One year supplies a common quantitative frame
Define an explicit quantitative mapping from an unfamiliar magnitude to a familiar scale, place several examples on it, and reuse the same mapping later so comparisons remain connected.
The Dragons of Eden
Carl Sagan · 33 weeksOne year supplies a common quantitative frame
SHORT SOURCE EXCERPT“compressed into the span of a single year”
Sagan defines a cosmic year from the text’s chosen fifteen-billion-year timespan, states day and second equivalents, and places selected events in readable pre-December and December 31 lists. The close uses the same frame to compare human history with the much longer preceding account and to look toward a second cosmic year.
The device is a reusable coordinate system rather than an isolated simile. Its declared conversion lets the reader connect examples across very different magnitudes while the uncertainty note distinguishes exact-looking placement from the quality of the underlying dates.
The source in context.
The text compresses its chosen cosmic timespan into one year and places selected events on that scale. Readable date lists and the closing account concentrate recorded human history near the year’s end, while acknowledging uncertainty and selection.
Open this chapterWhat this example supports
The device is a reusable coordinate system rather than an isolated simile. Its declared conversion lets the reader connect examples across very different magnitudes while the uncertainty note distinguishes exact-looking placement from the quality of the underlying dates.
Its limit
The calendar uses this historical text’s age assumption. LF322 explicitly qualifies chronology and omissions; the December graphic itself was not inspected, so this account relies on the prose and readable lists.
Source & edition
Carl Sagan, The Dragons of Eden; supplied Ballantine/Random House ebook text, copyright 1977 by Carl Sagan, eISBN 978-0-307-80100-5, version v3.1_r2; the filename’s 2011 date is not confirmed by an internal publication-date statement.
Supplied text, lines 316–399. The short quotation is checked against the source.
The completed whole-source AI synthesis supplied candidate observations and the broad argument map. This Codex editorial pass checked original source headings, section boundaries, openings and selected argumentative contexts; inspected every retained example; checked the existing pattern dictionary and base examples; and rewrote or rejected nominations. It is a source-checked editorial pass, not a new independently adjudicated whole-book reading.
supplied Ballantine/Random House ebook text, copyright 1977 by Carl Sagan, eISBN 978-0-307-80100-5, version v3.1_r2; the filename’s 2011 date is not confirmed by an internal publication-date statement