Carl Sagan On The Problems We Face Today

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]I'd like to stress that the problems that face us were made by people. There is nothing about them that cannot be unmade by people. Uh we have made extraordinary changes in what we consider obvious. Uh and of course when we make those changes then we forget.

[00:00:21]But for example, there was a time not so long ago when the view of the divine right of kings was widely held worldwide. Famous scholars wrote famous textbooks on this subject. there was a vast vested political interest to uh maintain this view uh especially among kings and uh yet in fact there was even a uh a war fought here partly on that issue. Um but that view is not to be found very often uh today. I mean except for some minor places like uh I don't know Thailand and the United Kingdom uh this is this is a view that uh that is gone uh or considered chatt slavery. the uh the view that some people are by right masters and some people are by right slaves and that the slave holders could do what they wanted with the slaves and break up families and all the rest of that. This doctrine was vigorously supported by Aristotle.

[00:01:36]It uh was considered to be an obvious truth. Not only that, that it was God-given that that's the way the world was to be arranged. But there's been a stirring worldwide revolution. Uh and there are very few places on the earth in which cattle slavery is considered acceptable or permissible or socially respectable today. Well, the vested interests in the divine right of kings and in slavery seem to me far greater than the vested interests in continuing the nuclear arms race. although there certainly are such vested interests and uh everybody on the planet has something to gain from reversing the nuclear arms race and uh I think this is something that can be done but only if we understand the nature of the issue and if we're willing to uh to take courageous personal steps to turn the situation