The Great Sagan

BookI am reading again of Immanuel Velikovsky, this time of his public interactions with Carl Sagan, widely regarded as a go-to source in the field of astrophysics. I am reading a book by Charles Ginenthal, who apparently had low regard for Sagan. I have read much of Sagan’s popular work, and would not call him a fraud. However, he did not put actions behind his words, and that is Ginenthal’s complaint, as will be apparent below.

Ginenthal published Carl Sagan & Immanuel Velikovsky in 1995, and so knew of the transparency of the Sagan figure long before I even knew of Velikovsky. I take heart that Sagan, who died in 1996, must have known of Ginenthal’s work, published a year earlier. But of course, being Sagan, he would have smugly set it aside. (Ginenthal has also written Stephen J. Gould and Immanuel Velikovsky and Newton, Einstein and Velikovsky. Hallelujah! I’ve been dying for fresh reading material.)

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