Scientist was a founder of modern ecology
Barry Commoner, a scientist-activist whose ability to identify and explain complex ecological crises and advocate radical solutions made him a pillar of the environmental movement, died of natural causes Sunday in New York City. He was 95.
His death was confirmed by his wife, Lisa Feiner.
Mr. Commoner was a biologist and author whose seminal 1971 book, “The Closing Circle: Man, Nature and Technology,” argued for the connectedness of humans and the natural world. It said environmental problems were related to technological advances and had a role in social and economic injustice.
He conducted research that helped propel a successful campaign for a nuclear test ban treaty in the early 1960s and drew early attention to the dangers of dioxins, the potential of solar energy and recycling as a practical means of reducing waste.
Historians of the environmental movement often name Mr. Commoner as one of the country’s most influential ecologists, along with scientist-author Aldo Leopold, “Silent Spring” author Rachel Carson and the Sierra Club’s John Muir and David Brower. Time magazine featured him in 1970 as the “Paul Revere of Ecology.”
“Together with Rachel Carson, he was the most important persons in catalyzing the modern environmental movement,” said Occidental College historian Peter Dreier, who named Mr. Commoner in his recent book “The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century: A Social Justice Hall of Fame.”
In “The Closing Circle,” he argued that there were three possible causes of environmental degradation — overpopulation, increasing affluence and technology. He decided technology was the No. 1 enemy.
A self-described “half-socialist,” Mr. Commoner called for stopping pollution before it is produced and cited the successful campaigns to ban the pesticide DDT and lead in gasoline. He said such changes could only be achieved by ending “the taboo against social intervention in the production system.”
These views did not make him a popular candidate for president when he ran in 1980 on his own Citizens Party ticket. (He garnered less than 1 percent of the popular vote.)
Born in New York City on May 28, 1917, Mr. Commoner was the son of a Russian Jewish tailor and seamstress. He ran with a street gang as a youth, but discovered a passion for biology in high school.
He learned one of his most valuable lessons outside the classroom, however. While serving in the Navy during World War II, he was assigned to spray a naval facility on the Jersey shore with DDT to rid it of mosquitoes. To his dismay, the mosquito population ballooned, and the fish that normally ate them died. He would recall the experience in later years, when he reflected on the development of his ideas about the worlds of men and nature sharing one ecosystem.