The headlines are changing. What we've been told about healthy food and diet is being challenged. The food industry will have to come to terms with this growing movement of Americans awakened and alert towards the false, the fake, the fucked up.
Long live The #Occupiers!
Read this article to see a popular media breakthrough.
Most of it is great except for the whole grains thing which I will gladly debate (even though it's that season when goodies made with flour - apple pie, pumpkin cookies - are sooooooo tempting!).
On an entirely separate note, I had a conversation about the fact that in countries older than ours, it's still viable to buy packaged groceries that are not processed, such as tomato sauce. I find it entirely preposterous that in order to buy tomato sauce without any additives, it has to be imported from Italy, when in fact tomatoes grow where I live.
Anyway... more and more items like that are becoming localized, so it may soon be possible to buy items like tomato sauce from somewhere much closer than Italy.
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Priorities
Okay, so I've been away from the blog for a while and I'm starting to get a handle on all this information. I think I feel good about my introductory posts... now it's time to move on to the practical matters of living this out on a daily basis.
Something that has come up numerous times is a misperception of the "organic craze" as simply a hot trendy thing that has only to do with people of affluence. This needs to be corrected. I've heard shoppers at my grocery store complaining about the price of organic produce. Once again, the food industry has concerned itself only with profit, and organic food has been marketed mainly to people with higher incomes as a symbol of prestige and wealth. This portrayal is misleading and detrimental, as it overshadows more pressing concerns about the chemicals and toxins used to grow conventional produce & meat, and the effects of such methods on the land. Mass outbreaks of diseases such as salmonella and e-coli do not occur in naturally regulated settings, yet most of our food comes from unnatural and/or contaminated settings: assembly line factory farms and feed lots where these diseases can thrive and rapidly spread.
I know I can't bring down Big Media or Big Agriculture, but for my part I need to voice my concerns. The way that this misperception - of fresh, unprocessed food as luxury - affects those of us with median or lower incomes is to make quality food seem out of reach - we feel as though eating healthier is not attainable, even if we really desire to. My friends whom I've talked to about buying local and organic have all hesitated to change their grocery-buying habits due to anxiety over affordability.
If this issue grabs hold of you and sparks a desire for change in your life, I give you my personal testimony that you CAN make it happen if you have an open mind and are willing to spend time thinking about these issues. This is not a status symbol, like a BMW, this is how we feel - every day - and our future health. This is also not an easy change to make, and may involve more restructuring in one's life than simply starting to buy different groceries. My point is that if and when a person decides to make a lifestyle change in the area of food, chances are great that it will affect his lifestyle choices in other areas.
Stop listening to the media - they don't represent farmers or consumers. Forget about how it's marketed and try it out for yourself. Compare prices for individual meals for a week between an organic store or farmer's market VS. your grocery store (or just purchase the organic products at your store), and also assess how you feel after eating a meal from each source. I'll tell you, there is a difference between eating meat/dairy/produce from a factory farm (standard grocery store) and meat/dairy/produce from an organic farm. Another major outcome with eating healthier products is that you won't need hardly any fillers such as rice, pasta, bread or potatoes, which cuts down significantly on your grocery bill. Eating naturally grown food fills you up - it better satisfies your hunger so that you don't need to supplement your daily diet with things you don't need (carbs, starches & sugars). You may still want the fried rice and that sugary beverage and a side of French toast, but you won't need them to feel full, or properly nourished, or energized.
Something that has come up numerous times is a misperception of the "organic craze" as simply a hot trendy thing that has only to do with people of affluence. This needs to be corrected. I've heard shoppers at my grocery store complaining about the price of organic produce. Once again, the food industry has concerned itself only with profit, and organic food has been marketed mainly to people with higher incomes as a symbol of prestige and wealth. This portrayal is misleading and detrimental, as it overshadows more pressing concerns about the chemicals and toxins used to grow conventional produce & meat, and the effects of such methods on the land. Mass outbreaks of diseases such as salmonella and e-coli do not occur in naturally regulated settings, yet most of our food comes from unnatural and/or contaminated settings: assembly line factory farms and feed lots where these diseases can thrive and rapidly spread.
I know I can't bring down Big Media or Big Agriculture, but for my part I need to voice my concerns. The way that this misperception - of fresh, unprocessed food as luxury - affects those of us with median or lower incomes is to make quality food seem out of reach - we feel as though eating healthier is not attainable, even if we really desire to. My friends whom I've talked to about buying local and organic have all hesitated to change their grocery-buying habits due to anxiety over affordability.
