SOURCE: "Unbeliever's Quest," in Newsweek, March 31, 1997, pp. 64-7.

In the following essay, Adler discusses Sagan's unshakable faith in science over religion even in the face of fatal illness.

A man of science, Carl Sagan didn't want prayers; he wanted proof. He died still waiting for evidence.

Carl Sagan, the famous scientist and author, never asked for anyone to pray for him, although in his final illness many people did anyway. For two years prayers for his health filled the great Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. They rose (if prayers do rise) to the heaven Sagan had never seen in all his years of searching the sky, and were heard (if prayers are heard) by the God Sagan never called on. And God (if he exists) let Sagan die anyway, late last year, at the untimely age of 62, leaving behind a wife, five children and...