If we talk about popularizers of science, Carl Sagan resonates loudly, who like no other managed to cross the barrier of scientific complexity to transmit his fascination with the cosmos. Through stories and simple explanations, he transmitted his knowledge to inspire more than one around the world.
And the ability to transform a highly abstract and complex world into more digestible forms of understanding is a gift that very few possess. He took it upon himself to put that vastness of intricate knowledge into simple terms. Carl was even able to translate cosmological history into a simple cosmic calendar similar to the one we use today. So that millions could assimilate the immensity of time that the Universe has passed until today.
It escapes our understanding, because the magnitude of the event does not fit into our mental structure. We need to reframe ourselves in abstract terms, to add a new expanded understanding of reality. Precisely, Carl Sagan’s cosmic calendar allows us to compress the 13.8 billion years to the duration of a calendar equivalent to one year and thus be able to understand the magnitude of history.
What is Carl Sagan’s cosmic calendar?
This is a simple way to visually observe the length of time our Universe has passed since the Big Bang. The distribution of the 15 billion years* has been adjusted to the calendar we use to measure the 12 months of the year. That is to say, Carl Sagan’s cosmic calendar is the history of the Universe summarized in one year.
In this distribution, each month would represent 1.25 billion years. Each day is equivalent to 40 million years and each second is equivalent to about 500 years of our history. Barely a blink in the work of cosmic time.
*At the time of Carl Sagan, calculations indicated that the age of the Universe was 15,000 million years. Today we know that the cosmic age is 13.8 billion years.
Chronology of the Universe according to Carl Sagan
In terms of the cosmic calendar, the Big Bang occurred in the first second of January 1. According to the summarized time distribution, La would have been born in May and other systems would have appeared in June, July and August.
The Sun and Earth appeared seven months after the Big Bang explosion, in September, and life emerged shortly after this. According to Sagan himself, humans have emerged so recently that the events in our history occupy only seconds of the last minute of December 31.
We humans appear on the calendar only until 10:30 p.m. on December 31. At 11:46 p.m. of the same day, the men learned to control fire. Just one minute before the end of the day, at 11:59 p.m., rock art flourishes in the caves of Europe and at 11:59:20 p.m., humans learn agriculture. And it is not until 23:59:59 that the historical period known as the Renaissance emerges.
Finally, the year ends, we find ourselves in the present time; the first second of the New Year. Where the expansion of science and technology arises in search of intelligent life in extraterrestrial space.