If this issue grabs hold of you and sparks a desire for change in your life, I give you my personal testimony that you CAN make it happen if you have an open mind and are willing to spend time thinking about these issues. This is not a status symbol, like a BMW, this is how we feel - every day - and our future health. This is also not an easy change to make, and may involve more restructuring in one's life than simply starting to buy different groceries. My point is that if and when a person decides to make a lifestyle change in the area of food, chances are great that it will affect his lifestyle choices in other areas.
Stop listening to the media - they don't represent farmers or consumers. Forget about how it's marketed and try it out for yourself. Compare prices for individual meals for a week between an organic store or farmer's market VS. your grocery store (or just purchase the organic products at your store), and also assess how you feel after eating a meal from each source. I'll tell you, there is a difference between eating meat/dairy/produce from a factory farm (standard grocery store) and meat/dairy/produce from an organic farm. Another major outcome with eating healthier products is that you won't need hardly any fillers such as rice, pasta, bread or potatoes, which cuts down significantly on your grocery bill. Eating naturally grown food fills you up - it better satisfies your hunger so that you don't need to supplement your daily diet with things you don't need (carbs, starches & sugars). You may still want the fried rice and that sugary beverage and a side of French toast, but you won't need them to feel full, or properly nourished, or energized.
Friday, May 6, 2011
Untangling the Knots/A Growing Resistance
I've been eating this new way for a while (five months), and my bodily needs have gone through some changes, as would seem natural. I've described in a previous post what happened to my appetite, energy and vitality initially when I stopped eating grains & starches, refined sugar and hydrogenated oils. Now, gradually, my appetite has increased to a level similar to what it was before the change in my diet, but I doubt that is an indication of anything troublesome. Possibly, it is due to an increase in physical activity, which my body compensates for with an increase in appetite. Maybe the adjustment period is over and I've reached a new equilibrium, or homeostasis... I don't know the answer, but I still feel way more energetic and vigorous than I felt when eating carbohydrates (I should admit, though, that I do ingest a small amount of carbs here and there: beer being a large culprit, pizza, and an occasional baked good.) Now that carbs are so minimal in my diet, I've noticed that when I do have carbs, I crave them - as in, I would love to eat ten chocolate croissants - like an addiction, which is something I'm looking into...
I've been learning about which questions have been asked and what conclusions have been drawn from the available data. That's a vague statement, but I'm reading the analyses presented in the book "Good Calories, Bad Calories" of research on nutrition, hunger, obesity and weight loss, and discovering (albeit from one author, at the moment) that the evidence for many health claims has only ever been vague. What I'm expounding on is my awakening to the degree of complexity in searching for answers to health issues. I'll use two examples, from "Good Calories, Bad Calories", to illustrate what I mean.
First, consider the factors of carbohydrates, fat, and the amount of calories we eat in connection with weight gain/loss. If you were to conduct tests to find cause and effect, you'd have to test a diet high in carbs and low in fat, a diet low in carbs and high in fat, and also observe whether the total calories went up, down or stayed the same. If your test subjects lost weight, is it because of low carbohydrates, high fat, the reverse, or a difference in total calories (or a combination)?
Another example is the issue of scurvy among sailors way back when. The author, Gary Taubes, explains that "Scottish naval surgeon James Lind demonstrated in 1753 that scurvy could be prevented and cured by the consumption of citrus juice, for example, he did so with British sailors who had been eating the typical naval fare 'of water gruel sweetened with sugar in the morning, fresh mutton broth, light puddings, boiled biscuit with sugar, barley and raisins, rice and currants'." (Taubes, p. 321) Now compare that to the diet recorded by anthropologist Vilhjalmur Stefansson: [he] "had spent a decade eating nothing but meat among the Inuit of northern Canada and Alaska. Among the tribes with whom Stefansson lived and traveled, the diet was primarily caribou meat, 'with perhaps 30 percent fish, 10 percent seal meat, and 5 or 10 percent made up of polar bear, rabbits, birds and eggs'." (Taubes, p.320) So, what is it that causes scurvy? The evidence is vague, at best.
