Manhattan Project
Bowler & Morus [Bowler2005] (pp 479-480) describe the Manhattan Project in terms that typify Tenner’s thesis both in the ironic nature of its effect and in its exchange of an acute and immediate problem for another that is deferred and chronic. The Project was a United States undertaking to develop a nuclear weapon during World War II. It was launched in response to a parallel effort believed to be underway by the German Reich with which the nation was at war. The Project succeeded, albeit after V-E Day, after which it was revealed that there was no counterpart German program. Still, the Bomb was used in 1945 to end the war in the Pacific and to frame the post-war relationship with the Soviet Union. Less than four years later, the Soviet Union possessed a nuclear weapon whose development was both spurred by the nuclear attacks on Japan and propelled by the Manhattan Project’s results, which were acquired though espionage. The nation’s effort to avoid facing a nuclear armed adversary, ironically created a nuclear armed adversary. In line with Tenner’s thesis, the Manhattan Project exchanged the acute (albeit illusory) problem of a nuclear armed Germany for the chronic problem of a nuclear armed Soviet Union, with the attendant nuclear arms race, mutual assurance of destruction, and (using Tenner’s words) the “burden of constant vigilance” demanded by four decades of global Cold War.
Other Cases
Tenner includes a menagerie of non-native species in his discussion of disrupted ecosystems: gypsy moths, killer bees, and fire ants; tumbleweeds, kudzu, eucalyptus, puncture vines, and Brazilian peppers; sparrows and starlings; German carp and walking catfish. Invasive pests disrupt their host ecosystems and displace native species. Some are introduced accidentally, some intentionally. Some are helped along by technology as they migrate naturally. Technology eugenically strengthens some pests as bacteria resist medication and insects resist pesticides. Tenner’s list is extensive but not exhaustive. Toads were imported to Australia in the 1930s to eat bugs in the cane fields, but did not stay there. Poison-excreting cane toads are now a hazard to humans and animals, threaten Australia’s ecology, and are of no benefit to the cane industry [Queensland2011]. Rabbits were brought to New Zealand in the 1800s for food and hunting, and to remind new English arrivals of their old home. In their own new home, rabbits thrived and the industry they supported prospered, but they produced disastrous results on the land [Christchurch2021]. The story of the Gulf Coast lovebug is a cautionary tale against revenge effects. The lovebug is said to have been intentionally introduced to curb the mosquito population but was ineffectual and, because lovebugs are attracted to automotive exhaust, they confine themselves close to moving cars. The lovebug is sometimes said to have been developed in a university laboratory and this would be an exemplary revenge effect except that it is not true [Leppla2015].
Just as it disrupts ecosystems to introduce non-native species, it can also be disruptive to suppress a species that is present. Clearing the buffalo from the Great Plans before 1880 clearly helped prepare the ground for the dust bowl of the 1930s [Lorentz1936].
A revenge effect is also understood to have contributed to the plague epidemic in medieval Europe. Though New York rats may now be too formidable for that city’s cats [Zhang2018], it is generally understood that cats eat rats and the job of a medieval housecat was to keep rats from the home. But if witches seem real, one might attribute a more diabolical role to a cat. The devastating impact of bubonic plague on 14th century Europe is often attributed to the widespread killing of cats after a decree on witchcraft by Pope Gregory IX in 1233 [Mark2019]. It is believed that with fewer cats, there was an abundance of rats whose fleas spread the disease. Though the actual impact of Pope Gregory IX on plague transmission is contested, this would be, and is popularly understood to be, a revenge effect.
Likewise, the hygiene hypothesis [Zaccone2006] suggests another revenge effect of species suppression. The argument goes that improvements in modern hygiene have suppressed human pathogens and parasites. This suppression of harmful organisms has created a lower incidence of infection. Fewer infections have, in turn, increased the incidence of allergies and autoimmune conditions, which has been observed. The hygiene hypothesis is unproven. But,the goal of improved hygiene is to improve health and if improved hygiene does harm to health, then this would be a revenge effect.