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Documentary, Pandoras Box Part 4 - Goodbye Mrs Ant
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00:00I dreamt last night, the moon was so bright, it melted the walls away, and it wasn't alarming when I saw Prince Charming come into my bedroom and say, let me persuade you to come to the place where tomorrow meets today.
00:21If you were a scientist, you were in.
00:51Your excellent science, I am your faithful servant.
00:57Let the commander be building a new world.
01:13Thomas Midgley was born in 1889. He became a chemist and an inventor.
01:18In 1921, he solved the problem of knocking in car engines. He put lead in petrol.
01:28In 1930, he discovered a new coolant for fridges. It was called by its initials CFC.
01:37Midgley became part of a golden age of chemistry in America in the 30s.
01:41Chemistry, alchemy, magic. The modern laboratory of today's chemists, fantastic in appearance as it is, is far out in the very vanguard of progress.
01:51The holy of holies wherein science moves in mysterious ways her wonders to perform.
01:56In 1935, Midgley predicted that in the future chemistry would solve many of the world's great problems.
02:03The ozone layer, he said, could be altered to control the sun's rays and allow scientists to govern the world's agriculture.
02:10In 1940, Midgley contracted polio. He built a pulley system to lift himself in and out of bed.
02:21But in 1944, he became trapped in it and strangled himself.
02:27That same year, the American army began mass producing CFC to help spray a new, some said miracle chemical, over the Pacific battlefields.
02:39It killed insects.
02:42It was called DDT.
02:44It was called DDT.
02:45Sixteen candles
02:48Make a lovely light
02:55But not as bright
03:01As your eyes tonight
03:06Blow out the candles
03:17Make your wish come true
03:22I was a project officer on the first aerial application of DDT that was ever made in the world, I guess.
03:27And we flew it over several square miles of jungle, and I was walking around some trails we'd cut in the jungle floor,
03:32and there was an incredible, describable rain of insects of all kinds coming down out of the tops of these huge jungle trees,
03:40100 to 130, 40, 50 feet.
03:42We got the Cerambicid beetles, beetles of all descriptions that probably many people had never seen, or if anybody had ever seen,
03:48because they're in the tops of the trees. I remember particularly some big of these longhorn beetles that were coming down.
03:53There were wasps and bees of all descriptions and so forth, and it was an incredible experience.
03:57And I guess what occurred to me then is that maybe this was one of the best ways to collect insects and find out what kind of insects there truly were in a representative area of the jungle.
04:07And that's just one of the more innocent things I guess one could read into it.
04:12The low-flying plains cover every section of the city, from the coast of Manila Bay to the outlying environs,
04:16in an effort to destroy the large numbers of flies and mosquitoes plaguing the area.
04:22Prior to the spraying, the populace was informed that the insecticide would not injure vegetation or clothes.
04:27In American bars, there was a drink which was called Mickey Slim,
04:33and it was a good gin with a spot of DDT in it.
04:40And this was supposed to give you a feeling of happiness and merriment.
04:48And in Naples in 1943 and 1944, there was an enormous epidemic of typhus transmitted by the human body loss,
04:56and about 10 million applications of DDT dusting powder were made to people, and they wiped that out.
05:00And those things got enormous publicity in household magazines like the Reader's Digest.
05:06Everybody wanted to try DDT, and the civilian population could hardly wait to get their hands on it
05:11when it was released in 1945 for civilian use.
05:20Well, it was sort of a miracle that happened, and by word of mouth, it spread rapidly, and I think everyone tried it.
05:28I remember one time in 1952, it was summertime, and we were going to have a birthday party right here on the lawn,
05:36right here where we're sitting.
05:38And the day before, I sprayed all the grass with water and DDT.
05:43And this got rid of the flies, and it also killed mosquitoes.
05:48And you know, flies in the afternoon while the sun's shining, and mosquitoes after dark,
05:52those are two things, if you could get away from them, you could have a wonderful party out here, and we did.
05:57We had a pest-free party out here on this farm.
06:00Chemical people would show us test plots, and the quality of the corn would have little small ears,
06:16where the weeds and the insects had taken over, and where they'd use the chemicals,
06:22the ears were bigger, and the yield was two to three times as much.
06:26The United States was a continent plagued with insects.
06:32Farmers lived in perpetual fear of finding a new infestation.
06:36Whole crops were regularly destroyed by pests.
06:40DDT and the other insecticides invented in its wake promised victory in this war.
06:45This man is a farmer, yes, but he is also a detective, a plant pest detective.
07:01A giant spider. What next?
07:04You don't in England. Anything like the insect life that we have.
07:11You don't have to have screens on the windows in many places.
07:16You can't survive here that way.
07:18Come on, just a little bit.
07:20We are edgier about them.
07:27Anything with six legs is an enemy.
