Ethos, Pathos, and Word Choice Grabbed My Attention

“The Obligation to Endure,” by Rachel Carson is about how the chemicals that we (human beings) use on crops are harmful to the air, water, animals, and even ourselves. Carson starts off by establishing her trustworthiness as an author by stating facts and giving her insightful opinions on the dangers of different chemicals that are used. She makes her readers question why certain processes are used with her word choice and emotional appeal.
Facts, facts, and more facts are given at the beginning of “The Obligation to Endure.” Statements such as, “Strontium 90, released through nuclear explosions into the air, comes to earth in rain, or drifts down as fall out, lodges in soil, enters into the grass or corn or wheat grown there, and in time takes up in abode in the bones of a human being, there to remain until his death,” and “500 new chemicals (per year) to which the bodies of men and animals are required somehow to adapt each year,” are written by Carson to engage the reader and establish herself as a trustworthy author (ethos). It is these numbers, statistics, and explanations of the toll that the use of chemicals has taken on our earthly environment that give the reader reason to take Carson seriously.
Another important technique that Carson practices is choosing words that sound harmful; kills, devils, deadly, disease, deprivation, and invasion are just a few of the examples. A person reading in this essay would use their logic to associate these words with scary situations and once the reader has made this connection, they would see the scariness and importance of Carson’s point.
Perhaps the best appeal that is used in the essay is the emotional appeal. Let’s be honest, humans tend to care about themselves and not much more, so Carson not only explains the dangerous effects of the chemicals on the environment, but also the dangerous effects the chemicals will have on our bodies. She says, “How could intelligent beings seek to control a few unwanted species by a method that contaminates the entire environment and brought the threat of disease and death even to their own kind?” When a person sees that their own health could be in danger, their interest will increase and they will care more about the things Carson is saying.
Carson does many more things that engage her readers, but the ethos, pathos, and her word choices grabbed my attention the most. I think she probably planned to use ethos, pathos and her particular word choice to get the attention of her readers, and there are probably even more techniques she used that we don’t realize.