Talk:Carl Sagan/Archive 2

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Demon Haunted World does not apply its own science tools to disproving ghost experiences

Late in his life, Sagan's books developed his skeptical, naturalistic view of the world. In The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, he presented tools for testing arguments and detecting fallacious or fraudulent ones, essentially advocating wide use of the scientific method. The book takes for granted as fact Sagan's personal belief, and does not use these tools to show, that all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions. The compilation, Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the End of the Millennium, published after Sagan's death, contains essays written by Sagan, such as his views on abortion, and Ann Druyan's account of his death as a non-believer.

I believe the above paragraph needs the sentence I've highlighted, to portray points both ways about the book. Without this point, the book is just getting praised. A member who objects to the sentence but has not offered his own rewrite, has asked for it to be brought to discussion. I propose that putting it back on-page is allowed if there have been no answers here within a day. Tern, 10:04 Aug 22.

Tern, I appreciate that we disagree with the need for this sentence, but please do not misrepresent my edits. I have offered a rewrite, which exists as the article stands right now (8-22): Critics of The Demon-Haunted World complain that Sagan dismisses religious and spiritual experiences as delusions. I believe this succinctly makes the criticism of the book very clear.

Allow me to lay out my specific problems with the sentances as you've inserted them into the article:

• A description of Sagan's book is not the place for criticism of Sagan's ideology. Sagan may, in fact, "take for granted" that experiences of paranormal activities are delusions -- but this isn't necessarily outlandish. The proper way to deal with a problem within the article is to offer lanague which makes it clear Sagan's views are not universally accepted. It is not appropriate to offer clearly biased statements against Sagan's lack of belief as "balance" for percieved inbalance.

• I do not believe that, as the article existed, it was baised. The paragraph clearly stated the intent of Sagan's book: to use scientific principles in weighing potentially fallacious arguments. No agressive statements against paranormal experiences are made as the paragraph previously stood. The precieved bias seems to be an issue of disagreeing with skepticim. I do not believe that this paragraph is praising the book simply by lacking reference to other beliefs. I do think that the agressive language being inserted is a problem, as it does not relate directly to the content of the paragraph, it states an opinion of Sagan's work as a factual statement, and has heavily anti-nonbeliver overtones.

• Loaded language. The sardonic use of the word "just," the judgemental phrase "takes for granted." Words like these make the additions seeme like they are intended to be an attack on Sagan and skepticism, not an attempt to improve the article. NPOV does not mean "balance": two equally heavy-handed or biased statements. It means approaching the article in as neutral and aloof a form possible. If criticism of Sagan's book is to be included, opinions should be stated clearly as opinions: "criticims of Sagan's book include"; and not as facts: "The book takes for granted." It seems to me that you want a "criticism" sub-topic in the article. If this is the case -- by all means, add one.

• Form. Perhaps my biggest criticism for the inserted lines are simply that they are wordy and unclear. Both versions are run-on sentences. "The book for granted as fact" is not proper English. "Just," as used in the first edit is a colloquialism. "Psychiatric" and "delusion" are redundant. I'm pretty sure "paranormal" is a pejorative. Inserting the specific issues of "life after death" and "paranormal" when they are not addressed in the text before hand is poor form.

• If I might embark on a slightly less serious tangent: Of course Sagan is dismissive of what he saw as superstitions. It is not necessary to insert statements to this effect in every article about outspoken atheists anymore than it is necessary to insert "...is dismissive of of non-Christians" in every article about an evangelical. The article is clear about Sagan's lack of religious beliefs, and it is clear that his worldview would be influenced by that. It is not necessary to bring repeated charges against him because of his ideology.

Finally, I don't think your call for a day-long discussion is a legitimate amount of time. While the internet may be instantanious, people's lives are not. It may take longer for a discussion to develop. ~CS 13:43, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

---

I’m sorry about the length of this reply to Tern (see above), but I want to give people who have not read the book a chance to judge the validity of Tern’s claim.