07:31Yes, this is our enemy.
07:34Insects not only eat up our agriculture, they threaten the very health of our land.
07:43I've seen the time full fields of crops would be ruined from the insects before the chemicals come into effect.
08:05I can remember the cutworms and the wireworms would absolutely clean the fields of corn and wheat.
08:14And there would be nothing left to harvest.
08:17And then when your chemicals come along, you had this to eliminate the insects and you had your crop then.
08:26It was a miracle chemical to us because we thought it would control practically every insect.
08:36I guess it was just a time in the period that God had decided that he would let us discover these chemicals and use them wisely.
08:42And I suppose everything, the whole system is directed by God.
08:48So I guess this was the time that we would find our knowledge given by God would lead us to find these natural resources to use, to control, do away with some of the slave labor.
09:01The incredible success of insecticides led to a wave of invention.
09:18Chemists vied with each other to design new, more powerful products.
09:21This in turn transformed other sciences, in particular the study of insects, entomology.
09:28Entomologists had traditionally been figures of fun, eccentric scientists who spent their time classifying insects.
09:36But this was now important information for the chemical companies.
09:40They began to employ large numbers of entomologists.
09:44In the process, the focus of their science began to shift.
09:47We were fed these new chemicals so rapidly, many of us didn't have time to do anything else but test the new chemicals.
09:54There seemed to be chemicals being introduced into the pipeline and inexhaustible pressure to put something out the other end.
10:01And literally we forgot about good basic entomology and became, in a sense, I think, handmaidens of the world chemical industry.
10:10The entomologists began to discover what appeared to be serious side effects.
10:14As they investigated the effectiveness of large scale spraying programs, they found that many other species of wildlife were being harmed.
10:24We found out soon that there were some side effects, even as early as 1946 and 47.
10:31But the benefits were so great, we eradicated malaria from the United States, let alone many other places in the world.
10:38And so there wasn't the public pressure on them.
10:43We were killing off birds in some cases.
10:47It was quite obvious that these species were disappearing starting in 47 or 48.
10:52And by 53, even the birds that lived quite a few years were beginning to disappear and they weren't replacing themselves because the eggs weren't hatching.
11:00These side effects led to serious disagreements among the entomologists.
11:06At their annual conference in 1953, their president made an impassioned defence of the chemicals.
11:12His speech was entitled, The Greater Hazard, Insects or Insecticides.
11:17The choice, he said, was a simple one.
11:21Either continue spraying or return to the bad old days of starvation and disease.
11:26Everything should be done to minimise the side effects, but ultimately it was a war of survival.
11:33Insecticides had already saved a hundred million human lives throughout the world.
11:38At our scientific congresses and meetings, we were completely immersed in a haze of propaganda about chemicals.
11:46There were lavish hospitality suites, banquets sponsored by the chemical companies,
11:51and a great many entomologists were employed by these companies.
11:54I'm sure they were absolutely convinced that what they were doing was a fundamental and very valuable importance to the world.
12:05The chemical companies also portrayed the battle against the insects as a necessary war.
12:10Promotional films of the 1950s invoked Charles Darwin.
12:13They depicted it as part of the inevitable struggle for existence.
12:19Wherever man is, there the ant is also.
12:23They seem to come from nowhere and suddenly are everywhere at once, crawling over the food.
12:28As the hordes invade, man often gives up his pleasures in utter despair.
12:32It is the law of nature, the strong survive.
12:36Now in evolution, all living species are essentially in competition with each other.
12:43And the ones that are most successful survive.
12:46And insects, as has been said, will inherit the earth, because they are so successful.
12:50And insects carry diseases to human beings, such as malaria.
12:54And when we spray to kill the insects, we are interfering with evolution.
12:58If evolution were to proceed, then we would be overwhelmed by the factors that are against us.
13:02Do you realize how easy it would be for them to overcome us humans?
13:07Then instead of being the hunters, we'd become the hunted.
13:10They'd be our masters. They'd live on us.
13:11When people in the post-war period spoke of a struggle in nature, they were selecting one aspect of Darwin's theories that suited their time.
13:27Now for Darwin, nature was a bloody battlefield.
13:30There were winners and losers, victors and the vanquished.
13:34But this imagery took on special significance in the Cold War years.
13:38In the American Midwest, when I was growing up, the household aerosols were called insect bombs.
13:46The point is that in these life and death struggles, scientists believed that they were seizing power from evolution
13:54and redirecting it by controlling the environment.
13:57They took it on faith from the biologists that this is how the world works.
14:01And then they chose to emphasize those aspects of Darwin's theory which fitted in best with the industrial programs they were embarked upon.
14:08This was not a neutral reading of Darwin at all. This was an interested reading.
14:13Anything left behind? Nothing but a dead spider.
14:17Well, this time he's going to stay dead. Dead and buried.
14:21Let's say at least until some egghead comes along and digs it up again.
14:24The first serious public attack on the widespread use of pesticides came from Rachel Carson.
14:36She was a biologist who had worked for the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.
14:40In the late 50s she began collecting evidence of the side effects.
14:45In particular, studies which showed that DDT was becoming more concentrated as it worked its way into the bodies of larger animals.
14:53In 1962 she wrote a book called Silent Spring. It was an attack on the chemical companies.
14:58It started coming out in the New Yorker. She kept it rather quiet. She knew that the chemical industry or the part of which she was worrying about would react.
15:10And sure enough, the official of the Velsicol Chemical Company wrote a very threatening letter to Houghton Mifflin.
15:20You must not print this book. And came out with the standard line that they still use.
15:27You see, if we stopped using all these pesticides, it would simply ruin the whole economy of the country.
15:36And this is a sinister plot by the far left subversive forces, as they called them, to destroy the United States.
15:46Silent Spring painted a dramatic picture of a poisoned America. It caused an immediate sensation.
15:52It coincided with revelations about thalidomide and the fallout of strontium-90 from nuclear testing.
16:01I got the book when I got home and I read that. And I got about two thirds of the way through the book and I saw so many things I knew were not true that bothered me.
16:10When I set out to make a lot of speeches to try to let people know what she had said and what was really the truth.
16:16Many other people were doing the same thing across the nation.
16:18So usually at some time during the talk somebody would be interested in, what about the effect on people?
16:23And it was handy at that time to have a box of DDT like this one.
16:26And so I could just dump some out in my hand and take some of it to show that it's not harmful to people.
16:33Never has been. Nobody's ever been killed by DDT.
16:36I've not even heard of them being made ill by it, even when they attempt suicide.
16:39In 1963, the book was made the subject of an hour-long TV special.
16:46Three of the program's sponsors, food and chemical manufacturers, withdrew in protest.
16:52Carson used the program to widen her attack on the chemical companies.
16:55Now, to these people, apparently the balance of nature was something that was repealed as soon as man came on the scene.
17:06Well, you might just as well assume that you could repeal the law of gravity.
17:10Man's attitude toward nature is today critically important simply because we have now acquired a fateful power to alter and to destroy nature.
17:26Unless we do bring these chemicals under better control, we are certainly headed for disaster.
17:31Miss Carson maintains that the balance of nature is a major force in the survival of man.
17:41Whereas the modern chemist, the modern biologist, the modern scientist believes that man is steadily controlling nature.
17:52If man were to faithfully follow the teachings of Miss Carson, we would return to the dark ages.
17:59And the insects and diseases and vermin would once again inherit the earth.
18:06The ironic thing was how Robert White Stevens died.
18:11He died as a result of the sting of a wasp.
18:17In 1963, Rachel Carson died.
18:21Although her book had caused an outcry, it had no immediate effect on the use of pesticides.
18:25But another attack on the chemical industry was about to be launched, this time from the suburbs.
18:32Although the faces of America's major cities seem relatively unchanged, a quiet revolution has been taking place there for nearly a decade.
18:41More than a million persons each year have pulled up stakes in the cities and turned commuter.
18:49America's suburbs had grown enormously during the 50s, often on land made habitable for the first time with the use of insecticides.
18:56But continued spraying to treat diseases such as Dutch elm now brought the side effects of the chemicals into the gardens of the wealthy and articulate middle classes.
19:06We live in what's called the Gold Coast area, the wealthier people.
19:11And so we had money right away to buy this stuff and the machinery and the men and so they went around and squirted first of all from the ground.
19:18But that didn't last very long. Soon there was a whole page in the Sunday Milwaukee Journal on how now Shorewood and Fox Point and Bayside where I live were really going to take care of their elm trees.
19:32And they had a photograph of a helicopter spraying with TDT.
19:51And not too long after that, the robins started going through the vultures.
19:56So it would start up, you'd see the robin and you'd think it would be alright, and then all of a sudden the squimmering would go up.
20:05Those robins got in the way of the spray and they got drenched with DDT and they fell to the ground and they were twitching in paradise.
20:11And that seemed like a terrible thing and it was for those robins.
20:15But there were millions of other robins that weren't being hurt at all.
20:17We'd be awakened by this, of them coming over the house.
20:26And one day I was so angry that I raced up into the attic and opened the dormer windows in my little pink nightie and I climbed up on top of the roof and I just stood there and shook my fist at them.
20:37and shook my fist at them.
20:39What happened next was that there was a spraying of DDT
20:44in Long Island, and Mrs. Yannacone didn't like it.
20:51The first time I noticed it, I drove past here
20:53on my way home from work, and there were dead fish
20:57for about 10 feet out from the side.
20:59This is noticeable as you drive by.
21:03The massive fish kill in this lake, and as we later found out,
21:07other lakes were all ignored, largely because the suburban population
21:13that was seeing this had nothing to compare it against,
21:16having come from the concrete canyons of Manhattan and Brooklyn
21:20and Queens, where I came from, and not knowing
21:23what the natural state was supposed to be.
21:25The scientific community, which should have been observing
21:29all of this, was too busy making new products
21:32or living in their ivory towers.
21:34Let us take charge.
21:36We will bring you better things for better living through chemistry.
21:40Victor Yannacone was a lawyer.
21:43Together with two local biologists,
21:43he founded the Environmental Defence Fund.
21:48Its aim was to legally challenge the use of DDT and other pesticides.
21:52Their argument was that the chemicals were spreading
21:55in uncontrollable ways, becoming more poisonous as they did so.
21:59One of the strongest pieces of evidence
22:01was the disappearance of the peregrine falcon.
22:04DDT was being found in their bodies,
22:06and their eggs were failing to hatch.
22:09Two ornithologists set out to count the falcon population.
22:12We were simply going to follow a route from northern Alabama
22:18all the way up to the state of Maine.
22:20And we started in, I believe it was early April.
22:23And birds should be on location at that time.
22:27And we simply worked our way northward,
22:29and we followed a very torturous route,
22:31and we checked something like 130 sites or something like that
22:35in the course of the next three months,
22:37driving a little over 14,000 miles.
22:40We found zero, not one peregrine falcon.
22:47In 1968, the Environmental Defence Fund
22:49discovered an obscure law in the mid-western state of Wisconsin.
22:54It allowed anyone a legal hearing
22:56if they believed they could prove water pollution in the state.
23:00Go north-western, go north-western,
23:02it's the very best way to go.
23:05Using this as a pretext, the fund engineered a hearing,
23:08and in November 1968, a small group of them
23:11travelled to Madison, the capital of Wisconsin,
23:14in the heartland of America's agriculture.
23:17The hearing was held in the vast state legislature.
23:20It quickly became a trial of DDT.
23:23The star was Victor Yanukone.
23:26His main aim was to get the public's attention,
23:28to explain why tiny amounts of a chemical
23:30could have such large effects.
23:32We had to explain that a part per million was significant.
23:37We did this by calling a very prominent scientist
23:42from the pro-DDT camp,
23:44and we asked him a very simple series of questions.
23:48Doctor, do you have any idea
23:51what the purpose of the hormones that flow in your blood is?
23:57Yeah.
23:57And they're responsible for your secondary sex characteristics,
24:01the hair on your head, the hair on your chest,
24:03the tone of your voice, right?
24:05Do you have any idea what the level of testosterone
24:08in your bloodstream is necessary
24:11to give you that lovely shock of white hair,
24:13all that hair on the chest,
24:15and the grandchildren that you're so proud of?
24:19And he finally admitted that it was five parts per million.
24:22I said, well, do you have any idea what would happen
24:27if the level of testosterone in your blood
24:30should drop to as low as three and a half parts per million?
24:36He, avert, he didn't know,
24:38and I said, well, you know
24:39that that hair of yours would change,
24:42the hair on your chest would disappear,
24:44the hair on the rest of your body would change,
24:46your voice would go up to a little squeak,
24:48and you sure as hell wouldn't have any grandchildren.
24:52The public got the point.
24:55One part per million could be very significant.
25:00The Madison hearing soon became headline news,
25:03with both sides claiming
25:04that everything America stood for was at stake.
25:09At the height of the battle over DDT,
25:12I wrote a poem and sent it to Time magazine.
25:15It was a parody on America the Beautiful,
25:18and I'll sing it for you.
25:19Oh, beautiful for bug-filled skies,
25:23for weevils in the grain,
25:25for apple scab and stable flies,
25:29please bring these back again.
25:32Malaria, malaria,
25:35red blood cells harbor thee,
25:37where Rocky Mountain fever thrives,
25:40where babies have TB,
25:43where parasites take human lives,
25:46why, that's the man for me.
25:57Malaria, malaria,
25:59my spleen will welcome thee,
26:02restore the sickness grandpa knew,
26:05by banning DDT.
26:07I walked in,
26:11Yannicko and looked at me long and hard and says,
26:14I think he'll do,
26:16and then he looked at me and says,
26:17can you between now and tomorrow
26:18put together a lecture of about 40 slides
26:21of all the different pictures
26:22of the Wisconsin ecosystem,
26:24so it'll be not only beautiful,
26:26but emotionally rich,
26:27and will affect the people who listen to it.
26:30So I'll try.
26:31Next day I came here
26:35and gave this talk
26:37with beautiful slides
26:38of the prairies in the woods of Wisconsin.
26:43It was, I'm sure,
26:45the first time anybody has ever shown wildflowers
26:48in the chambers of the Wisconsin legislature.
26:54In the late 60s,
26:56ecology was a modest scientific backwater.
26:59Ecologists spent their time
27:01studying the mutual dependence and balance
27:03of all the inhabitants of a particular area.
27:07But for Yannicko,
27:08ecology was a powerful weapon
27:09with which to attack the defenders of DDT,
27:13especially the entomologists.
27:15It gave him a scientific basis
27:17to challenge the idea of evolution
27:19they used to justify the large spraying programs.
27:23The entomologists,
27:25who should have known better
27:26and now, 30 years later,
27:27admit they should have known better,
27:29simply saw the death
27:31and the extinction
27:33of what we now know
27:35to be beneficial insects
27:37as the operation
27:38of the fundamental law
27:39of survival and evolution.
27:42What they didn't realize
27:43is the kind of evolution
27:44they were looking toward
27:45was the evolution
27:47of monsters arising
27:49from garbage dumps,
27:50of chemically deformed animals
27:52and plants.
27:54What they thought would come out of this
27:56was a simplified world ecosystem
28:01with good plants,
28:04bad plants, weeds.
28:05Good insects,
28:07bad insects.
28:08Good animals,
28:09the ones we eat,
28:10bad animals,
28:11the ones that take up space.
28:13There was a problem, though.
28:14If human beings
28:15were inextricably interwoven
28:16with other parts of nature,
28:18as ecology said,
28:20where were the effects
28:21of DDT on humans?
28:23In 30 years,
28:24no worker in the DDT factories
28:26had been poisoned.
28:27The defenders made great play
28:29of this at the hearing.
28:29But then, in early 1969,
28:33the Environmental Defense Fund
28:34received some unexpected news.
28:37A Swedish chemist
28:38by the name of Göran Löfroth
28:40wrote a letter saying
28:41that they have found
28:42in almost all women in Sweden
28:44DDT in the mother's milk.
28:47Well, we went to my house,
28:50we finally said,
28:51hey, let's call up Sweden.
28:54And we did.
28:55We got him out of bed.
28:57He must have been
28:57four o'clock in the morning then.
28:59He spoke pretty good English.
29:01What do you want?
29:02He says,
29:03we want you in medicine.
29:06He said he would come.
29:08Thursday came and went.
29:10Friday at 10 o'clock,
29:12people went out to the airport.
29:14It was all hush-hush
29:15because the testimony
29:18was droning on and on and on.
29:20The pesticide this and the chickens that
29:22and the eggs this and so forth and so on.
29:24My God.
29:25When just hours,
29:26I mean, we have,
29:27after all,
29:27we have 14 of these volumes,
29:302,800 pages of testimony.
29:33The stenographers went bananas.
29:35Anyway,
29:36at 11.30,
29:37somebody high-hold me,
29:38little sign,
29:39and we went outside the hall
29:41and sure enough,
29:42there was Gurren Lerfroof
29:44with his little suitcase.
29:48In the meanwhile,
29:50of course,
29:50we had called the New York Times,
29:52the Chicago Tribune,
29:53the Washington Post.
29:54All these reporters
29:55were waiting in a wink.
29:57It's happening.
29:58Hiya, happening.
30:00Oh, hello, everybody.
30:01And then for the next three hours,
30:03Gurren Lerfroof laid it on the line
30:05that if babies eat,
30:07drink milk
30:08of cows that grazed on land
30:10that was sprayed with DDT,
30:11their fat is going to contain DDT.
30:14And not only this,
30:15but its fat,
30:16of course,
30:16is in the brain.
30:17Most brain
30:18is fat.
30:20It will be loaded with DDT
30:22by Sunday,
30:23front page
30:24of the Sunday New York Times.
30:26And the opposition
30:27was just livid with rage,
30:30but we won that one.
30:31Oh, boy, oh, boy, oh, boy, oh, boy!
30:34We've got fun,
30:35we've got freedom,
30:36we've got joy!
30:38We've got fun,
30:39we've got freedom,
30:40we've got joy!
30:41When I heard it was banned,
30:43I really felt bad about it
30:45because I felt
30:45it was a victory against science.
30:47and I felt that
30:49scientists and industry
30:51had a place in this country
30:53and certainly being undermined
30:56by the statements
30:56about pesticides in general.
30:58It's gotten worse since then,
30:59of course.
31:00After banning DDT,
31:01the others were easy.
31:02Somebody said maybe
31:03because DDT
31:04was so easy to spell
31:05that people
31:05immediately thought about it.
31:07Where once chemicals
31:08were seen as good,
31:09now they were bad.
31:10In the early 1970s,
31:12press and television
31:13became fascinated
31:14by any reports
31:15of the side effects
31:16of pesticides and herbicides.
31:19What happened,
31:20that leg's just malformed,
31:21but he's...
31:22When he was crippled,
31:23he was born after the strain
31:24this year.
31:25That's the only evidence...
31:27And above all,
31:28by the effects
31:28on human beings.
31:30The first analysis
31:31was phoned to me yesterday
31:32to say they have found
31:34the residues of 2,4-D.
31:36So I guess I'm
31:37the first documented case
31:38to say it is residual
31:40in the human body
31:41after you've been exposed to it.
31:42The battle against DDT
31:44had been won ultimately
31:45by evidence of its presence
31:47in humans.
31:48Now the Environmental Defence Fund
31:50placed advertisements
31:51in the national papers
31:52implying that DDT caused cancer.
31:55Donations flooded in,
31:57but the decision split the leadership.
31:59The Environmental Defence Fund
32:01and Carol and I
32:03parted company
32:03over the issue
32:05of whether the shift
32:06should be from
32:07the questions
32:09that we were sure of
32:11that DDT was bad
32:12for the environment
32:12to the speculation
32:14that DDT might cause cancer.
32:16I don't believe
32:17in going to court
32:18on speculation.
32:20I go to court
32:21on relatively solid evidence.
32:25DDT is not good
32:28for mammalian systems.
32:31It damages the nervous system.
32:33It damages
32:34the liver enzyme systems.
32:35It causes some problems.
32:38It is not
32:39a strong carcinogen.
32:42It is not,
32:43except in very large doses,
32:46associated with
32:47serious human health hazard.
32:50Its real problem
32:51is that
32:52it had the capacity,
32:54had it continued to be used
32:55at the rate it was being used,
32:57to literally destroy
32:59almost the entire world
33:02natural ecological system,
33:04on which we really depend
33:06and would have meant
33:08the ultimate collapse
33:09of the human species
33:10as an animal species.
33:13The DDT hearing
33:14was a watershed,
33:15not just for the battle
33:16against chemical pollution,
33:18but for the science
33:19of ecology.
33:20Ecologists became
33:21influential figures,
33:23giving scientific advice
33:24in the battles
33:24against other pesticides.
33:27But in the process,
33:28their science
33:29was transformed.
33:30It became the guiding force
33:32of the environmental movement.
33:34Beginning with the
33:36unintended consequences
33:37of DDT,
33:38the science of ecology
33:40had emerged
33:41as a useful tool
33:42in science,
33:43and many people
33:44began to see it
33:45as something
33:46that could be drawn upon
33:47for moral enlightenment
33:49as well,
33:50the notion of
33:51everything being connected
33:52to everything else.
33:53It's the relationship
33:54between me
33:54and plants and animals
33:56and the world in general.
33:57I remember the first time
33:58I ever heard
33:58the word environmentalist
34:00on the air
34:01was on an Arthur Godfrey show,
34:03and he was trying
34:05to explain what it was,
34:06and it was hard
34:06for him to explain
34:07what the drive,
34:08what the era was.
34:10So it was really
34:11a new era.
34:11Some people
34:31have a deep
34:32abiding respect
34:33for the natural beauty
34:35that was once
34:36this country,
34:37and some people
34:39don't.
34:41People start pollution.
34:44People can stop it.
34:47Two days ago,
34:48a man whose
34:49controversial predictions
34:50of a forthcoming
34:51global catastrophe
34:52have made him
34:53an international figure
34:54arrived at London's
34:56Heathrow Airport.
34:57He is Paul Ehrlich,
34:59professor of biology
35:00at Stanford University,
35:01California,
35:02and the chief spokesman
35:03for the so-called
35:04ecological movement.
35:06Dr. Ehrlich,
35:07just how realistic
35:08is your projected
35:09theory of the
35:09ecocatastrophe?
35:10Well, I think that
35:13it's getting more
35:14realistic all the time.
35:15The signs are getting
35:15worse, but I still
35:16have considerable hope
35:17because although
35:18governments are very
35:18slow, people all
35:20over the world
35:20are awakening very
35:21rapidly to what
35:22the real danger is.
35:23In much the same
35:24way as the science
35:25of entomology
35:26had been changed
35:27in the 1950s,
35:28now ecology
35:29was transformed
35:30by the social
35:31and political
35:32pressures of the
35:33early 70s.
35:34Ecologists became
35:35the moral and
35:36spiritual guardians
35:37of a new view
35:38of the human
35:38relationship to
35:39nature.
35:42And they too
35:43cited Darwin's
35:44laws to prove
35:45that their view
35:46was correct.
35:49Nature has a
35:50set of laws
35:51that all organisms
35:53have to obey
35:54by necessity
35:55because that's
35:56the way they
35:57evolved,
35:57and this applies
35:58to human beings
35:59very much so.
36:00if we need to
36:01introduce into
36:02our lives nature,
36:04it is a need
36:05that is enormously
36:07deep.
36:08Look around you
36:09wherever you go
36:09into homes.
36:11There are not only
36:11living flowers,
36:12there are not only
36:13aquaria and pets.
36:14Look at the wall,
36:15what do we see?
36:17Sunflowers by Van Gogh
36:18or irises by Van Gogh
36:19or pictures,
36:21photographs of
36:22landscapes.
36:23You don't see
36:24framed in a house
36:26a picture of a
36:27crankshaft
36:28from a ford
36:29or a tin can
36:33squashed.
36:34Now, in modern art,
36:36which is a sick art,
36:37because it reflects
36:38the confusion
36:39in the human minds,
36:40yes, indeed.
36:40Darwin's so big
36:41that he can support
36:42any number of
36:43generalizations
36:44about the world.
36:45I mean, given
36:46Darwin's image
36:46as a scientific saint,
36:47people inevitably
36:48try to get him
36:49on the side
36:50of their view
36:50of nature.
36:52Now, Darwin
36:52was complex.
36:54In The Origin of Species,
36:55for example,
36:55the metaphors
36:56tumble over one another
36:57in the most
36:58unscientific way.
37:00Sure, nature's seen
37:01as being at war,
37:03but nature's also
37:04likened to a web
37:05of complex relations.
37:07Here, then,
37:07was another aspect
37:08of Darwin
37:09for people to seize on
37:10for their own purposes.
37:12Darwin gave them
37:13a basis
37:13for urging us
37:14not to take control
37:16of nature,
37:17but to cooperate
37:18with it,
37:19to stay within
37:20its balance.
37:21Again,
37:22Darwin serves up
37:23slogans.
37:27In the popular imagination,
37:31scientific theories
37:32are something fixed,
37:33and if they're good
37:34theories and accepted
37:34by creditable people,
37:36then they're absolute,
37:37and that's that.
37:38What people don't understand
37:39is that scientific theories
37:40never have a single meaning.
37:43They become
37:44a cultural property.
37:46They are usable,
37:48serviceable
37:49for different
37:50interested parties.
37:51The story of DDT continues.
38:17The head of a large
38:18property company
38:19has called a press conference
38:20to announce
38:21that he has stopped
38:21construction
38:22in one of his skyscrapers.
38:24Yeah.
38:24Have you one minute?
38:25Yeah.
38:25Okay, thank you.
38:27Well, let me move
38:29over this side
38:30to have more light.
38:31What's happening
38:32here this morning?
38:33Well, the peregrine falcons
38:35have been nesting
38:36in this building
38:37for five years,
38:38and every year
38:39the peregrine society
38:40comes and retrieves
38:42the eggs.
38:42The eggs
38:43will not hatch here
38:45because due to
38:47DDT contamination,
38:49they're too weak
38:49for the bird
38:50to sit on.
38:51Go ahead,
38:51open the window.
38:52Quick.
38:53Go ahead.
38:53Go ahead.
38:56Go ahead.
39:00Whoa, whoa, whoa, man.
39:04All the way to the way, man.
39:05Somebody's pushing it.
39:07Okay, take it easy.
39:08Each year,
39:09they bring back
39:09a small baby
39:11for the bird
39:12so that they feel
39:13that they've completed
39:14the cycle.
39:15Okay.
39:16You all,
39:18did you want to come in
39:18closer?
39:19Basically,
39:20the people are here
39:21because it's not just
39:21a story about
39:22the eggs being laid
39:24and gathered.
39:25It's a story about
39:26how this particular
39:26developer,
39:27the J.H. Snyder Company,
39:28has literally suspended
39:29construction in this area
39:31during the mating season
39:32of these particular birds.
39:33And how it's
39:34an excellent idea
39:35of how developers
39:36and business people
39:37can participate
39:38in environmental concerns.
39:39Come on.
39:39You saw the number
39:46of TV cameras
39:47and the media people
39:48that were up here today
39:50watching the manipulation
39:51going on.
39:52This, in effect,
39:53is really a myth
39:55being born
39:56or being fostered
39:57at any rate.
39:58Looking out
39:58from the ledge
39:5926 floors
40:00above Wilshire Boulevard,
40:01it's hard to believe
40:02that the Falcons
40:03would pick an urban area
40:04like this to nest.
40:05The myth in this case
40:06is that the
40:07peregrine falcon
40:07is sacred.
40:08Granted,
40:09it's a precious species.
40:12We were about to lose it
40:13perhaps a number
40:14of years ago.
40:14Now we have peregrines
40:15back in good numbers.
40:16There have been
40:17dramatic recoveries.
40:19I think it's just
40:19an unrealistic attitude
40:21about how sensitive
40:23parts of nature are.
40:25At the start
40:25of the DDT litigation
40:27in 1966,
40:29science had become
40:31the way that
40:34the human beings
40:35could avoid responsibility.
40:37Science would take
40:38care of us.
40:39After the DDT wars,
40:41we knew that science
40:43was not necessarily
40:44going to be the answer.
40:45But mankind
40:46in the 20th century
40:47still wanted to avoid
40:48responsibility
40:49for their own
40:50individual actions.
40:52Now it's nature
40:53that's going to permit us
40:55to shift the responsibility
40:57from human beings
40:59to some force
41:00that we don't have
41:01to take responsibility for.
41:02What we're talking about
41:21is a very profound
41:22internal shift
41:23of attitude
41:24and of values.
41:25this is the gift
41:26of ecology
41:27to human beings
41:27and really to all species
41:29today.
41:30And that gift
41:31can give rise
41:32to not utopia
41:33but ecotopia,
41:36which is this
41:37profound sense of place,
41:39the sense of coming home
41:40at last.
41:40The kinds of ideas
41:42about ecology
41:43and environment
41:44that we see today
41:45I don't believe
41:45are any more scientific
41:47or rational
41:48than previous notions
41:50of nature.
41:52In both cases,
41:53people that talk about them
41:54are saying,
41:55look, this is scientific.
41:56I'm not making this up.
41:57These are not my hopes
41:58and dreams.
41:58This is what science tells us.
42:00But in both cases,
42:01I think what you can see
42:01happening
42:02is there particular kinds
42:03of social ideals
42:04being read back to us
42:05as if they were lessons
42:06derived from science itself.
42:08In the case
42:09of contemporary ecology,
42:10it seems to me
42:11what we're actually getting
42:12is a kind of utopia
42:14of a perfectly constructed,
42:16complex universe
42:17of natural things.
42:19And from that universe,
42:20one tries to derive
42:22various kinds of laws
42:23that can help us
42:24live better as human beings.
42:26I think it is
42:27a moral lesson.
42:28There is a possibility
42:30for a kind of utopia.
42:32We've dreamed about it.
42:33And that possibility
42:34exists in our future.
42:36The scientific
42:37and technological notions
42:38of the 1950s,
42:40the ideas of endless possibilities
42:42for exploitation of nature,
42:44are now seen
42:45as ill-conceived
42:46and ill-guided.
42:48I'm haunted
42:48by the possibility
42:49that the ideas
42:50of ecology
42:51that we now embrace today,
42:53may in 30 or 40 years,
42:55seem similarly ill-conceived.
42:56And there are no more
42:57scientific
42:58and let's say
42:58other notions of nature
43:00that we have
43:01looked to in the past.
43:06At least
43:07when science was our god,
43:10we felt that
43:10we were actively
43:11doing something.
43:12We were in control.
43:13Now,
43:14there are too many people
43:15that say,
43:16there's nothing I can do.
43:18Nature will take care of it.
43:19I just will continue
43:21fat, dumb, and happy
43:23the way I am.
43:25We must go back
43:26to the simple
43:28lesson of history.
43:31Every human being,
43:32concerned enough,
43:34dedicated enough,
43:35and willing to make
43:36the sacrifice,
43:37can change the world
43:38around the world.
43:42In 1860,
43:43Charles Darwin
43:44wrote to a friend
43:45in America
43:45about whether it is
43:46possible to seek
43:47divine providence
43:48in nature.
43:50I feel most deeply,
43:51he said,
43:52that the whole subject
43:53is too profound
43:54for the human intellect.
43:55A dog might as well
43:56speculate on the mind
43:58of Newton.
43:59Let each man hope
44:00and believe
44:01what he can.
44:11Oh, come on, folks.
44:13We just gotta get
44:15to the top.
44:16Top?
44:16Top of what?
44:17Why, the top of the...
44:19Oh.
44:20Oh, gosh.
44:22Gosh, I just can't believe it.
44:25I was sure
44:26it would be here.
44:27Oh, sure.
44:28Keep going.
44:28Stick together.
44:29Everything's going to be
44:30just lovely.
44:31when we get to the top.
44:32Well, we're at the top
44:33and where's this paradise
44:35we heard so much about?
44:36Do you think we'll
44:36ever know what's best?
44:38We will one day,
44:40but it won't be here
44:41on Earth
44:41in our lifetime.
44:43We'll know
44:44when we get to heaven,
44:45we'll know what's best.
44:47Oh, look!
44:48Look, everybody, look!
44:53Happity!
44:54Oh, Happity!
44:55In the castle
44:56on the corner
44:59there's a cloud there
45:01and we bank
45:03all these things.
45:04Oh, gee, wait!
45:05Look, it's a human...
45:06And we bank all these things.
45:06...
45:06and we bank all these things.
45:08Oh, gee, wait!
45:09Look, it's a human...
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