Silent Spring

It's always interesting to read a book like this that has been so influental after its message has already had its impact. I read this in high school and was deeply impressed not so much by its content -- for the reader today it should come as no surprise that indiscriminate use of pesticides carries undesired effects with it -- but by Carson's beautiful, poetic writing even when talking about such dry topics. For a book that is doing nothing less than an alarm cry and an impassioned plea for change I was surprised by its gentleness. Silent Spring is not so much a polemic (although it is that too) as a hymn in praise of the harmony of nature and a plea not to be all too hasty in disturbing that balance. While the use of chemicals has show more been reconsidered in the decades since the book was written, this message still remains as relevant as ever. show less

Given my interests and the timing of this book being published, one would think I would have read this book decades ago. It was certainly well known already when I was deep into my higher education pursuits so many years ago. I had always assumed it would be rather dated and much overshadowed by more modern research, if I were to read it now. Plus, I don't recall the last time the title of this book and DDT were not directly connected in comments I read about one or the other of the two. As it turns out, the book is startling in its applicability to today's world, especially one in which environmental protections are exuberantly being stripped off like so many layers of skin on a human being by a stunningly misguided government show more administration. (Can someone please pass a law requiring all candidates be able to read?) True, DDT is not much in the news now, but this book speaks directly and fluently about the very same issues that face the world now as to those it faced back in 1962. I have read other books that were more adept at stating their case about the intricacies of trying to manage our environment, but this book does a fine job of it and is well worth the read even now. show less

The scary thing about reading this book at a fifty year remove, is not that one learns of new threats to our ecosphere, or even that many of the dangers highlighted are still in existence, it is that the corporate powers had to be dragged, screaming and kicking, into an admission of each threat. We have no reason to presume that this reluctance has passed into history and so, all that the last fifty years has accomplished is that the apologists have learned more subtle ways to gain-say the danger.

In 1962, the poison producers simply brushed aside the concerns of the people, nowadays, they cry their best crocodile tears and promise that they are moving mountains to reverse the situation whilst, in reality, they blithely ignore the show more issues, as before.

Back to the book, history has proved Carson correct on almost every fear that she expressed. Admittedly, the planet still exists but, it would be interesting to know how many deaths might have been avoided had the "progressives" accepted the flaws in their approach: indeed, had they so done, maybe the knee jerk reaction to genetic engineering and fracking would not be so universally negative. If the general public could have any belief that safeguards were in place, I am sure that a far greater number would be willing to allow this research, without attempts to disrupt.

You may feel that this review is at a tangent to the book but, these are the areas which Ms. Carson would, I am sure, be tackling, were she to be writing now. The issues have changed, the response has not. The evidence of current misdemeanour's is kept from us, it is only by reminding ourselves of the historical position that we can see how to proceed now. show less

Normally, I'd probably give this four stars, but I'm bumping it because of the impact it had. Fifty years later, we need a contemporary Rachel Carson to wake up the world to the devastating impacts of fracking and human generated greenhouse gas emissions.

In 2012, New Scientist put out a list of the top 25 most influential popular science books (narrowed by popular ... of course ... vote to the top ten) in honor of the 50th anniversary of Ms. Carson's landmark work. I decided that I would read all 25...eventually. When A Brief History of Time turned out to need too much explaining to my 15 year old, I gave him this...and that forced me to read it sooner than I had planned.

Stunning how much she put into this book and stunning that she show more made something happen. Wouldn't work today with the FoxNewsers and Senators Inofe. I'm saddened that we've gone in the opposite direction from 1962. To be fair, on this particular matter, we've finally got "organic" as a norm instead of a fringe, but with the rest of science ignorance? I call it the New Dark Ages.

A recommended read. show less

A legendary book from the 1960s that I had never read until now.
Carson tells the story of the (mis)application of toxic chemicals intended as insect pest controls. As she vividly points out in the book, the pesticides failed signally in their objective, and caused untold (until she wrote) collateral damage to wildlife and humans.
The author writes beauftiful text - the sense flows effortlessly off the page. While she was clearly as mad as hell, she restrains herself in the writing, and makes every effort to present facts dispassionately - this was not the twitter era.
I read in the afterword that she was ferociously attacked by vested interests following publication of the book. But, she won - she was right, they were wrong, and she show more roused such a public reaction that the toxic chemical industry was forced to buckle under some governmental constraints - not a perfect ending, but quite a vindication for a brave author. show less

In this classic work of 1962, biologist Rachel Carson details alarming, detailed accounts of the ecologically and biologically disastrous effects of applying chemicals to our environment. As a reader 55 years later, I was simultaneously aghast and hopeful that, surely, what we've learned from the science in the last half-century results in fewer haphazard and negligent practices. However, given the recent threats to the EPA, an agency whose mission is to protect human health and the environment, I'm no longer feeling that optimism.