"The book takes for granted as fact Sagan's personal belief, and does not use these tools to show, that all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions." (source: Tern, see above) What does it mean to say that a "book takes something for granted"? This would seem to mean that the book adopts a position with no explicit mention or analysis of the evidence that exists to either support or contradict that position. In the specific case of "The Demon-Haunted World" and life after death, what does Sagan do?

First, the issue of an after life is not a major part of the book. The book discusses beliefs in an after life as one of many popular beliefs for which there is not good scientific evidence. Sagan's most concentrated attention on the idea of life after death comes in Chapter 12, "The fine art of baloney detection". However, Sagan recognized death as a major human concern and as early as page 8 he is already discussing the importance of science as man's most successful way of dealing with disease and death. By the time Sagan reaches Chapter 12 he had already discussed many beliefs that have no significant objective evidence to support them including belief in: alien UFOs, magic, "recovered memories", miraculous apparitions, and the dangers of satanic witches. This all takes 200 pages and Sagan measures the objective evidence for such beliefs against the evidence for alternatives such as: UFOs do not involve alien beings, "recovered memories" are invented memories, apparitions are hallucinations. In each specific case, after discussing the evidence for the two different alternatives, Sagan asks, "Which is more likely?" He is asking the reader to make an informed decision. That is the main point of the book; that people become informed so that they can decide for themselves. Sagan is not in the business of taking anything for granted.

What does Sagan use as a starting place in Chapter 12 for introducing the issue of belief in life after death? He describes his own desire that he could contact his own dead parents and he writes, "Plainly, there is something within me that's ready to believe in life after death." Next, he says that this is not just him; a tendency towards belief in an afterlife is part of being human. Sagan mentions that sometimes in dreams he seems to have contact with his parents; a very emotional experience. Sagan points out that our readiness to believe in life after death leaves us open the dishonest "medium" who tells us what we want to hear- that contact with the dead is possible.

Sagan reminds us to look at the evidence. Is there verifiable evidence that any "medium" is passing along to us the words of a dead person? Sagan says that he is eager to find evidence for life after death. This echoes his well-known crusade to reveal any evidence of alien UFOs that might have been hidden by government secrecy. Sagan is not one to hide from evidence, but after reviewing the words of several "channelers," he says, all we get from "channelers" is, "banal homilies," and other unverifiable "puerile marvels". Sagan comments that it is common for people to believe and not question when they hear what they want to hear: tales of life after death and life eternal.

Chapter 12 then goes on to mention many other beliefs that have no significant objective evidence to support them and he launches into his presentation of a "baloney detection kit", a set of guidelines for judging if objective evidence supports a claim and if certain types of arguments for a belief are valid forms of argument. The topic of belief in life after death comes up once more, briefly, in Chapter 15. Chapter 15 is about the reactionary social forces that are aligned against science and the idea that human belief should be guided by objective evidence. Sagan makes the observation that belief in life after death can have benefits for societies, particularly in times of war. People who believe that we only have THIS life are more reluctant to fight and die than are people who believe that they will live again. Sagan always wants to understand why people believe things without needing objective evidence, and this observation about the sociology of belief in an after life completes Sagan's analysis. In the case of the very common belief in life after death, Sagan has identified three supporting reasons for such belief: we naturally want to believe, we have experiences that can be interpreted as contact with the dead (such as Sagan's own dreams) and cultures that promote belief in life after death may have a survival advantage. Note that objective evidence for life after death is not a reason for why people believe.

Next, we must ask, where is an account of, "Sagan's personal belief.....that all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions"? At the start of Chapter 12, Sagan describes his attitude towards people who believe in life after death. He creates an imaginary example, a widow who "talks to" her dead husband. This is where Sagan says he understands such behavior and that such behavior is "about humans being human" and there is NO talk of "psychiatric delusions".

