The two faces of modern chemistry

Are we living in the Anthropocene? Enduring the atomic age? Or weathering the next major extinction event? There is no shortage of terms to describe our environmental present. The term “Anthropocene” first entered the English vocabulary in 2000, at the suggestion of atmospheric scientists Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer. Twenty years later, scholars continue to devise names for our current era of unprecedented environmental change. Environmental historian Jason Moore recently coined the phrase “Capitalocene” to emphasize industrial capitalism as the primary cause of environmental degradation, whereas journalist Elizabeth Kolbert has given our era the morbidly apt moniker of the “Sixth Extinction.”

Biologist Frank A. von Hippel adds to the abundance of neologisms in The Chemical Age: How Chemists Fought Famine and Disease, Killed Millions, and Changed Our Relationship with the Earth, which highlights the roles that chemists played in public health campaigns, warfare, and environmental transformation from the mid 19th century to the present. Although not explicitly defined, the titular “Chemical Age” nevertheless captures the widespread application of chemistry to real-world problems and the related belief that chemistry can solve them. Von Hippel reprises for a popular audience the familiar story of technological optimism and its unintended consequences; his text is a welcome addition to the growing corpus of environmental histories.

A professor of ecotoxicology by day, von Hippel aims to promote scientific literacy and environmental consciousness among the general public. The Chemical Age builds on the author’s penchant for environmental activism. Its strongest chapters are those that adhere most closely to its motivating theme: chemistry’s promise and peril. The book is full of tragic characters like German-Jewish chemist Fritz Haber, who developed a class of insecticides later used by the Nazi regime for genocidal purposes. Von Hippel also highlights chemists complicit in environmental harm, such as the less well-known Thomas Midgley, who developed leaded gasoline in an effort to improve automobile engines. His invention inadvertently polluted the atmosphere with lead.

The role of chemistry itself as a tragic character comes across most clearly in the author’s discussion of DDT. Once heralded as a magic bullet for malaria and typhus, a boon to agriculture, and a necessity for suburban living, DDT was synonymous with environmental degradation by the early 1960s. That attitudinal change occurred largely because of marine biologist Rachel Carson, whose 1962 book Silent Spring depicted the environmental consequences of indiscriminate pesticide use. As Carson’s warnings provoked widespread debate about pesticide safety, chemical companies mobilized to discredit her claims. Their gendered critiques of Carson’s “emotional” tone and their pleas to present “both sides” of the controversy resonate strongly with contemporary environmental politics and make von Hippel’s analysis both incisive and timely.

Readers interested in the history of chemistry must approach the book with patience. The Chemical Age is divided into four sections. The first two discuss the Irish Potato Famine and several epidemic diseases, including malaria, yellow fever, typhus, and the bubonic plague. In each case, the author meticulously reconstructs dominant theories of disease transmission at the time and follows scientists’ efforts to identify pathogens, but he only briefly mentions chemical prophylactics and cures. Those appear in a much later chapter discussing the use of synthetic chemicals like DDT and atabrine to curb malaria transmission during World War II.

The chemical age began during the age of late imperialism, and chemical cures did not universally benefit the global population. As von Hippel puts it, they often underpinned “nineteenth- and twentieth-century imperial ambitions.” European states relied on anti-malarial drugs to colonize African nations in the 19th century. Similarly, the US depended on a steady supply of quinine to extend its influence into the Panama Canal Zone.

As von Hippel reconstructs imperial public health campaigns, he frequently quotes colonial officers’ frustrations that colonized people would not cooperate with directives. Those passages would benefit from further context. Chemistry and imperialism intersected during military invasions, to be sure, but they also intersected in the day-to-day exercise of imperial power, which forced uncertain chemical cures on indigenous people and used the language of public health to support claims of racial difference. By glossing over those elements, the author misses an opportunity to show the Janus face, or two sides, of modern chemistry, so crucial to the book’s argument, and to credit those who resisted its incursions into their daily lives.

Likewise, the author misses the mark when discussing chattel slavery and mosquito-borne illnesses. He twice remarks that West Africans’ moderate immunity to illnesses like malaria and yellow fever “ensured” their enslavement at the hands of plantation owners, but he makes no mention of factors like racial ideologies or Euro-American profit motives. As more scholars look to scientific disciplines for perspectives on history, they should be wary of focusing too narrowly on chemical and biological causation and thus diminishing the role of human agency and responsibility. When we speak of the chemical age, we inevitably speak about synthetic molecules. But we should also look with a critical eye at those who wielded them, their motives, and the effects of their choices. In its analysis of modern environmentalism, von Hippel’s monograph fulfills that task. The Chemical Age is a timely exploration of our environmental present.