Billions and Billions:: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium (Hardcover) | Released: 02 Jun 1997

In this book, his last, Carl Sagan shows once again his extraordinary ability to interpret the mysteries of life and the majesty of the universe for the general reader. Brilliant, eloquent, and imbued with Sagan's uniquely childlike sense of awe, this entertaining collection of essays captures the authors spirit at its best.InBillions and Billions Sagan applies what we know about science, mathematics, and space to everyday life, as well as to the exploration of many essential questions concerning the environment and our future. Ranging far and wide in subject matter, he takes his readers on a soaring journey, from the invention of chess to the possibility of life on Mars, fromMonday Night Football to the relationship between the United States and Russia, from global warming to the abortion debate. And, on a more intimate note, we are given a rare glimpse of the author himself as he movingly describes his valiant fight for his life, his love of his family, and his personal beliefs about death and God.Throughout these essays, Sagan provides clarity and understanding for an audience eager to make sense of the world around it as it prepares for the challenges of the coming millennium, and in the process he illuminates his strongly held belief that we have the ability to change the world and our lives for the better.Sagan has said, We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers. With this book, as in his magnificent career, he makes this world significant indeed. From Booklist Carl Sagan died last December, and as a result, these essays exude a feeling of interrupted eloquence. The celebrity planetary astronomer possibly had more books to write that could have compared favorably with hisCosmos (1980) orPale Blue Dot (1994), but disappointingly, this collection does not bloom like those dependable library perennials. Perhaps expectations are overly inflated with a new Sagan exposition in hand--but here, expectations rapidly deflate upon seeing that the contents comprise much reprinted material, such as nonscience articles he and his wife and coauthor, Ann Druyan, wrote for a Sunday newspaper supplement. OneParade piece, advancing their argument in favor of legal abortion, sourly criticizes televangelist Pat Robertson for using his influence to mobilize opposition to the 1990 article, a point that skates over the sway the authors themselves were trying to exert in the abortion controversy by means of their article. In other chapters, the subjects are flat--an explanation of the origin of Sagan's brand-name cliche"billions and billions" --or the subjects are rudimentary. Blemishes apart, this collection offers some worthwhile essays: his account of battling cancer or summaries of the enviro-political issues that he weighed in on, such as ozone depletion and the fossil fuels^-atmospheric warming nexus. However uneven and eclectic, this tome still flashes with Sagan's curiosity, wonder, and humanity concerning the scientific enterprise.Gilbert Taylor From the Inside Flap , his last, Carl Sagan shows once again his extraordinary ability to interpret the mysteries of life and the majesty of the universe for the general reader. Brilliant, eloquent, and imbued with Sagan's uniquely childlike sense of awe, this entertaining collection of essays captures the authors spirit at its best.

In Billions and Billions Sagan applies what we know about science, mathematics, and space to everyday life, as well as to the exploration of many essential questions concerning the environment and our future. Ranging far and wide in subject matter, he takes his readers on a soaring journey, from the invention of chess to the possibility of life on Mars, from Monday Night Football to the relationship between the United States and Russia, from global warming to the abortion debate. And, on a more intimate note, we are given a rare glim