This is what blew me away: "To be technically accurate, however, [James] Lind and the nutritionists who followed him in the study of scurvy demonstrated only that the disease is a dietary deficiency that can be cured by the addition of fresh fruits and vegetables. As a matter of logic, though, this doesn't necessarily imply that the lack of vitamin C is caused by the lack of fresh fruits and vegetables. Scurvy can be ameliorated by adding these to the diet, but the original lack of vitamin C might be caused by other factors. In fact, given that the Inuit and those Westerners living on the Inuit's vegetable- and fruit-free diet never suffered from scurvy, as Stefansson observed, then other factors must be involved. This suggested another way of defining a balanced diet. It's possible that eating easily digestible carbohydrates and sugars increases our need for vitamins that we would otherwise derive from animal products in sufficient quantities.
READ THAT LAST SENTENCE AGAIN. Those sailors who ate nothing but grains, fruit and sugar (all carbohydrate) developed a vitamin deficiency, yet the Inuit and Western explorers who ate only meat with a few eggs did not develop ANY deficiencies, despite having eaten nothing that modern nutrition experts would consider an adequate source of vitamins.
When I think about my experience, this actually starts to make sense. When I ate carbohydrates as a large percentage of my diet, I wanted to eat those foods all the time, and I was always hungry, and I also craved lots of fruits and vegetables. Now I seldomly have cravings for fruits or vegetables as necessary nutrients - and the only reason I still sometimes need to supplement my diet with fruit or vegetables is because I don't have complete access to meat & dairy from farms that raise their animals 100% biologically appropriate. By that I mean raising animals without factories or machines or cages, and allowing them to eat what they're meant to eat, thereby metabolizing and storing the nutrients that I need in the meat and fat that I eat. If I decide I've evolved to eat mainly meat, then I need to procure my meat from sources where my meat eats what it has evolved to eat, and passes the benefits on to me (and you).
Another point, about ecological cycles - that if animals eat what they're equipped to eat (a cow, for example, has multiple stomachs precisely to be able to digest grasses, not grains), then when they die and humans take their meat, the rest of the carcass decomposes and replenishes the soil with the appropriate nutrients - the same nutrients that the animal used up to begin and sustain its life. It all works together in exact precision if there is no tampering; unfortunately, there is...
My inner skeptic asks if I'm just saying all this because I want to believe what I'm reading. Possibly, but the evidence that I've accumulated so far regarding my diet is more supportive of eating more meat, less fruits and vegetables, and hardly any or zero grains and sugar (although I still love a decadent brownie - damn the food industry for raising me on crap I'm not equipped to eat).
I've been learning about which questions have been asked and what conclusions have been drawn from the available data. That's a vague statement, but I'm reading the analyses presented in the book "Good Calories, Bad Calories" of research on nutrition, hunger, obesity and weight loss, and discovering (albeit from one author, at the moment) that the evidence for many health claims has only ever been vague. What I'm expounding on is my awakening to the degree of complexity in searching for answers to health issues. I'll use two examples, from "Good Calories, Bad Calories", to illustrate what I mean.
First, consider the factors of carbohydrates, fat, and the amount of calories we eat in connection with weight gain/loss. If you were to conduct tests to find cause and effect, you'd have to test a diet high in carbs and low in fat, a diet low in carbs and high in fat, and also observe whether the total calories went up, down or stayed the same. If your test subjects lost weight, is it because of low carbohydrates, high fat, the reverse, or a difference in total calories (or a combination)?
Another example is the issue of scurvy among sailors way back when. The author, Gary Taubes, explains that "Scottish naval surgeon James Lind demonstrated in 1753 that scurvy could be prevented and cured by the consumption of citrus juice, for example, he did so with British sailors who had been eating the typical naval fare 'of water gruel sweetened with sugar in the morning, fresh mutton broth, light puddings, boiled biscuit with sugar, barley and raisins, rice and currants'." (Taubes, p. 321) Now compare that to the diet recorded by anthropologist Vilhjalmur Stefansson: [he] "had spent a decade eating nothing but meat among the Inuit of northern Canada and Alaska. Among the tribes with whom Stefansson lived and traveled, the diet was primarily caribou meat, 'with perhaps 30 percent fish, 10 percent seal meat, and 5 or 10 percent made up of polar bear, rabbits, birds and eggs'." (Taubes, p.320) So, what is it that causes scurvy? The evidence is vague, at best.
This is what blew me away: "To be technically accurate, however, [James] Lind and the nutritionists who followed him in the study of scurvy demonstrated only that the disease is a dietary deficiency that can be cured by the addition of fresh fruits and vegetables. As a matter of logic, though, this doesn't necessarily imply that the lack of vitamin C is caused by the lack of fresh fruits and vegetables. Scurvy can be ameliorated by adding these to the diet, but the original lack of vitamin C might be caused by other factors. In fact, given that the Inuit and those Westerners living on the Inuit's vegetable- and fruit-free diet never suffered from scurvy, as Stefansson observed, then other factors must be involved. This suggested another way of defining a balanced diet. It's possible that eating easily digestible carbohydrates and sugars increases our need for vitamins that we would otherwise derive from animal products in sufficient quantities.
