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Though first published in 1996, this book seems more relevant today than ever before. Carl Sagan was always the great explainer of concepts of science, the universe and our place in them. The subtitle of the book is "Science as a Candle in the Dark" and was written before much of the internet, social media, etc. was accessible to so much of the population.
While the benefits are substantial for connecting the world and providing access to information, our ability to critically filter that information has led to the growth of a new Dark Age instead of an age of enlightenment. As a question posed in the book asks - How can we make intelligent decisions about our world if we don't understand the difference between the myths of pseudo science, New Age thinking, etc. and the testable hypotheses of science? We are overloaded now with so many untested theories, and unproven factoids presented as facts, that many default to unrestrained credulity and the easy way of accepting these rather than the harder path of critical thinking.
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