ALN Monthly Book Club: The Demon-Haunted World (Old Town)

For our June Monthly Book Club, we will be reading Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark!"

We will be hosting this event IN PERSON, outdoors, at Presidio Park in Old Town! We recommend (but do not require) that attendees wear masks and maintain social distance.

We typically meet at the picnic tables in the shade at the end of the loop made by Cosoy Way. Please see the embedded map below for more details.

Content warning: N/A. Details not given here to avoid spoilers. Contact an organizer if you have concerns about the book's content.

Carl Sagan presents a scientific examination of pseudoscience, debunking historical fallacies while warning how modern misinformation threatens democratic freedoms in our technology-driven society.

Questions:

1. Intro: What is your name, and what is your favorite science fact?
2. Carl Sagan spends quite a bit of the book debunking pseudoscience. What pseudoscience were you surprised to hear about? What pseudoscience were you surprised NOT to hear about?
3. This book was published in 1995. What has happened in science since then that you think Carl Sagan would have opinions about if he'd lived to see it?
4. Sagan discusses the policy of nuclear deterrence by mutual destruction, which assumes all nuclear governments are run by rational actors. What other old world assumptions should be revisited in our new world?
5. Carl Sagan worried about a time when America, after becoming a service and information economy, would become mired in superstition and darkness. America in the intervening time has succumbed to this prediction. Was there any way of avoiding it? What can America do to pull itself out of it?
6. The psychoanalyst Robert Lindner began to believe in the fantasy world dreamed up by Kirk Allen until Kirk Allen confessed he’d made it all up. Why, with no direct evidence, did he begin to believe? Why do we fall for others’ “Invisible Dragons in the Garage?”
7. Carl Sagan posited that “The values of science and the values of democracy are concordant, in many cases indistinguishable,” but also that “democracy can also be subverted more thoroughly through the products of science than any pre-industrial demagogue ever dreamed.” Do you agree with these statements, and how can science be used to subvert democracy?
8. 60 Minutes Australia and James Randi were able to convince a large number of people that Randi was able to channel the ancient spirit Carlos, and continued to do so even after the hoax was revealed. Why is it so hard for people to give up such beliefs, and is there any way to help them let go of them?
9. Throughout history there has been a persistent “delusion” in the Western world that there are ‘sexually obsessive non-humans who live in the sky, walk through walls, communicate telepathically, and perform breeding experiments on the human species.” In the past they were believed to be demons, now they are aliens. Why do you think this belief began and how has it persisted throughout the centuries?
10. What is one thing you learned from this book that has changed what you believe or how you live your life?

We hope to see you there!

Upcoming Events:
July: The Chaotic Orbits Trilogy, by Beth Revis
August: The Spear Cuts Through Water, by Simon Jimenez
EPIC: The Priory of the Orange Tree, by Samantha Shannon
September: 2026-2027 ALN Book Selection!