Admittedly, it took me almost exactly a year to read Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. Having almost zero chemistry background, I found it hard to concentrate on the details, especially the beginning. Between the point when I put it down, somewhere in chapter 3, I think it was, and the time I finished, I read a ton of other books—including Moby Dick! I just couldn’t follow what she was saying. That, of course, made me feel dumb, because this book is known for how accessible her science writing is. And maybe it is accessible to most people or maybe I am dumb, but I underestimated the amount of chemistry that was involved.

I had heard that this was a very important environmental text that sort of kicked off the movement, which is why I show more wanted to read it. I was surprised that the book focuses solely on one aspect of environmentalism: pollution and unintended consequences caused by pesticides and herbicides. So naturally there’s a lot of chemistry. But I didn’t know that going in (which is probably a good thing; I know my limits).

But once I got past the really chemistry-intensive chapters, the book really did pick up. And here was my second surprise: this novel is not about research or experiments that Rachel Carson herself performed—from some of the critiques I’d seen of her being a marine biologist outside her field, I thought there would be some well-intended but flawed experiments that she conducted in here. Instead, it’s a compilation of research literature that already existed at the time, but was so spread out and difficult to access that most people couldn’t grasp the big picture. She basically did a comprehensive literature search on the effect of certain poisons on wildlife and the ecological food chain, and then retold the stories of that research in a voice that is doubtless, by comparison, quite accessible. (Personally, I’m kind of thinking a book in the same model on hydraulic fracturing is about due, right?)

And that led to the third surprise: my, how things have changed, and my, how they have stayed the same. On the one hand, holy crap were the 1940s and ‘50s a different world. Who ever thought crop dusting was a good idea, for example? But, the way Carson puts it, it kind of makes sense when you have a bunch of extra post-WWII planes, out-of-work pilots, and a burgeoning chemical pesticide industry. Much of it reminded me of the picnic scene in Mad Men where they just leave all their trash on the grass (disclaimer: I don’t watch Mad Men, but someone told me about this scene and I looked it up on YouTube, so sorry if the context is misplaced here). Little things that I’ve taken for granted my whole life, like the inevitable existence of house flies and fire ants, I learned faced multiple eradication efforts that were incredibly expensive in terms of time, money, and health, but ultimately failed. And a short generation later, it would never have occurred to me to try to exterminate all house flies! Because who really cares?

But on the other hand, I could see our current society reflected in Carson’s critique of how close the chemical industry had snuggled to academia and government, specifically the Department of Agriculture, which seems to have been woefully misled through whole decades. I’ve heard similar accusations about the State Department and the Keystone Pipeline industry groups. I’ve also heard questions about trusting research on the effects of medications conducted by the pharmaceutical companies, the effect of fracking on local water supplies and earthquakes by the natural gas industry, and the effects of off-shore drilling on sea life by the oil industry.

Overall, Silent Spring has become a historical text, illuminating a particular moment in time when we were just becoming aware of the facts that showed how we were poisoning ourselves. But it took Carson pulling all those facts together to make a change in the way we think about this stuff. The world we live into today—-one with house flies, sure, but also with bald eagles and stream trout—-is one that needed this book to influence policy makers to make changes in what kind of chemicals were allowed in what quantities. To be clear, Carson never claims that all chemicals for all purposes should be eliminated; she was a scientist, after all. What she calls for is a better understanding of the environmental impacts of our actions and better communication from the groups that choose to apply chemicals about the potential and inherent dangers.

This is not all “big picture” or un-relatable, historical stuff, though. I already tended to eat organic whenever that’s an option, so that hasn’t changed for me. But, in reading one of the later chapters about the delicate balance of garden pests, I recognized some of the symptoms my roses, which are the only plants in my garden to which I regularly apply spray. So I stopped spraying them for a couple weeks, and they’re already healthier. I think my spray was killing off the natural predators of whatever is actually killing the leaves, but not dramatically impacting the real pests’ population. So, there. I learned something!

Throughout Silent Spring’s horror stories of the terrible decisions of agriculturalists pre-1970s, I found myself at many points asking “WHAT were they THINKING?!” And of course the answer is that the people who needed all the information didn’t have it. But I wonder if we’re not at a similar point today, when future generations will look back and ask the same question. And how do we intend to address that? show less