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My grandfather was in the US Air Force and has served as lieutenant general. He told me a story about the time he met Carl Sagan. He organized a conference on s

by Jerry2 5y ago

My grandfather was in the US Air Force and has served as lieutenant general. He told me a story about the time he met Carl Sagan. He organized a conference on space for USAF officers and someone suggested he invite Sagan to give a keynote speech. My grandfather told me that Sagan was trouble from the start. He (or his office?) cancelled or delayed the conference multiple times and his list of demands for lodging rivaled those of a rock band. He also said he was rude and never smiled. After he gave his speech, one of the colonels asked him a question that my grandfather said was good and interesting but Sagan dismissed him in one sentence and didn't even want to engage him on it. BTW, that colonel is now a general and in charge of USSF!

sandworm101 5y ago
I've seen scientists reacts strangely to military people. There are all sorts of reasons, mostly based on false assumptions about the sort of people who chose a military life. But equally, lots of famous people are just jerks. Many at the top of thier fields, be them scientist or admiral, got there by walking over or past other people.
- freedomben 5y ago
  > mostly based on false assumptions about the sort of people who chose a military life. Very good point. The prejudice against military people is very real, especially in tech. I took my military service off my resume and unless directly asked about it I try to avoid disclosing it.
  - sandworm101 5y ago
    Any company with a culture that causes vets to hide thier service should look long hard at their diversity program. If they cannot tolerate a former soldier they are probably pretty intolerant of all sorts of other groups too. I was walking home one day, in uniform through a rural area, when i helped push a car out of a ditch. The lady driving seemed to recoil at me. But then her husband explained that i was not a hunter, that the camo was a uniform. She was vegan. She has seen me walking through the area in early mornings and thought i was scouting for deer.
    - tidenly 5y ago
      Military service isn't a protected characteristic or something inherent in a person. It's a choice, and one people may take issue with if they're anti-imperialist.
      - sandworm101 5y ago
        >> Military service isn't a protected characteristic or something inherent https://www.justia.com/employment/employment-discrimination/military-status-discrimination/ https://www.justia.com/employment/employment-discrimination/... "The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) prohibits employment discrimination based on an employee's past, present, or future military service. This federal law applies to anyone who performs duties in the "uniformed services," whether involuntarily or voluntarily." "Unlike many of the other anti-discrimination statutes, which apply only to employers of a certain size, USERRA covers all employers in the United States, irrespective of size. Part-time or probationary employees receive as much protection as full-time employees under USERRA." So yes. Soldiers are a protected class for purposes of discrimination. If people in your employ feel they need to hide thier military service, that is a serious liability that needs to be addressed asap.
      - freedomben 5y ago
        This lines up well with my theory that most people know so little about the military that they think what motivates a person's decision to join must be support or desire for imperialism. I joined after 9/11 and watching live on TV while fellow humans had to choose whether they wanted to die from leaping out the window or die from fire and smoke inhalations. I wanted to help make sure that something like that never happened to my friends again. The idea of colonizing a foreign land never entered my thoughts.
        kidme5 5y ago
        Hopefully it entered your thoughts after Iraq and Afghanistan?
        5y ago
kidme5 5y ago
Someone like Sagan who values collective human consciousness probably wouldn't meld with guys bent on militarizing space. Deep philosophical differences. Hard to judge your story without knowing what question exactly was asked.. Guess: "Is Space the ultimate high ground??"
- thrashh 5y ago
  It’s a pretty simplistic view to regard someone doing something that you don’t understand as irrational, especially when you’re not in or will ever be in their shoes. You’d think past some age, people wise up to the nuance of the world.
  - kidme5 5y ago
    Carl Sagan had different existential assumptions. He constantly writes about the need for humanity to value it's collective and fragile existence as a whole, whereas the military cares more about WHO gets to exist and which group of people dominate the other. Excerpt: THE PALE BLUE DOT OF EARTH Image: NASA Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. -CS
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]

by Jerry2 5y ago

sandworm101 5y ago

I've seen scientists reacts strangely to military people. There are all sorts of reasons, mostly based on false assumptions about the sort of people who chose a military life. But equally, lots of famous people are just jerks. Many at the top of thier fields, be them scientist or admiral, got there by walking over or past other people.

freedomben 5y ago
> mostly based on false assumptions about the sort of people who chose a military life. Very good point. The prejudice against military people is very real, especially in tech. I took my military service off my resume and unless directly asked about it I try to avoid disclosing it.
- sandworm101 5y ago
  Any company with a culture that causes vets to hide thier service should look long hard at their diversity program. If they cannot tolerate a former soldier they are probably pretty intolerant of all sorts of other groups too. I was walking home one day, in uniform through a rural area, when i helped push a car out of a ditch. The lady driving seemed to recoil at me. But then her husband explained that i was not a hunter, that the camo was a uniform. She was vegan. She has seen me walking through the area in early mornings and thought i was scouting for deer.
  - tidenly 5y ago
    Military service isn't a protected characteristic or something inherent in a person. It's a choice, and one people may take issue with if they're anti-imperialist.
    - sandworm101 5y ago
      >> Military service isn't a protected characteristic or something inherent https://www.justia.com/employment/employment-discrimination/military-status-discrimination/ https://www.justia.com/employment/employment-discrimination/... "The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) prohibits employment discrimination based on an employee's past, present, or future military service. This federal law applies to anyone who performs duties in the "uniformed services," whether involuntarily or voluntarily." "Unlike many of the other anti-discrimination statutes, which apply only to employers of a certain size, USERRA covers all employers in the United States, irrespective of size. Part-time or probationary employees receive as much protection as full-time employees under USERRA." So yes. Soldiers are a protected class for purposes of discrimination. If people in your employ feel they need to hide thier military service, that is a serious liability that needs to be addressed asap.
    - freedomben 5y ago
      This lines up well with my theory that most people know so little about the military that they think what motivates a person's decision to join must be support or desire for imperialism. I joined after 9/11 and watching live on TV while fellow humans had to choose whether they wanted to die from leaping out the window or die from fire and smoke inhalations. I wanted to help make sure that something like that never happened to my friends again. The idea of colonizing a foreign land never entered my thoughts.
      - kidme5 5y ago
        Hopefully it entered your thoughts after Iraq and Afghanistan?
        5y ago

kidme5 5y ago

Someone like Sagan who values collective human consciousness probably wouldn't meld with guys bent on militarizing space. Deep philosophical differences. Hard to judge your story without knowing what question exactly was asked.. Guess: "Is Space the ultimate high ground??"

thrashh 5y ago
It’s a pretty simplistic view to regard someone doing something that you don’t understand as irrational, especially when you’re not in or will ever be in their shoes. You’d think past some age, people wise up to the nuance of the world.
- kidme5 5y ago
  Carl Sagan had different existential assumptions. He constantly writes about the need for humanity to value it's collective and fragile existence as a whole, whereas the military cares more about WHO gets to exist and which group of people dominate the other. Excerpt: THE PALE BLUE DOT OF EARTH Image: NASA Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. -CS
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]