Sagan on fire breathing dragons

I had never seen this short article written by Carl Sagan until today. I’ll leave my comments on it for tomorrow. Until then, enjoy and read:

“A fire-breathing dragon lives in my garage”

Suppose (I’m following a group therapy approach by the psychologist Richard Franklin) I seriously make such an assertion to you. Surely you’d want to check it out, see for yourself. There have been innumerable stories of dragons over the centuries, but no real evidence. What an opportunity!

“Show me,” you say. I lead you to my garage. You look inside and see a ladder, empty paint cans, an old tricycle — but no dragon. “Where’s the dragon?” you ask.

Continue reading Â»

By the way, Carl Sagan was one of those people I completely worshipped as a kid. He was smart, specifically knowing a lot about physics and astronomy. Most importantly, he had that show Cosmos which helped reinforce this opinion to, at least, me. If you don’t know who he was, I highly suggest reading about his life a bit over at Wikipedia.

About this entry

You’re currently reading “Sagan on fire breathing dragons,” an entry on Jason Lancaster

Published:: 02.20.07 / 1pm

Category:: Religion

Previous entry:: Wicking layers
Next entry:: Commentary on the fire breathing dragons

About

I have three passions: Dancing, climbing, and technology.

I am a Lindy Hopper, a style of dance that began in the early 1920’s. I dance with Charm City Swing, Baltimore’s premier swing dancing venue. You will find me EVERY Monday night on the dance floor.

I live to climb things. It took me 25 years to figure this out but I can’t imagine life without it. I primarily enjoy bouldering — For me, the lack of ropes and freedom take bouldering to purest level of climbing.

I founded and work at Fusion Bay, a web application development firm with Adam Douglass. We program cool things for clients and ourselves, like the popular Wordabble iPhone application and GiftListIt.

Loutre 02.21.07 / 3pm

when you were a kid, you believed in santa claus. not because you found pieces of his beard, not because you saw footprints by the fireplace, not because you ever had evidence that he actually existed. and of course, as a physical entity, he doesn’t exist. but his spirit, the spirit of christmas, does exist. i won’t go into the yes, virginia story; you can read that on your own. so whether or not the dragon exists in some physical manifestation that we as humans can understand and prove is not really the issue. rather, it’s the faith that people have in the dragon, and therefore, whether the dragon then becomes more than a dragon, and in essence, a spirit that lives within us all.

Daddio 02.22.07 / 5pm

Hmmm… the godless geeks website is down today. Perhaps a little retaliatory lightning strike from an angry god — or a firey blast from an angry dragon?

I read the essay yesterday when the site was up. It’s a good one. Fits right in with stuff I’ve been thinking about lately since reading Richard Dawkins’ THE GOD DELUSION, which your baby sister got for Xmas but I got to read first (she’s too busy with biology, calculus, text messaging, and such). Thanks for bringing such an intelligent, logical and entertaining little essay to my attention!

Jason Lancaster 02.22.07 / 6pm

Hmm. If the godless geeks website continues to be flakey I might have to steal that essay and republish it here. I didn’t because I don’t know if it is copyrighted. If anyone reading ever can’t get to it, just search google for sagan the dragin in my garage.

Daddio 02.22.07 / 6pm

You mean “sagan the DRAGON in my garage”.

Hey, got an idea for making this blog more user-comment friendly. Add some HTML automated stuff, so people can do links like you did just now without knowing HTML code. You know, click a button to add a link.

Jason Lancaster

Sagan on fire breathing dragons

About this entry

4 Comments

Have your say

About

Recently

Pages

Categories