fbpx

Sagan, Stars and Grains of Sand

[additional-authors]
May 12, 2015

Who could look at the stars and yawn? Certainly not astronomer “>here; see also, Sagan, Cosmos (Random House 1980) at 4, 196.) It was a wonderful reference.

We may sense that there are a lot of stars in the sky, but with the naked eye it is hard to pinpoint and count them, even or maybe especially on a clear night. Sand is somewhat different. We can take a fistful of it at a beach, survey the area, think about the coast lines of the various continents, and then factor in countless interior beaches. Sagan says that our hand will hold about 10,000 grains of sand. (Cosmos, at 196.) Without help, we may not be able to do the math or know the result of the equation, but we can understand that the beaches hold an enormous number of grains of sand.

What Sagan did not say is that his two subjects, stars and sand, were invoked long ago in the “>Hosea’s prophecy — the dissolution of the Northern Kingdom of Israel due to internal corruption and external military forces — is among the earliest of preserved writings of its kind. After expressing God’s disenchantment with the House of Israel, Hosea consoled with a prediction that the people of Israel and of the Southern Kingdom of Judah would be reunited: “The number of the people of Israel shall be like the sands of the sea, which cannot be measured and counted . . . .“ (See Hos. 2:1-2.)

  • The Northern Kingdom was destroyed by the Assyrians around 722 BCE, and a number of northerners did migrate south. But a century plus afterwards, the Kingdom of Judah came under attack by the Babylonians. As he sat in prison contemplating the destruction of Judah, “>second Isaiah chastised now exiled Judahites but also promised them that they will, through the success of God’s servant “>about six million Jews in modern Israel. To them, 6,000,000 would seem to fulfill the ancient promises. Imagine their surprise if they learned that there are almost “>world population of Jews totaling just under 14,000,000.

    Perspective is important, however, and those 14,000,000 collectively do not exceed two-tenths of one per-cent of the “>between 0.05 and 2mm in diameter. For purposes of our calculation, a cubic millimeter of sand will serve as the volume of an average grain of sand.

    The volume of sand on the world’s coastal beaches is a product of the length, width and depth of those beaches. The length of coasts can be determined reasonably well by modern technology, but not all coasts have beaches. Most estimates of the fraction of beach shore to coast range from about one-fifth to two-fifths. The length but especially the width of a beach varies throughout the day as tides ebb and flow. Naturally, the depth of the beach will then vary as well. One “>Another approach puts the number of grains at 5 billion billion, including those on inland beaches. Either way, the result is more than a few sextillion (a billion billion) grains of sand.

    Calculating the number of stars in the sky presents different challenges than counting the grains of sand on the Earth’s seashores. Instead of having a reasonably fixed parameter with which to work, like the number of miles of seashore, the stars are set in a universe which is not only expanding, but “>NASA’s relatively new “>other, newer space observatories, “>galaxy 13.2 billion light years way. We do not know, of course, and cannot know, if that star system has survived. We may be seeing stars that no longer exist. Conversely, stars are being born all the time. The light from some of these young stars may not have had time to reach us yet. If it takes 5 billion more years to get here, we will never see it as our “>us with it.

    What we can say is that our Sun is one of over one hundred billion stars in its galaxy, the “>400 billion.

    As Hubble and other observatories probe deeper and deeper into space, they see farther and farther back in time. Astronomers now believe that there may be 100 to 500 billion galaxies in the known universe. The “>Andromeda galaxy located only 2.5 “>M13 galaxy found in the constellation Hercules, are rounder and are known as globular clusters. The most massive galaxies, the largest known one of which is the “>Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Andromeda may contain “>a hundred trillion stars. Conversely, dwarf galaxy may hold just one to ten million stars. Consequently, a reasonable range of the “>here.) So Carl Sagan was right.

    Now some folks may conclude from all of this that the Hebrew Bible has been proven, once again, to be a faulty guide. The reported promise from God that the number of descendants of the Jewish patriarchs would exceed the number of stars in heaven or grains of sand on the seashore has not come true. Moreover, science through Sagan and others has shown definitively that the promise will never be fulfilled.

    The literalists would be literally correct, of course. But, as they often do, they miss the greater messages of biblical literature. First, the recorders of the patriarchal legends and the prophets cited above were not seeking to make a scientific point, or a mathematical statement about demography. They were, rather, expressing their faith in their social and political future. They were asserting, even as Americans echoed a similar assertion over two millennia later, a mixture of confidence and hope in a doctrine of “>open letter which acknowledged: “As scientists, many of us have had profound experiences of awe and reverence before the universe.” Five years later, and just one year before he died, Sagan contended that “science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality.” Summarizing Sagan’s approach to the sacred, Dartmouth religion professor “>Aaron Zeitlin once wrote:

    Praise Me, says God, and I will know that you love Me.
    Curse Me, says God, and I will know that you love Me.
    Praise Me or curse Me,
    And I will know that you love Me.
    . . .
    But if you sit fenced off in your apathy, says God,
    If you sit entrenched in, “I couldn’t care less,” says God,
    If you look at the stars and yawn, . . .
    Then I created you in vain, says God.

    Both Carl Sagan and the authors of the Hebrew Bible would ask the same question: How can you look at the stars and yawn?

  • Did you enjoy this article?
    You'll love our roundtable.

    Editor's Picks

    Latest Articles

    Print Issue: Got College? | Mar 29, 2024

    With the alarming rise in antisemitism across many college campuses, choosing where to apply has become more complicated for Jewish high school seniors. Some are even looking at Israel.

    More news and opinions than at a
    Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.

    More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.

    More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.