As an environmental science student at Melbourne University, I was told "Silent Spring" launched the environmental movement and paved the way for much greater knowledge of the environment. In contrast, on conservative book lists, the book is sometimes listed as a bigger killer than Mein Kampf because of its ban on DDT, but the liberal "Modern Library" listed it as the fifth best nonfiction book of the twentieth century.

The reality is that "Silent Spring" is neither quite the pioneer in ecology that it is sometimes supposed to be nor could anything in it be said to pave the way for a huge number of deaths from the spread of malaria. First of all, the book does not offer any serious insight into the actual functioning of ecosystems, even though Carson must have known quite a lot about these questions considering the amount she wrote about marine biology. There is nothing in "Silent Spring" that discusses even the most basic human ecology or resource depletion problems. Although the book's viewpoint that humans were capable of altering the environment is drastic manners via the use of artificial chemicals, was a genuine revelation, anybody seeking a precursor to Marc Reisner, Tim Flannery or even Sylvia Earle will be disappointed.

On the other hand, though the descriptions of the way in which pesticides killed fish in many American rivers is truly graphic and all the better for it, claims that Rachel Carson actually advocated the complete banning of pesticides that killed malarial mosquitoes can be shown in the book itself to be false. It was only the hysteria that came after the book that led many people to advocate complete bans on pesticides, and those who see her as a mass murderer overlook two facts.

The first is that one of "Silent Spring"'s most essential points - that insects become resistant to specialised insecticides very quickly - means that it is exceptionally unlikely DDT is likely to keep malaria eradicated for long periods. The second is that Carson was not nearly so misanthropic as her critics would have it. Rather than advocating rapid growth of pests that would reduce the food supply, she advocated much more efficient use of pesticides that would probably serve to reduce resistance and make for much less ecological damage as well as potentially lower costs. The fact that oil's cheapness is "Silent Spring"'s day eliminated this potential gain is consistently but naturally overlooked by her critics.

What makes "Silent Spring" valuable is not that it merely shows pesticides have done damage, but that it is able to see far worse consequences. The most telling are the way in which the absence of one insect from spraying leads to another becoming a worse pest, which has an (unfortunately overlooked) analog in the biological control which Carson advocates as the answer to pest problems - though I know all too well from studying the cane toad that such a view is simplistic and Carson fails to mention that agents used for biological control as often as not become pests themselves. Her idea of using such methods as fertility control, however, is actually further ahead of its time than anything else in "Silent Spring" as it was not studied significantly before the 1990s.

This ability to move beyond simplistic arguments has had many benefits for "Silent Spring" over the years. Most especially, Carson's ability to see beyond simplistic cause-and-effect analyses is one reason why "Silent Spring" has held up with age vastly better than The Population Bomb or Unsafe at Any Speed, which are so often bracketed with it. I sincerely hope people can get beyond the hype to see a book that has held up very well and remains an impressive read even a half-century later as well as a superb look into the technology and life of its time. Such is a rare combination.

The previous review gives one star for political reasons, not for the quality of the writing or argument presented in Silent Spring. It is not apparent that this reviewer has read the book at all. We do a service to the Earth when we show compassion for all life, and cease to think in terms of sacrificing one life for another. Read the book, research the problem, and draw your conclusions based on the evidence, not someone else's hot-headed opinions.

Perhaps her cause was just in writing this book, but her short-sighted ignorance of the repercussions was inexcusable. Because of the ban on DDT which largely resulted from Silent Spring, the WHO has estimated that around 20 MILLION children have died of malaria.

DDT was, & still is, one of the very best insecticides to control mosquitoes, the sole transporter of this deadly disease. Best of all, DDT is very NON-toxic to humans.

The need for DDT is so urgent that even the Sierra Club is justifying it's use inside houses in malaria stricken locations of Africa, South America, & Asia.

Way to go Rachel. Save the Birds, Kill the Children...Wake Up People!!