Page 175 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

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when the price of oil quadrupled. Not only did its costs Meikle, J. L. (1995). American plastic:A cultural history. New Brunswick,
escalate, the demand for its products fell as Western NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Morris, P. J.T. (1986). Polymer pioneers. Philadelphia, PA: Center for the
economies faltered. The public image of plastics was History of Chemistry.
already lackluster.The environmental movement, gaining Mossman, S. T. I. (Ed.). (1997). Early plastics: Perspectives, 1850–
1950. London: Leicester University Press.
momentum from the anti-Vietnam War protests, was
Mossman, S. T. I., & Morris, P. J. T. (Eds.). (1994). The development of
highlighting the highly visible results of discarded plas- plastics. Cambridge, UK: Royal Society of Chemistry.
tics waste. Even more alarmingly, there were growing Seymour, R. B. (Ed.). (1982). History of polymer science and technology.
New York: Marcel Dekker.
concerns about the safety of the workhorse plastic PVC.
In 1972, the monomer (building block) of PVC was dis-
covered to cause a rare form of liver cancer. More recently
there have been concerns about the health effects of plas-
ticizers, chemicals used to make PVC flexible. The pro- Plato
ducers of traditional materials such as wood, metals, and (c. 427–347 bce)
glass were not idle and capitalized on this public disillu- Greek philosopher and writer
sionment. Sometimes the users of these materials, for
instance furniture manufacturers, made their products lato was born into a wealthy and aristocratic family
more competitive by incorporating plastics into their Pwho was active in politics in Athens, Greece. His
products where they would be invisible. given name was “Aristocles”: “Plato” was a nickname that
he received as a result of his broad shoulders, testimony
The Resilience of Plastic to his youthful love of wrestling. He first sat in the circle
Nevertheless, the plastics industry proved to be remark- of the philosopher Socrates when he was about twenty
ably resilient. By 1992,American production had trebled and remained devoted to his teacher until Socrates’s exe-
over two decades. Meanwhile, the use of plastics contin- cution in 399. Afterward Plato traveled for a time, visit-
ues to grow, in window frames, computers, and in our ing Cyrene, Egypt, and Sicily. His visit to Sicily ended
cars. The high-performance plastics of the 1960s are abruptly when Dionysius I, the tyrant of Syracuse, had
becoming commonplace, and even more sophisticated him deported.
plastics are being developed. Carbon-fiber-reinforced Upon his return to Athens, Plato followed Socrates in
composites are used in sports equipment. While the the establishment of a philosophical circle. In effect, Plato
public at large remains attached to natural materials, we removed himself from civic life, neither marrying nor par-
use an ever-increasing amount of plastics (even if we tend ticipating in political life. Plato’s circle, however, had a
not to think of them as such). more formal existence than that of Socrates. It met regu-
larly in the grove dedicated to the hero Hakedemos, from
Peter Morris
which it took its name, the “Academy.” This circle, in es-
sence a school if not a university, continued its existence
for more than nine hundred years, ceasing its operations
Further Reading
only at the order of Christian Emperor Justinian in 529.
Clarke, A. J. (1999). Tupperware: The promise of plastic in 1950s Amer-
ica. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press. Plato’s foundation of the Academy represents the mer-
DuBois, J. H. (1972). Plastics history USA. Boston: Cahners Books. est beginnings of his influence on subsequent genera-
Fenichell, S. (1996). Plastic:The making of a synthetic century. New York:
HarperBusiness. tions.The most prolific interpreter of Socrates, he wrote
Katz, S. (1984). Classic plastics: From bakelite to high-tech, with a col- dialogues in which his teacher is characterized as a
lector’s guide. London: Thames and Hudson.
Kaufman, M. (1963). The first century of plastics: Celluloid and its sequel. shrewd and versatile interrogator. Plato’s Socrates does
London: Plastics Institute. not offer teaching so much as cross-examine claims to