Rachel Carson From A Silent Spring Summary

Rachel Carson is a noted biologist who studies biology, a branch of science addressing living organisms, yet she has written a book called Silent Spring to speak about the harmful effects of pesticides on nature. Carson doesn’t write about birds’ genetic and physical makeup, the role of them in the animal food chain, or even how to identify their unbelievable bird songs, yet strongly attests the fight for a well developed environment containing birds, humans, and insects is just and necessary. To Carson, the war for a natural environment is instantly essential for holding on to her true love for the study of biology. Thus Carson claims that whether it be a direct hit towards birds or an indirect hit towards humans and wildlife, farmers need to understand the effects and abandon the usage of pesticides in order to save the environment by appealing to officials, farmers, and Americans in her 1962 book, Silent Spring. She positions her defense by using rhetorical devices such as rhetorical questioning to establish logos, juxtaposing ideas, and using connotative and denotative diction.

“Along with the possibility of the extinction of mankind by nuclear war, the central problem of our age has therefore become the contamination of man’s total environment with such substances of incredible potential for harm-substances that accumulate in the tissues of plants and animals and even penetrate the germ cells to shatter or alter the very material of heredity upon which the shape of the future depends” (Carson, 1962).

These methods lead to the reduction of chick survival and bird population. The emission of fumes from the insecticides cuts off the air supply of oxygen which birds initially require to survive. Farmland bird species is on decline because of ill advised changes in farming techniques. These include increased agrochemical inputs and loss of mixture farming.

She accounts that the pesticides that we use do not single out and destroy only the insects that we want but it also kills things that are around it, which includes the animals that prey on it. And since we are eating that same food that was once sprayed with insecticides, it is also killing us.

Although people are well intentioned in their use of pesticides, people are ignorant of the harmful effects of them. Carson uses appeal of to pathos and logos to convey his point. Carson describes in the passage that while people are trying to kill weeds and insects, as a consequence of that we are in return hurting our ecosystem. She states, “ to still the song of the bird and the leaping of fish in the stream, to coat the leaves with a deadly film, and to linger on in soil all this intended target may be only a few weeds or insects”. This quote in the passage is used to appeal to the reader’s sense of emotion by making the reader feel a sense of responsibility. Although people easily kill bugs and weeds, they would never think that it would

Agriculture is the most fundamental resource of society. Without it, humans could not live, especially in the ways we do now where people reside in cities. This means that those cities could not exist without large scale agriculture to sustain them. Since agriculture is such a necessity, people have developed methods to gain more from their land. One of the many solutions besides machinery they have developed to produce higher crop yields is through the use of pesticides. However, those pesticides which have resulted in high crop yields have come at price, and that is human health itself. This seems rather contradictory. Pesticides were designed to help people and society by increased the success of producing high crop yields, and they

Within this book, she tackled the issue of harmful pesticide usage, bringing to light an unknown issue. Carson's research forced the mass population to view pesticides as a harm to public health, thus, emphasizing the public's role within environmental frameworks. Ultimately, Carson made society rethink their relationship with the natural world.

Having already established the harm to man, Rachel Carson now shifts to the effect the spraying has on birds, saying “So they sent in the planes on their mission of death-the casualty list included.(22-24). The reference to spraying as a mission of death lends it the connotation of being mass killing, in other words, genocide. The reference to the amount of dead as a large casualty list illustrate such sprayings as an act of war, of which the blackbirds were the innocent victims of. In addition, neat the end of the passage, another question is asked to the reader, demanding “Who has decided-who has the right to decide-”(56-57). The use of the word right appeals to the intended audiences sense of justice and belief in distribution of power and decision making. By asking this question, the decision to spray pesticides is seen as one made without the consent of all involved, and thus in need of changing. Both these descriptions and questions serve to provide an appeal to pathos for the

Carson clarifies that “the sprays, dust, and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests, and homes-nonselective chemicals that have the power to kill every insect, the “good” and the “bad”.” In contemporary world today many people use these mankind chemicals without understanding the effects of nature. For example, the reproduction of bees are dropping traumatically because of the pesticides effects on the insects. According to CNN “How Pesticides are killing the bees “Recent data published in science, Nature and other un journals show that bees are dying from some pesticides that are found in our food supply.” The damaged the chemicals are doing to the bees have worries many scientists. The New York Times wrote, pesticide linked to honeybee deaths, “a group of pesticide believed to contribute to mass deaths of honeybees.” Another example of the harmful chemicals affecting the good insects are by destroying favorable insects such as lady bugs and butterflies, which are another great alternative way to pollinate flower. These beneficial insects are very important for human wellbeing; therefore, we should minimize the use of

This suggests that the roadsides was once beautiful and bloomed with healthy and lively vegetation; however, they are now destroyed due to the use of pesticides. From these examples, it can be shown that even though pesticide is beneficial, its deadly effects outweigh its benefits; in addition, it is a dangerous substances to the environment, organisms, and even human.

In the next section of the excerpt, Carson gives example upon example of the real effects of the pesticide, and she begins with perhaps the most significant: the rapid decrease in the eagle population. Throughout the next few pages, Carson writes about various researchers noticing the lack of not only eagle eggs that never hatch, but also a lack of eagle eggs in general. One of the facts she gives states, “Between 1952 and 1957, about 80 per cent of the nests failed to produce young.” This astonishing piece of information would come as a surprise to any American, simply because it being a sort of national icon. Carson uses this to begin her series of epidemics to captivate the reader.

In the book Silent Spring, Rachel Carson’s main concern is the widespread use of synthetic pesticides and their impact on the environment. Carson concentrates on a commonly used pesticide in the 1950s called DDT. She opposes the indiscriminate spraying of DDT because it has profound consequences on the environment, humans and animals. Carson collected information about how the DDT can cause cancer in humans, harm animals such as birds and remained in the environment for long periods of time. Subsequently, the chemicals in the pesticides are extremely harmful so she tries to raise awareness and convince others that there are better alternatives.

America the Beautiful! So why are we destroying it everyday with the use of pesticides? It has been proven that pesticides have affects on it's surrounding, although made to improve earths resources, they typically take there negative effect on the environment in time. Pesticides affect more than the environment; they also affect the animals and humans living in the environment. There are alternative, to this major problem but, we as the caretakers of earth must act fast. In the following paper I'm going to share with you what pesticides are. I'll tell you why they are not safe to use and some of the affects of pesticides. Last, I will talk about some new alternatives there are

This book was focused on the concern of pesticides that industries, along with us as individuals, have been dumping (both knowingly and unknowingly) into water. Carson was concerned that the chemicals which the farmers spread on their fields, and even the chemicals we use in our homes (among others), in the end, might come back around and harm us. The beginning of the book tells a story of a place, that was once so beautiful, turned dead and ugly due to a “strange blight that crept over the area” and destroyed everything. Later in the book, she goes on to explain that chemicals, particularly one known as DDT, are the major cause of environmental damage and the near extinction of

In the book 'Silent spring ' written by Rachael Carson we find a picture of Carson 's deep concept about the connection between nature’s equilibrium and the web of life that has been ruined by the uncontrolled use of insecticides which in turn affected the healthy livelihood of this earth’s creatures. Furthermore, she tells the readers of substitute techniques of achieving the same ends. The title of the book is enough to make us understand that it was a hint of a spring season with no bird songs painting our atmosphere meaning that all birds had vanished due to misuse of pesticides.