Barry Commoner, Pioneering Environmental Scientist and Activist, Dies at 95

by Peter Dreier 

 

Barry Commoner, a pioneering environmental scientist and activist, died Sunday at age 95.

Described in 1970 by Time magazine as the "Paul Revere of ecology," Commoner followed Rachel Carson as America's most prominent modern environmentalist. He viewed the environmental crisis as a symptom of a fundamentally flawed economic and social system. A biologist and research scientist, he argued that corporate greed, misguided government priorities, and the misuse of technology undermined "the finely sculptured fit between life and its surroundings."