"...none of these options are allowed by the framing of the question."
That's not true. The right answer is 'I don't know, and this isn't a question that is answerable by scientific methods known to me.'
That's what is actually factually accurate. If Sagan was touting Atheism he had a religious faith that is not scientifically superable, as many do. There is no evidence there is no god. Anyone that asserts there is no god has faith in that godlessness, because there isn't any evidence to support their contention. Atheism is a faith, just like any Abrahamic faith, Hinduism, or Shinto. There is actually some evidence of Abrahamic faiths and etc, because there are old books that make claims there were eye witnesses to acts of gods. That may not be testable evidence, not a scientifically superable claim, but it is something. That's more than is even potential for Atheism.
Untestable evidence isn't probative of anything IMHO, and this is my assertion. I don't have any evidence that can demonstrate anything of the kind, so I don't assert anything of the kind. However anyone frames any question, I can answer that way, because I can answer the question they should ask, and I am not forced to fall into their linguistic traps.
And that's what you're doing. You're standing up a strawman you can knock down and calling it science. It's not. Science gives the answer I give. I don't know, and I can't test anything in any way I can think of. That's actually the scientific answer, not that there's no god. That's faith, not science.
Thanks!