Sagan does not make much use of the term “delusion” in his book (it is not an item in the index). On page 173 he discusses a hypothetical situation in which a group of people believe that dragons exist even though the only existing evidence to support it seems to have been faked. Sagan writes, “Once again, the only sensible approach is to reject the dragon hypothesis, to be open to future physical data, and to wonder what the cause might be that so many apparently sane and sober people share the same delusion.” In other parts of the book, he does discuss President Reagan’s habit of confusing movie plots with reality, invented witness testimony and reports of alien encounters and miraculous visions. As discussed above for his analysis of belief in an after life, Sagan tries to suggest reasons for such beliefs without calling them delusional. Our brains can fool us (due to fatigue, drugs, illness), some people get attention by inventing stories about unusual experiences, sometimes a kind of social hysteria takes over and people misrepresent natural events as supernatural, sometimes people invent and say what they think other people want to hear. Yes, sometimes people suffer from "psychiatric delusions" and a mental health problem might account for some strange beliefs (we now know that Reagan had Alzheimer disease), but Sagan knew that such disease is relatively rare and he did not make wholesale dismissals of common beliefs such as belief in life after death by blaming "psychiatric delusions."

Conclusion. For anyone who actually reads Sagan’s book, the statement, “The book takes for granted as fact Sagan's personal belief, and does not use these tools to show, that all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions," can be seen to be a strange thing to say. First, as someone devoted to letting the objective evidence decide debates, Sagan is most careful not to push unsupported personal beliefs on the reader. He made a public career of science advocacy out of writing books that present evidence and reasoned arguments. Second, it is not clear exactly what Tern is trying to contribute to the article. Tern needs to identify a specific personal belief of Sagan and show us a specific place in the book where he “takes it for granted”. In particular, trying to be generous in interpreting the intent, Tern may be trying to imply that Sagan took for granted that there is no after life. Sagan’s discussion of the idea of an after life in “The Demon-Haunted World” (summarized above) shows that Sagan looked at the evidence and rationally based his belief on the facts. The entire book is about looking at evidence so that people can decide for themselves what to believe. Sagan does not seem to take anything about his disbelief in an after life for granted, nor does the book. It is true that Sagan does not “show, that all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions." There is a simple reason for this. Sagan does not believe that “all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions." If this is what Tern’s sentence is meant to imply, it is a misrepresentation of Sagan’s views. Tern’s desire to insert this sentence into the ‘’’Sagan’’’ article cannot be construed as “telling the other side of the story” or giving us a more complete view of the book. Tern’s claim/claims are not supported by the facts.

I have to add that Tern’s repeated insistence that the sentence is helpful to the article does not seem to be simple error or understandable confusion about the content of the book. Sagan’s free-thought approach is routinely attacked by reactionary institutions. There are many people who have never read Sagan’s books but have been told by “authorities” how to react to them. In particular, I have no doubt that some “Critics of The Demon-Haunted World complain that Sagan dismisses religious and spiritual experiences as delusions.” However, it is troublesome to leave such a complaint unanswered in the article. The idea that Sagan dismisses religious and spiritual experiences as delusions is intentionally misleading. Clearly there could be some religious and spiritual experiences that have been delusional and Sagan would be brave enough to label them as such. However, Sagan did not dismiss the phenomenon of religious and spiritual beliefs as being delusional. He admitted to having his own experiences that could be labeled as “spiritual” and he described such experiences as normal human experiences. An easy to misinterpret “hot button statement” like “Critics of The Demon-Haunted World complain that Sagan dismisses religious and spiritual experiences as delusions.” Has no place in the ‘’’Sagan’’’ article. I think it is troublesome that allowing such misleading statements into the article is viewed by some editors (sorry User:CS42) as a reasonable “compromise”. Allowing such a misleading statement is not reasonable.

Honestly, I'd rather no such sentance exist at all, and agree that a "Criticism" or "Reaction" section would be a far better procedure. I included the sentence as a temperary measure after Tern insisted that some version remain. It seemed a better alternative than to leave the clearly inappropriate and confusing lines intact. Otherwise, I concur with your analysis. ~CS 20:21, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

If we want to do things right, there should be an entire section in the article that discusses criticisms of Sagan and each complaint can be fully explored. I think this is justified in Sagan’s case because like other people who have questioned dogma, Sagan has become a target for criticism by reactionary forces. The Darwin article has a section called “reaction” where the voice of his critics is heard, and the ‘’’Sagan’’’ page could have something similar. I suggest we start such a “reactions” section and start by moving “Critics of The Demon-Haunted World complain that Sagan dismisses religious and spiritual experiences as delusions.” To that new section. I will be happy to write a critique of that criticism along the lines of what I wrote above. --JWSchmidt 20:11, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

