Can we know the Universe? The question Sagan poses as his title will have a very different answer depending on the person you ask. Different answers throughout history have been central to philosophical, theological, and intellectual movements. Even though Sagan's scientific breakdown of the question is very compelling and accurate, it still does not strike the metaphysical implications of the question. But despite that, Sagan's answer is correct in that it is a way to "know the universe". In this sense, Sagan's way is one way of many. Sagan's way of knowing the universe contrasts Blake's mysticism and focus on innocence vs. Experience. For Walt Whitman, he knows the universe by experiencing it fully as a leaf of grass would. Whitman functions more on the level of actual experience as a way to comprehend the vast expanse that is the universe. In this way he embodies the Romantic image of divine moments as the peak experiences in life.

Even though Sagan is the only one of these authors who outright suggests the question, all three are trying to figure out how to know the universe and their place in it through their writing. In this way, famous authors mirror a decision that all people must face in their life: Figuring out how it is that you view the world. Perhaps this is what makes all three authors so appealing, in sharing their unique perspectives, they remind us of ourselves and our own search. Personally I have been faced with this question in my own life recently, specifically in a conversation I had with my grandmother about religion, and finding your place in the world.

This conversation started by discussing my own plans for next year, and what I should expect upon turning 18. My grandmother then revealed to me that she had married my grandfather when she was 18, essentially having run off from her family to elope. This was all the more scandalous because she came from an orthodox Christian family, and he was a much older atheist mathematician. From what my grandmother has taught me, it seems like her worldview has been very much influenced by this event in her life. She is still very religious, but she is a critical thinker, and forms her own theological expressions in a way that fits with her morals, and worldview. As the conversation slipped into religion, I divulged how I had become more open to religious thought over the last year, especially the eastern variety, but was still resistant to christianity. As she described her own particular strand of christianity though, I realized that stripped down of all of it's cultural and historical context religion is all quite similar. It functions as a vehicle for virtuous conduct, and meaningful experience that can, and should be interpreted however fits with one's viewpoint.

But then when I took this thought process further I realized, that much of philosophy can also be stripped down in this way. Even if the actual specifics are different, they are all comments on the human experience, and how the author chooses to interpret it. In this way you could come to the neat conclusion that as the greek say all of life exists in two seperate spheres: pathos (knowledge), and mythos (spiritual). With philosophy, and religion falling under the latter, and science under the former. But Carl Sagan puts a wrench in this possible conclusion by making science fully his worldview, thus combining pathos and mythos into his unique, emotional relationship to the scientific world. In his first sentence Sagan says "Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge".

Though this may run contrary to the Greek way of thinking, we can still put Sagan's view under the same umbrella of worldviews as religion, and philosophy. Sagan simply takes his personal perspective, his mythos, and applies it to what the cold hard facts are, the pathos. In this way, Sagan creates a beautiful crossroads of thought-processes which undoubtably led to his great success as writer, and why he is considered a "popular science writer".

Thus as a conclusion I'd advocate for people to have worldviews similar to Sagan, where the rational is combined with the beautiful and mysterious, to form a well-rounded view of the universe. This isn't to say in this view that people should discount other emotional writer such as Whitman and Blake, or if it is even necessary to take science into account at all. Because that's the beauty of making your own viewpoints about things, you do not need to go by one source, or ideology. People can mix and match in a way that works with them personally. So when I suggest being similar to Sagan, I do not suggest following him strictly. But rather I suggest taking viewpoints from different sources, ones that are both purely rational, and ones that are spiritual/philosophical. Keeping both sides of experience in mind can make a person a well-rounded individual. And I know as I continue to form my worldview, I will attempt to do this for myself.