue un gran visionario y siempre quiso difundir el conocimiento y la curiosidad como un modo a partir del cual podemos hacernos una mente crítica y valorar lo importante que es indagar más sobre las cosas, formando un entendimiento basado en la ciencia y una continua búsqueda de la verdad. Hace observacion ...more

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Mar 02, 2020 Mark Gowan rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The Varieties of Scientific Experience as a title explains the approach of Carl Sagan's book: that religion is a now unwarranted form of what was once considered to be scientific questioning. A collection of a series of Gifford lectures which Sagan gave in 1985, it shows Carl Sagan at his best. Being Carl Sagan, he shows a degree of patience with religious claims throughout the book but continually pointing out that these approaches consistently fail and pointing out the myriad of reasons that t ...more

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Dec 04, 2011 David S. T. rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: religion, science

This book is a transcript of Sagan's Gifford lectures from 1985, where Sagan discusses his views on the question of if there is a deity. According to Druyan (from the appendix), she felt the need to publish these now with the growing “extreme fundamentalism violence” and when the United States is in a state of “phony piety”. No doubt this was also published because of the growing market for atheist literature. I think its pretty lucky though that Sagan did the lectures 25 years ago and they seem This book is a transcript of Sagan's Gifford lectures from 1985, where Sagan discusses his views on the question of if there is a deity. According to Druyan (from the appendix), she felt the need to publish these now with the growing “extreme fundamentalism violence” and when the United States is in a state of “phony piety”. No doubt this was also published because of the growing market for atheist literature. I think its pretty lucky though that Sagan did the lectures 25 years ago and they seem less agenda driven and far more tolerant towards people of beliefs. I think this distance from the growing new atheist segment is where this book really shines, its far less than an anti-religious polemic but more of a discussion about why when Sagan looks up at night he doesn't see the work of a interventionist deity.

As for the book itself, a major reason Sagan doesn't believe in a god is because of the vastness of space. I can see his point, take a minute watch a youtube video or get a book such as Sizing up the Universe which shows the sizes of the planets relative to the sun and the sun relative to some of the large stars. The earth is just a minor spec in our solar system and our solar system is just a spec in our galaxy and out galaxy is just one of hundreds of billions of galaxies. It definitely puts things into a different perspective, it could cause a loss of faith, if everything was created by a deity and humans were the culmination of creation, then everything else sure seems like a waste. Of course to a theist this could have the opposite effect and confirm how magnificent god is, it all depends on your mindset.

The book is far more than just this one argument though and I don't want to list them all out now. I enjoyed it a bunch, I really liked the Q&A where Sagan was questioned by theists and while disagreeing with them, he seemed to at least respect their opinion and give real answers. This is the least offensive agnostic/atheist book I've read. As for the arguments and book itself, I previously read Pale Blue Dot which contained many of the same arguments (although not as focused), and really if you've read that much of this is redundant (and besides that's a better book all around). ...more

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Dec 07, 2007 Kitty rated it really liked it

Shelves: philosophy, science-and-science-related

Interesting and enjoyable – I could hear Carl’s distinctive voice the whole time I was reading it! A good idea was to use updated pictures instead of the slides he used while giving these lectures in 1985.

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