Dr. Carl Sagan CNN Interview with Ted Turner

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• published: 21 Jan 2013
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In this classic interview from 1989, Dr. Carl Sagan, possibly the greatest populariser of fundamental science in modern history, has a conversation with CNN founder and environmental philanthropist Ted Turner. Ted Turner, like many others, acknowledged Carl Sagan's message about the importance of scientific reason about difficult matters such as environmental destruction and the threat of nuclear war early on and is responsible, in part, in drawing attention to the issue of environmental destruction to the masses. Turner undoubtedly monopolised the cable television sector making CNN one of the most powerful forms of mass media on earth. Fully aware that his financial gain was the direct result of the high technology of the time, Turner had responsibility to interview one of the leading scientists in the public sphere back then. Carl Sagan realised that part of the problem of nuclear war and global warming was the lack of understanding that the damage they can cause are both non-mutually exclusive to the countries that are responsible and the countries which are not responsible. In other words, greenhouse gases and radioactive smoke and dust do not recognise borders between countries, CO2 and radiation do not carry passports. Carl Sagan's work in the consequences of nuclear winter, which he derived mainly by Mie Scattering calculations of dust molecules in Martian dust storms, predicted to happen under certain conditions following a nuclear war was a key part in the development of the theory of Nuclear Winter which is one of the leading arguments against the perceived stability in the policy of Mutually Assured Destruction (M.A.D). Other scenarios, such as atmospheric irradiation, which would permanently destroy the Ozonosphere, and long term radioactive fallout are probably more likely, and more disastrous, scenarios making Carl's predictions somewhat optimistic. Moreover, human made climate change induced by CO2 and Methane emissions by intense industrial society has been predicted, using computer modelling at MIT and Caltech and others, showing a runaway global warming effect if Arctic and Antarctic permafrost is melted which would release huge amounts of trapped methane into the atmosphere warming the earth by perhaps 5 degrees or more at the equator, up to 12 degrees at the poles which would cause sea and ocean levels everywhere to rise as well as shifting of ocean and air currents causing unpredictable and much more energetic weather formations. Continuous Ozone depletion and water acidification and contamination are also serious issues as is the issue of fresh water shortage, which will tally the consequences of climate change to everyday human life. Carl Sagan shows us that our technological progress, unregulated, gives humanity the power to do utter devastation to the environment and to the human species itself. logically regulated however, Carl has taught us that the proper use of technology and the proper action to scientific knowledge can also do great good to the soften the impact of a technical civilization on the environment and towards helping the human community on a global scale. We should start taking Carl Sagan's and many others' example of thinking of the border divides between countries as imaginary to avoid global catastrophe by the threats of warfare by weapons of mass destruction and by global warming and environmental destruction. The silver lining of such actions would be, as Carl Sagan observes, the driving force that unites the human species to become a planetary civilization. Other Issues such as global poverty and the importance of science and mathematics education, fundamental science research and exploration are discussed and some more esoteric topics are discussed as well such as life on other planets, the philosophical implications of future technologies, the existence/non-existence of God(s) and the possible future of the human species.