Carl Edward Sagan was born in Brooklyn, New York, on November 9, 1934. Carl graduated from the University of Chicago, studying planetary science and extraterrestrial intelligence. In 1968, he also became the director of Cornell Laboratory and worked on several NASA projects. Finally, Carl Sagan brought the idea of Nuclear Winter to the world in 1983, with the help of computer models and some of his colleagues, to tell us how Nuclear Winter could destroy humanity.
Carl Sagan assembled the physical messages sent into space to Pioneer Plaque and Voyager Golden Record. Those were sent to the area by putting in NASA’s Pioneer and Voyager Spacecraft so that this message could be sent to the civilization where it would reach some time. Carl was also an author, has authored several books and academic papers, and was the narrator and author of the award-winning TV series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, which became the most famous scientist in the 1970s and 1980s.
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Carl Sagan’s early life
Born on November 9, 1934, in Brooklyn, New York, Carl Sagan was interested in astronomy since childhood. His parents learned this when Carl was five. Samuel Sagan, a Taylor, was Carl’s father and Richel Molly was the mother of Gruber. Carl used to say that the Sense of Wonder in him came from his father, “In his later years as a writer and scientist, Carl often draws on his childhood memories to illustrate scientific points and reflect on his mother’s father’s thinking effects.
In 1939, when Carl was 4, his parents took him to the New York World Fair, New York World Fair he saw much future science and technology, including a Time Capsule; Davidson writes that the idea of a time machine thrilled Carl, Carl and his co-workers would make similar capsules, capsules that will be sent to the galaxy. Carl says, “That time in his life was one of the most defining moments that became a turning point.”
Carl’s family cared for his European relatives during World War II. Although Carl was generally unaware of the ongoing war, that time was difficult due to World War II. Carl includes his memories of that struggling period in his book The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, but his curious thoughts were never negatively impacted by the Second World War.
Carl Sagan’s Education
Soon after entering elementary university, he expressed intense curiosity about nature. Carl had started going to the public library alone when he was 5, as he had to know what “stars” were. However, at that time, none of his friends, parents, or teachers gave him a clear answer.
Carl used to say, “When I went to the librarian and asked for a book about the stars, the answer was amazing; the sun was a star that was so close to us, the stars were the sun, but so far they were only small points of light, this vastness of the universe. Suddenly it opened up to me. It was a kind of religious experience. It had a grandeur that never left me.”
At about 6 or 7 years old, Carl Sagan and a friend of his went to the American Museum of Natural History Museum across the East River in Manhattan, where he went to the Hayden Planetarium and the museum’s space objects, such as meteorites of dinosaurs and animals in natural settings Demonstrations went around. Carl also considers those trips to be changes in his life.
Carl’s parents fully supported him in education, seeing his growing interest in science. After reading science stories from writers such as HG Wells and Edgar Rice Burroughs, his imagination about life on other planets like Mars was strengthened, and he soon became a fan of science fiction stories and extraterrestrial life.
Carl was studying at Boody Junior High School in 1947 when he was 13, but soon his father’s job led his family to move to New Jersey, where he completed his high school at Rahway High School. Carl Sagan was an extraordinary student, and his teachers knew this, so his teachers often told Carl Sagan’s parents to teach Carl in a private school, but due to lack of money, his parents did not give him to a private school.
Carl was very good at chemistry. In his home, he also maintained his chemistry laboratory, where he studied the structure of Molecules and Molecules. At that time, Carl was primarily interested in astronomy as a hobby, but as he became aware of Astronomy, he made Astronomy his career goal.
Carl Sagan received his high school degree at 16 in 1951. He moved to the University of Chicago, where he collaborated with physical chemist Harold Urey at HJ Muller’s Laboratory, writing a thesis on the origins of life and his own on the possibility of Alien Life Increased attraction.
Carl Sagan’s Scientific Career
In 1955, Carl received a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree with a BA in Physics. Four years later, he went to the University of California after obtaining his Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics, where he assisted in developing the infrared radiometer in NASA’s Mariner-2 robotic probe. In the 1960s, he worked at Harvard University and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. His early work focused on the physical positions of the planets, particularly in the atmospheres of Venus and Jupiter. During that time, Carl became interested in the possibility of life beyond Earth and the discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence. However, at that time, extraterrestrial intelligence was a contentious research area that Carl Sagan pushed forward.
In 1968, he was appointed director for the study of planets in Carl Cornell University’s laboratory, and three years later, he became a professor. Re-working with NASA, Carl helped determine where the Viking Probe would reach Mars and also helped prepare messages from Earth that were sent beyond our solar system by Pioneer and Voyager Spacecraft.
In his thirties, Carl Sagan began speaking on issues that attracted his attention, such as Interstellar Flight and the idea that Aliens came to Earth thousands of years ago. He also talked about UFOs—all these things used to be exciting news for ordinary people at that time.
In 1968, when he was a noted figure in the scientific field, he worked in Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey. Carl was the most famous scientist in the United States in the 1970s and 1980s. Those whose Cosmic Connection an Extraterrestrial Perspective (1973), Other World (1975), The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence (1977) and their novel contact, etc., all attracted the attention of the scientific community and general audience.
In 1980, Carl Sagan co-founded the Planetary Society and became an award-winning person in a highly influential TV series “Cosmos: A Personal Voyage,” which he wrote and hosted. Cosmos increased people’s interest in science; later, he wrote a book on it. One of his other famous works was Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994), the next sequel to Cosmos, taken from the famous “Pale Blue Dot” photograph during the Voyager mission.
In 1981 Carl Sagan launched a campaign for nuclear disarmament, using his status as a celebrity and scientist to pursue his political goals, and became an opponent of President Ronald Reagan’s strategic defense initiative.
In 1983, he brought Nuclear Winter from the nuclear war to the world, and the following year he was awarded several awards during the career of Carl Sagan, who co-authored The Cold and the Dark: The World After Nuclear War. Distinguished Public Service Medal of NASA Public Welfare Medal of the National Academy of Sciences, and the John F. Kennedy Astronautics Award. Carl used to pay a lot of attention to his career; perhaps this was why he was divorced twice. In 1961 Carl Sagan married writer Andrew Yan, and the two were always together.
Death
After suffering from Myelodysplasia for two years and after three Bone Marrow transplants, he died of pneumonia at the age of 62Even after his death; he remains a famous and popular scientist in science.
Sources
- Spangenburg, R., Moser, K., & Moser, D. (2004). Carl Sagan: A Biography. Greenwood Publishing Group.
- Davidson, K. (2000). Carl Sagan: a life.
- Impey, C. (2000). Carl Sagan, Carl Sagan: Biographies Echo an Extraordinary Life. American Scientist, 88(1), 74.
- Impey, C. (2000). Carl Sagan, Carl Sagan: Biographies Echo an Extraordinary Life. American Scientist, 88(1), 74.
- Carl Sagan | Biography, Education, Books, Cosmos, & Facts. (n.d.). Encyclopedia Britannica.
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