• The sheer length of these answers suggests a lot of defensive emotion has been unleahsed. So does attacking the opposition's character: in fact that is one of the unscientific methods of argument the book describes. Assuming that anyone who has disagreements with Sagan is a "reactionary force" - eh? That is doctrinal paranoia. It's treating science like religion, after you have made with no evidence personal attack on meof accusing me of opposing free thought. And the way you describe that is as a psychological assumption you make against anyone who disagrees with Sagan! - eh?
• Not having chosen to buy the book I'll have to access a copy again to answer the demands for pinpoint references. Meanwhile, those who have copies could tell us whether they deny it is true that: every time the book mentions audio or visual experiences apparently associated with extracorporeal personalities, it describes a psychiatric episode as an explanation for them,and expects you to take that as the actual explanation. It does not,right there in the same point in the text, weigh the merits of the spirit explanation against the psychiatric explanation, for the particular experience, nor does it question the psychiatry is right. At one point - a stand-alone sentence,and notthe bit about his parents - it says that a spontaneous auditory hallucination of a voice can make people into strong believers in ghosts, but does not lift a finger to discuss the merits of calling it a hallucination.
• I like the present "temporary" sentence, if "psychiatric" is added before "delusions". "treats" describes it better than "dismisses" and is less pejorative. The importamnt point I was originally trying to get at, was that the book does not attempt in any way to apply the baloney detection rules, Occam's razor, etc, to the psychiatric delusion theory of spiritual experiences. Failiure to apply his ideas consistently. If there is that failiure, it becomes one-sided to describe the book without saying so.
• Sure Sagan analysed other sources of evidence on life after death, but not this one.

Tern, 00:56 Aug 23

If anything I wrote seems to be a personal attack on user Tern, I am sorry. I was trying to justify including in the article a new section for "reactions" to Sagan. There is often resistance within wikipedia for including such sections in articles. I tried to make the point that for some historical figures such as Sagan, a complete description of their importance in history should include reactions to their work. In my view, user Tern's sentence about The Demon-Haunted World fits into an identifiable pattern of reactions to Sagan's published ideas. I think that the Sagan article could benefit by explicitly including and discussing such reactions to Sagan's work. If user Tern rejects my characterization of the possible intent of "The book takes for granted as fact Sagan's personal belief, and does not use these tools to show, that all personal paranormal experiences related to evidence for life after death are psychiatric delusions." then I apologize for representing the sentence in an objectionable way. Tern has given (see above, 00:56 Aug 23) a self-characterization of the intent of the article contribution that is under discussion, and I accept that characterization. I still think it would be best to put contributions like Tern's in a new section of the article that would be specifically for complaints and other reactions to Sagan and his works. --JWSchmidt 14:09, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Good proposal if you've got material to write such a section with,from your knowledge of his critics. It means his work gets reviewed in a pro and con way. As an ideas man you'd expect him to favour that! tern 03:55, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Immanuel Velikovsky

The comments added by User:24.125.31.67 do not seem to agree with what is said about Sagan at the Immanuel Velikovsky article. --JWSchmidt 13:21, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I also find the added text to be unnecessarily disparaging and poorly written, but as a Sagan fan, perhaps I am just not capable of reading it objectively. If the text stays, "It could be argued" should be removed and the article needs to decide whether Sagan's response to Velikovsky was a "campaign" or a "debunking"; obviously I'd prefer the latter. —HorsePunchKid→龜 23:43, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I posted a request for help at Talk:Immanuel Velikovsky. I have never read either Velikovsky or Sagan's analysis of Velikovsky. --JWSchmidt 00:21, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

I saw it over there. I read Sagan's stuff many years ago and I have reviewed some of it over the last coupld of days. Is there anything specific you need help with now? Bubba73 (talk), 04:53, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

