Should Rachel Carson be stripped of her posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom and other honors?

Question

In the 1960's Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring, which led to the worldwide ban on DDT. For this, she was posthumously given the Presidential Medal of Freedom and other honors, such as having public buildings named after her. However, improved research has shown that DDT is not a carcinogen as it was believed to have been in those days. Also, DDT is effective in much smaller amounts that was realized, so that it can be applied much more judiciously, without accumulating in birds' eggs.

Wikipedia gives the MINIMUM estimated number of deaths from malaria as approximately 1.5 million per year. The ban took effect in the 1970's and 80's, so use a late date, 1985 as the year DDT became fully banned.

1.5 million x (2006 - 1985) = a MINIMUM of 31.5 million worldwide human deaths due to the lack of DDT.

This is more deaths than caused by Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Hitler, Stalin, and ranks alongside those caused by Margaret Sanger, worldwide!

She is widely regarded as a hero of sorts to the environmental crowd. Yet she accomplished horrible thngs!

Should we allow Rachel Carson an "Oops, that's not what I meant"...?

What would we do if she were still alive...?

If we overlook this, do we have the moral right to condemn ANYBODY for ANYTHING, no matter how heinous, as long as they thought they were right...?

Answer 1

I'll have to research your information but if it proves correct we mihg t want to look at those honors.

Answer 2

You essentially resolved this question by yourself with the statement, "Also, DDT is effective in much smaller amounts that was realized, so that it can be applied much more judiciously, without accumulating in birds' eggs."

Rachel Carson did not write about the theoretical best practices of DDT use. She wrote about the DDT use which was going on in her time - use of DDT in such high concentrations that it did accumulate in top-of-the-food-web species.

There is nothing incorrect or deceitful about her work. However, now that we know that we were overkill with our DDT usage in the past, we can consider using it again at more appropriate levels.

At any rate, the United States' ban on DDT does not prevent African nations from using it. Furthermore, the essentially global ban on DDT (United Nations' Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants) makes explicit exception for DDT use to fight malaria. Ultimately, the suggestion that Rachel Carson contributed to the malaria-induced deaths of 31.5 million people is borderline ludicrous.

Answer 3

I don't recall that DDT was considered carcinogenic. Rather, it was accused of causing birth defects, which research has repeatedly shown to true. Furthermore, DDT is effective in small amounts only in organisms that have not been previously subjected to it. Many strains of DDT resistant insects were being found, creating the necessity to use DDT in ever increasing concentraions, which is why it was appearing in birds in levels sufficient to make the shells of their eggs too thin and fragile, resulting in reduced populations of several species.

Answer 4

Christopher Columbus took a wrong turn and accidentally stumbled onto a piece of land he thought was one country and it turned out to be something else entirely, but we're getting ready to celebrate Columbus Day all over America because of his blunder.

Don't even get me started on how many other explorers discovered America long before he ever got here....

Just because we've discovered something else since Rachel Carson's time, doesn't mean she didn't do great things in her own time. Should we condemn the original surgeons who figured out that you could save a life by amputating a limb infected with gangrene just because we've discovered/created broad spectrum antibiotics now so that amputation is rarely necessary? Barbaric, wasn't it? What they were doing? Life-saving in their time though.

All science is a process of never-ending discovery and rediscovery and layers of yet more discovery. Let's not condemn someone because she didn't have all the facts. In fact... let's not rule out that SHE was right and we're NOW making a mistake to believe that we can get by with what we're using now. It takes generations to make those determinations and it's often evidenced by children being born with rare genetic disorders in clumps in regions and at some point someone has to review history to see why that may have been.

Maybe Rachel Carson wasn't a fortune teller and able to predict the future. Then again... maybe she was.