TRAVELS WITH… CARL SAGAN
Imaginary travels with great historical figures. This month: a journey through the cosmos with one of Earth’s greatest astronomers.
ANTHONY LAM travels to the edges of the Earth – and the universe – with the American cosmologist
跟隨歷史偉人踏上神遊之旅。本月，地球上其中一位最偉大的天文學家帶我們暢遊宇宙。撰文：林嘉偉
CARL SAGAN WAS an American astronomer and cosmologist. He was not only a great populariser of science: he also helped us appreciate the wonders of our own planet while mentally venturing far beyond it. ‘Exploration is in our nature,’ he said. ‘ We began as wanderers, and we are wanderers still.’
Sagan was born in Brooklyn in 1934, and his interest in astronomy was apparent from an early age. A trip to the World’s Fair in New York when he was four became the defining moment of his life. There, he saw a time capsule being buried, which later inspired him to send Nasa’s two Voyager spacecraft off with their own time capsules. ( Voyager 2 is still travelling to Sirius, the brightest star visible in the night sky, and is scheduled to arrive in 296,000 years.)
He saw too much potential in the cosmos beyond to be confined to a single planet. He writes in The Cosmic Connection: ‘ There is a place with four suns in the sky – red, white, blue and yellow; two of them are so close together that they touch, and star-stuff flows between them. I know of a world with a million moons. The universe is vast and awesome, and for the first time we are becoming a part of it.’
For Sagan, travel was less a physical act Carl Sagan是美國天文學及宇宙學家，他不僅是推動科學普及的功臣，還讓我們懂得欣賞地球的奧妙，並且更進一步，思考地球以外的世界說。他 過：「探索未知領域是人類的天性，我自們 盤古初開已在大地上到處周遊，至今依然漫遊四方。」
Sagan在1934年出生於紐約布魯克林，自幼已展現出對天文學的濃興厚 趣。年方四歲時，他到紐約參觀世界覽博 會，成為響影一生的經歷。他在展覽中目睹一個時間囊被埋在地下，此情此景啟發他來後 將美國太空總署兩台Voyager太空探測器方往太空時，在裡面均裝入時間囊。Voyager二號至今依然繼續太空旅程，朝夜空中最明亮的天狼星進發，計預於296,000年後抵達。
在他眼中，宇宙絕不侷限於一個星球，而是蘊含著超乎想像的無限。可能 他在《The Cosmic Connection》一書中寫道：「遠方有一個地方升起四個太陽，分別呈紅、色色色白 、藍及黃，色 當中兩顆靠得極近，甚至互相碰撞，體星 的物質在它們之間浮游。我也知道另一個世界，它擁有百萬個月。亮 宇宙壯闊無垠，而我們第一次為成 其中一部分。」
對Sagan而言，旅行與其說是一項實質活動，不如說是一生追尋宇宙奧秘的一次探奇。
他大概會想足踏 暫時仍未能觸及的木星大紅，斑 一睹這團比地球大一倍的橢圓形風暴。，接著 他會嘗試攀上火星的奧林
and more a lifelong pursuit of his curiosity about the universe.
Though it still remains out of reach, he’d want to travel to Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, a swirling oval storm twice the width of Earth. The next stop would be Mars’ Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the solar system. This vast mountain measures 624 kilometres across and rises almost 22 kilometres above the Tharsis plains, almost two and a half times the height of Everest. And no trip with Sagan would be complete without visiting the Apollo 11 landing site at the Sea of Tranquillity, where, in 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first people to set foot on the Moon.
We can but dream. But part of Sagan’s legacy is the way once dry and dusty museums and labs have been transformed into places of wonder and exploration.
Back on Earth, our Sagan tour starts at the Hayden Planetarium in the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, which first sparked his passion for astronomy; then continues to the Yerkes Observatory in Wisconsin, where Sagan did research during his time at University of Chicago; and the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, where Sagan spent most of his teaching career.
Sagan never made it to Europe. But the stargazer would have loved the Gornergrat Kulm Hotel, on Switzerland’s Gornergrat ridge, 3,120 metres above sea level. The two towers of the adjoining observatory contain the Kosma telescope and the Gornergrat infrared telescope, giving views of the stars that were Sagan’s passion throughout his life.
The astronomer passed away in 1996 when widespread space travel was still very much a distant dream.
In Cosmos, he write: ‘ We have lingered long enough on the shores of the cosmic ocean. We are ready at last to set sail for the stars.’ 帕斯火山，窺探這座太陽系最龐大的火山，其直徑足足有624公里，從Tharsis高原拔地而高起， 22公里，大概是珠穆朗瑪峰高度的兩倍半。Sagan的旅程想必少不了月球，讓想像馳騁到太空船阿波羅11號著陸的寧海附近，重溫Neil Armstrong和Buzz Aldrin在1969年實現人類次首 踏足月球的舉壯 。
我們只能懷有夢想，但Sagan留下來的瑰寶之一，是把乏味而灰暗的博物館和實驗變室 成值得探索的奇妙地方。
與Sagan同的行星際，旅程將以地球為終站。我們首先來到紐約市，走訪美國自然歷史博物館內的Hayden Planetarium天象館，那裡正是發啟 他矢志探索宇宙奧秘的地方；然後我們前往威康斯 辛州的Yerkes Observatory天文台，回溯Sagan在芝加哥大學任研究生的足跡；最後我， 們去參觀波多黎各的Arecibo Observatory天文台，那裡是Sagan任教時間最長的地方。
Sagan一生從未踏足。歐洲但如果你是星象迷，應該會愛上瑞士的Gornergrat Kulm Hotel酒店這。 間酒店矗立於海拔3,120米的Gornergrat山脊，毗連的天文館設有兩座高塔，住客可利用塔內的Kosma望遠少及Gornergrat紅外線望遠少一， 窺Sagan終身嚮往的星海。
這位偉大的天文學家於1996年辭世。當時，民間太空旅行是常仍 非 遙遠的夢想。
在《Cosmos》一書中， Carl Sagan指出：「我們在宇宙的岸邊徘徊已久，現在終於準備就緒，可以航向遙遠的星際了。」