As has been exhaustively documented by various Velikovskian societies, Sagan's AAAS piss-take of Velikovsky was egregiously wrong in almost every statement he made. (This is not to say that Velikovsky was right either, of course ;-) But at least he sincerely believed what he was saying, unlike Sagan's cynical hatchet job) There have been whole books published, dismembering Sagan's paper. If I wasn't at work this morning I'd look 'em up... ;-)--feline1 09:28, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

I would like to see some specific examples: Velikovsky made claim X, Sagan said Y about X. We know that Y was a cynical hatchet job because Z. There have also been whole books published dismembering Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, that does not mean that they are featured on the Charles Darwin Page. --JWSchmidt 13:12, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Have a look at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1561840750/104-5591005-7998341?v=glance --feline1 14:26, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the link, feline1. I wish I had the time (and motivation, more unfortunately) to read the book, since the reviews are clearly quite mixed. It seems like this was (and remains!) a very polarizing issue. The section has to be substantially reorganized if the new text remains, since it was apparently just stuffed into the middle of the existing paragraph. Perhaps when this reorganization is done, the harshness ("frought [sic] with errors and logical fallacies") can be toned down. —HorsePunchKid→龜 14:40, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, the "was Velikovsky right?" debate is a rather open-ended one ;-) However, what is pretty unequivocable is that Sagan peppered his AAAS address with a lot of silly crowd-pleasing strawmen to poke fun at Velikovsky. He delivered them with such panache that he won most of the audience over (for the only other interpretation would have been that Sagan was dishonest) ... sadly this seems to have been the reality. For example he ridiculed things like V claiming plagues of frogs rained down from Venus - the audience lapped it up - but V, of course, had claimed no such thing. But Sagan cleared off before V could rebutt him, and the mud was already slung. It took Sagan two years to rewrite his AAAS philippic into a proper paper for the proceedings, as he had to remove all the muck ... many claim to have debunked his debunking in even this paper, however. But then that's where the fun really starts, a la Ginethals' book.--feline1 14:54, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Sagan's response to Velikovsky (I read the version published in Broca's Brain) is deliberately sarcastic; it is directed at a popular audience and, as Jerry Pournelle pointed out, Sagan filled the huge gaps in Velikovsky's arguments with his own, frequently amusing assumptions (usually clearly recognizable as such). Velikovsky's defenders then tried to use this as evidence that Sagan's arguments were fallacious, because for many of Sagan's claims, they said: "But we never said that .." They felt that science needed to catch up with them, not the other way around, and simply avoided discussing the ridiculous premises of Worlds in Collision (about interpretation of ancient texts, about probability of certain events, etc.), instead resorting to catch-all arguments like: "Sure, it looks unlikely today. But wouldn't that be true for any sequence of events?"

This makes it absolutely vital that we do not simply repeat claims that Sagan's arguments were fallacious, as this article previously did. That would be a bit like saying that A Modest Proposal is fallacious. It would be more accurate to see Sagan's review of Velikovsky as part scientific paper, part popular science lecture. It's a fair criticism to say that Sagan should have written just one or the other; Velikovsky's work is so shoddy that you don't need any calculations to disprove it to a rational audience, and he could have dismissed it in a few pages. His presentation in Cosmos was much more appropriate, if still a bit lengthy.

As it was, Sagan was dragged into a "debate" which to a large extent strengthened Velikovsky's followers, as they felt that "science" was doing a poor job debunking their made up theories. This is the reason why many biologists refuse to debate proponents of creationism (including its ID variant). But, it's a catch-22: If you get into a serious scientific debate, the pseudoscientist will use this as proof that he is a scientist, after all, his work is debated in scientific papers. If you don't, he will speak of repression and present himself as a heretic fighting a biased system. Perhaps Sagan was looking for a middle ground; effectively, what he got is the worst of both worlds.

Velikovsky has always appealed to those who want to see "real truths" in ancient sacred texts, waiting to be discovered. They associate some positive emotions with those texts, and wish to validate these emotions somehow. Velikovsky provides this validation under the guise of science. It is very similar to the "ancient astronauts" phenomenon, and it is no coincidence that both were discussed in the same book by Sagan.

