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The National Resources Defense Council explains it well: "Thomas Paine's Common Sense galvanized radical sentiment in the early days of the American revolution; Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe roused Northern antipathy to slavery in the decade leading up to the Civil War; and Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which in 1962 exposed the hazards of the pesticide DDT, eloquently questioned humanity's faith in technological progress and helped set the stage for the environmental movement."
In other words, the use of man-made toxins could eventually result in a "silent spring."
Over at E-Notes, we learn that Silent Spring "surveys mounting evidence that widespread pesticide use endangers both wildlife and humans. Along the way, Rachel Carson criticizes an irresponsible chemical industry, which continues to claim that pesticides are safe, and imprudent public officials, who accept without question this disinformation. As an alternative to the 'scorched earth' logic underlying accepted pest-control practices, the author outlines the 'biotic' approach— cheaper, safer, longer acting, natural solutions to pest problems (for example, controlling the Japanese beetle by introducing a fungus that causes a fatal disease in this insect)."
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