Carl Sagan

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."

"The cosmos is a vast living body, of which we are still parts."

"Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge."

"For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love."

"Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere."

"The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence."

"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle."

"Skepticism is the highest of intellectual virtues."

"All civilizations become either spacefaring or extinct."

"The brain is like a committee of experts."

"Science demands a tolerance for ambiguity."

"Wonder is the beginning of wisdom."

"Books are the most portable form of immortality."

"We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology and yet the scientific literacy is plummeting."

"The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena."

"In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position was mistaken.'"

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be discovered."

"Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality."

"A central tenet of science is that all claims must be open to testing and criticism."

"Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star."

"The cosmos is within us. We are made of starstuff."

"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."

"I am proud to be made of the stuff of the universe."

"When you make the finding yourself you feel the full force of that new truth."

"In every conceivable manner, the family is link to our past, bridge to our future, and bond to one another."

"The preservation of life on Earth is humanity's most important task."

"Understanding is a kind of ecstasy."

"There is a gulf of mutual incomprehension between science and the humanities."

"The sky calls to us. If we do not destroy ourselves, we will one day venture to the stars."

"For me, it is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion."