Julia said "My reading of the piece is that the author is evading
all the social, political and economic issues related to the
production and control of synthetic pesticides..."
I agree. I once jokingly remarked to one of the toxicologists here
that most scientists not only couldn't see the forest for the trees,
but in most cases couldn't see the tree either because they were too
busy analyzing the bark ! But the fact is, they are really good at
analyzing the bark and so I'm not sure that the chemical argument
advanced by Ames is "spurious." If we could combine the microcosmic
understanding of science with the macrocosmic wisdom of ecofeminism,
I think that the political implications would indeed be "staggering."
Mat-the book I mentioned last week is called "Phantom Risk" (edited
by Foster, Bernstein & Huber), published 1994 by MIT Press.
Deborah
