THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 14, 1996 TAG: 9604140274
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J2 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Book Review
SOURCE: BY JAMES SCHULTZ
LENGTH: Medium: 83 lines
THE DEMON-HAUNTED WORLD
Science as a Candle in the Dark
CARL SAGAN
Random House. 457 pp. $25.95.
Human beings are a credulous, naive lot, so desperate for novelty and entertainment that they'll buy almost anything dolled up in a pretty package or peddled by a persuasive purveyor.
That's the forceful argument in The Demon-Haunted World, an engaging new book by astronomer Carl Sagan that assails delusion, superstition, fraud, New Agers and the occasional (alleged) alien abductee. Sagan's mission, as he proclaims in his book's subtitle, is to shine some light into the dark recesses where today's ``demons'' of ignorance and fear yet reside.
The brightest light, he insists, is produced during the rational and relentless pursuit of information and discovery: the process commonly called science.
``Science invites us to let the facts in, even when they don't conform to our preconceptions,'' Sagan writes. ``It counsels us to carry alternative hypotheses in our heads and see which best fit the facts. It urges on us a delicate balance between no-holds-barred openness to new ideas, however heretical, and the most rigorous skeptical scrutiny of everything - new ideas and established wisdom.''
Flawed thinking is the normal state of affairs, according to Sagan. Hallucinations, mistaken assumptions and wrong-headed intuitions are far more common than most of us are willing to admit. We routinely misjudge risk; we turn to psychics and horoscopes for comfort; we accept the most extraordinary claims on the flimsiest of evidence because of emotional need.
Science, on the other hand, has a track record, producing advances that have improved or saved the lives of untold millions. Science has ascended in part because of what Sagan terms ``the fine art of baloney detection.''
``Credulous acceptance of baloney can cost you money; that's what P.T. Barnum meant when he said, `There's a sucker born every minute.' But it can be much more dangerous than that,'' he writes. ``When governments and societies lose the capacity for critical thinking, the results can be catastrophic - however sympathetic we may be to those who have bought the baloney.''
Even experts can be flummoxed by fraud or delusion. Sagan cites two noteworthy, and fascinating, examples.
In one case, a psychoanalyst became ensnared in the private world of a brilliant government physicist who said that he could mentally transport himself into the far future. There, the scientist was the pilot of interstellar spacecraft and an extrasolar adventurer.
Pressed by the therapist to provide details of this future life, the physicist complied. The more answers produced, the more convoluted and - at least, to the therapist - the more convincing the details of this future existence. Could it be the scientist was existing in two separate but linked worlds?
Eventually, the physicist admitted his whole narrative had been invented. He had stopped, the scientist said, because he could see he was emotionally damaging the therapist.
The other episode involved a hoax orchestrated by famed magician and devoted debunker James Randi. Randi captivated and then flimflammed nearly the entire Australian press with the claim that a young American artist could channel the spirit of one ``Carlos,'' a 2,000 year-old disincarnate spirit.
Before Randi was done with the elaborate charade, millions of Australian television viewers and hordes of experienced journalists had been duped.
As refreshing and as welcome as Sagan's book is, it suffers from the disease of declaration. Sagan, trained as a scientist, has retained the stiff cadences of one used to submitting articles to science journals for peer review.
Perhaps because Sagan has written fiction and television scripts - the acclaimed TV series ``Cosmos'' is his creation - we hope for a smoother narrative flow. Despite Sagan's declaration that science is about wonder, there is precious little wonder evoked here; much workman-like prose, certainly, but precious little poetry.
But no matter. That one of America's premier science writers has produced yet another thoughtful, provocative work is comfort enough. MEMO: James Schultz is a staff science and technology reporter. by CNB