Accordingly, the followers of Velikovsky often see themselves as a sort of avant-garde in science, the leaders of a revolutionary new thought model which unites religious and scientific truths (in actual fact, science itself already has subsumed as much truth from religious texts as is supportable by evidence). But we have to keep in mind that the part of Velikovsky's work discussed by Sagan is entirely rejected by the scientific community. Accordingly, we should present the views within the scientific community about Sagan's approach to Velikovsky. This would be more of a methodological analysis of debunking pseudoscience rather than a "point/counterpoint" presentation of Velikovsky's views. Such a point/counterpoint analysis, for all practical purposes, belongs into the article about Immanuel Velikovsky, not here.--Eloquence* 07:11, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Eloquence, you’ll have to do better than that! ;-) I appreciate this is only a Talk page, but you’re just blustering here really. Sagan *did* make errors in his scientific material - his flaws were not simply just in rhetorical strawman - the quote from the NASA scientist in the main article is a classic example of this. As for Velikovsky, you rail again him being "wrong" above without dealing with specifics, in terms of the physics that would be necessary to support his scenarios. Notwithstanding this being epistomologically dubious, it is also unnecessary: if one wants to pick holes in V’s work, the place to do it is in his treatment of literary and mythical sources, which is what he used to base his theories on. Various people have demonstrated the problems with his use of various sources, often with skillful and meticulous work - Sagan wasn’t one of them though, he was more just a p*ss artist.--feline1 08:36, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

As I have said, this is not the place to debate the merits or lack thereof of Immanuel Velikovsky's pseudoscientific works. Please read the section in Wikipedia:Neutral point of view about pseudoscience:

If we're going to represent the sum total of human knowledge, then we must concede that we will be describing views repugnant to us without asserting that they are false. Things are not, however, as bad as that sounds. The task before us is not to describe disputes as though, for example, pseudoscience were on a par with science; rather, the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view; and, moreover, to explain how scientists have received pseudoscientific theories. This is all in the purview of the task of describing a dispute fairly.

Pseudoscience can be seen as a social phenomenon and therefore significant. However, pseudoscience should not obfuscate the description of the main views, and any mention should be proportional to the rest of the article. [all emphasis mine]

Again, the right approach to this article is to spend more time describing the scientific reaction to Sagan's approach at debunking Velikovsky, specifically the methodological criticism thereof, not to give a point/counterpoint account of Velikovsky's pseudoscientific work. And again, it has to be absolutely clear that Sagan's response to Velikovsky's ideas was not a scientific paper, it was a chapter in a pop-sci book, with many of the simplifications and much of the humor that are typical for that form of writing. It was written mostly because Worlds in Collision became a beststeller, and Sagan saw it as a dangerous example of pseudoscience resonating with the masses.

Sagan quite solidly demolished Velikovsky's premises, but in the process also used arguments which could easily be deconstructed by the Velikovskians. The problem is that Sagan got lost in the detail of Velikovsky's work, rather than focusing just on its premises. Effectively, he fell into the trap of the "paradoxers", as Sagan himself called them. Most pseudoscience rests on fundamentally flawed premises -- creationism, homeopathy, Worlds in Collision -- but uses elaborate scenarios to justify these premises. Once you start debating these scenarios in detail, you are almost certain to lose through the aforementioned catch-22.--Eloquence* 09:10, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Eloquence, applying the pejorative label "pseudo-science" to Velikovsky's work is POV in the first place, and is entirely the point at issue! The whole point is that Sagan just decided to debunk V with sarcasm, (often getting his physics and maths wrong in the first place!), and failing to critique V's use of various humanities disciplines (archeology, linguisitics, history, comparative mythology etc etc) which were the *actual* basis for his ideas, not physics. It could be said that this was because Sagan had a view that "science" was superior to the humanities, and this 'arrogance' reduced the effectiveness of his intellect. This backfired on him (and science) as it was recognised by many of the public, making them disinclined to believe in "science" and more sympathetic to what Sagan was trying to debunk.--feline1 09:32, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

This is a talk page, we are exchanging points of view. The article should not state that Velikovsky's work is pseudoscience, but it should treat it accordingly, as described in the NPOV policy which I cited. As for Velikovsky's treatment of the humanities: Sagan wrote that he was impressed by it in a similar way some people from the humanities he spoke to were impressed by Velikovsky's treatment of physics (but thought his texual analysis was rubbish), but felt equally incompetent to comment upon it. Insofar as Sagan did in fact "get his physics and maths wrong", we should not simply assert this, but attribute it to scientific authorities. Things are rarely as simple as they seem in a soundbite, and Sagan wrote a response to Jastrow's critique and probably others; this, too, should be summarized and included.--Eloquence* 09:51, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, hmmm, ... I think I'd summarize it this way: if the main purpose of the article is ultimately to provide a short biography of Sagan, then a main thrust for this bit is: he was an advocate and populizer of "science" to the public, but he did appear to do it in a rather cavelier/"arrogant" way at times. His run-in with Velikovsky is a good example of this. Sagan's ego and/or belief that "science" was superior to the humanities led him to discourse at times in a less than rigorous way, and this actually backfired on his attempts to populize science - he turned off some of the public, making them think of "science" as some kind of experts' closed shop, protecting their own theories and ignorant of the insights of other disciplines. It is "true" that this occured, and whether or not Velikovsky was "right" or "wrong" is quite separate from that.

This is your personal view, and it has no place in the article as such.--Eloquence* 10:37, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Auch fer goodnessakes - I'm not trying to push my personal view of Sagan - I'm suggesting that the article should be able to document a summary of the *public's* "personal views" of Sagan, in terms of Sagan trying to educate the public about "science", and his success or failure to do that, based on their reaction to him or perception of him as "arrogant". There clearly is a fair amount of documented evidence of this phenomenon - we had a link up there to a book about the Velikovsky example, no doubt there's other pertinant examples too which could be used.--feline1 10:58, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

That doesn't make much sense. "The public's personal views"? The question is: Did notable individuals portray Sagan as arrogant? If not, did some survey or poll show that many members of the general public perceived him in this way? Since "arrogance" is a fairly elastic term and easily taken as an insult, it is not something we can state or conclude as fact; it needs to be attributed to sources.--Eloquence* 11:28, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

it has nothing to do with "notable individuals", it has to do with the Joe Ordinary's whom Sagan wanted as an audience for his TV shows, books, articles, etc. The "fact" we want to document is not some subjective POV quality of Sagan, it is how *other people* regarded him: *that* isn't POV, it's widely recorded actuality--feline1 11:40, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

And your source for this is..?--Eloquence* 12:14, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

The Hackenthorpe Book of Lies--feline1 13:58, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

OK - there have been assertions made that Sagan did not make any errors of fact in his address at AAAS conference on Velikovsky, nor in the heavily-revised paper he provided for the proceedings 2 years later - that his only mistakes were in cheeky strawmen popularisations which apparently "don't count" in some way... I don't believe this is the case. I did some searching with people more knowledgeable on the subject than I:

- Shulamit Kogan (V's daughter, who had a degree in Physics) had a letter published in "Physics Today", Sept 1980, pointing out errors in Sagans "Analysis..." paper, 

as did Leroy C Ellenberger (chemical engineer and editor of pro-Velikovskian 'Kronos' journal) (in "Physics Today" April 1981). NASA scientist Jastrow published his criticsm of Sagan (the stuff where he pointed out that Sagan had ignored gravity and 'Velikovsky was the better astronmer') in the New York Times in late 1979 and in "Science Digest", 1980, which was reprinted by the UK Society for Interdisciplinary Studies in their "SIS Review". Ginethal's book (see reference to Amazon above) contains further material and Kronos published a "Scientists Confront Scientists Who Confront Velikovsky" book as well. Peer reviewed scientific periodicals did not deign to publish corrections to Sagan, as the whole point of the AAAS seminar was to discredit V and therefore publishing things discrediting Sagan would have rather defeated the object!--feline1 14:28, 4 October 2005 (UTC)