READ THAT LAST SENTENCE AGAIN. Those sailors who ate nothing but grains, fruit and sugar (all carbohydrate) developed a vitamin deficiency, yet the Inuit and Western explorers who ate only meat with a few eggs did not develop ANY deficiencies, despite having eaten nothing that modern nutrition experts would consider an adequate source of vitamins.
When I think about my experience, this actually starts to make sense. When I ate carbohydrates as a large percentage of my diet, I wanted to eat those foods all the time, and I was always hungry, and I also craved lots of fruits and vegetables. Now I seldomly have cravings for fruits or vegetables as necessary nutrients - and the only reason I still sometimes need to supplement my diet with fruit or vegetables is because I don't have complete access to meat & dairy from farms that raise their animals 100% biologically appropriate. By that I mean raising animals without factories or machines or cages, and allowing them to eat what they're meant to eat, thereby metabolizing and storing the nutrients that I need in the meat and fat that I eat. If I decide I've evolved to eat mainly meat, then I need to procure my meat from sources where my meat eats what it has evolved to eat, and passes the benefits on to me (and you).
Another point, about ecological cycles - that if animals eat what they're equipped to eat (a cow, for example, has multiple stomachs precisely to be able to digest grasses, not grains), then when they die and humans take their meat, the rest of the carcass decomposes and replenishes the soil with the appropriate nutrients - the same nutrients that the animal used up to begin and sustain its life. It all works together in exact precision if there is no tampering; unfortunately, there is...
My inner skeptic asks if I'm just saying all this because I want to believe what I'm reading. Possibly, but the evidence that I've accumulated so far regarding my diet is more supportive of eating more meat, less fruits and vegetables, and hardly any or zero grains and sugar (although I still love a decadent brownie - damn the food industry for raising me on crap I'm not equipped to eat).
Thursday, April 14, 2011
An Open Letter to the Vegan Ethos
The ethical/moral stance of vegetarians and vegans towards animals is commendable. Working for the cause of justice (of all kinds) is of the highest convictions, and I am deeply concerned about fairness and respect. Not everyone feels empowered to fight for justice due to social conditioning or oppression, yet everyone is capable, when backed up against the wall, to muster that courage. Righteousness is in every story about the triumph of the human spirit; we inherently seek to overcome destructive forces with love.
There are always extremes, however, that represent the opposite swing of the pendulum. There are some black and white issues, such as animal cruelty, human torture, violence, etc., and there are some issues with a vastly greater degree of complexity, such as what is appropriate for humans to eat.
All of us should follow the lead of vegans that are bold enough to take action against the cruel and inhumane practices of the food industry. Here's the rub: the vegan ethos becomes a separate thing altogether when the urgency about the treatment of animals becomes the encapsulating bubble around morality in general. The debate over eating animals versus plants IS MORE COMPLEX than that. When someone claims superiority based on a matter of physical nature, that is not a singular fight for justice, that is religious fervor - the same damaging protocol espoused by all organized religions: to convert or be exiled.
Any person other than myself does not know what it feels like to be me. You do not know how my hunger works, or how eating three meals of wheat products every day makes me feel, or how many beers it takes to make me sick. You do not know what triggers my migraines, or if my muscles are sore for days after running one mile, or if I've ever been to the hospital for malnutrition.
You do not have the right to tell me I'm immoral because of my dietary choices (cannibalism excepted). Like I said, I am a comrade in the fight against animal cruelty, but I'm not of the persuasion that eating meat is morally wrong. Vegans need to accept the reality of nutrition and stop trying to fit it into their mold. Humans have evolved in a specific way: the exact nutrients we need to be healthy come from eating certain foods - from both plant and animal sources. I'm not making this up to suit my fancy. If you really believe that humans should no longer eat meat, you're going to have to wait another 600,000 years for our biology to change. I have another issue to raise with you, however, if that's the case: the available amount of land on our planet that is suitable for growing the crops for a vegan diet is already in use - there is no more. The solution to world hunger through more plant-based food is not viable or sustainable. I'm ready and willing to discuss other options...
I've been a proponent of several different diets - diets with meat, diets without meat, raw food, vegan food... but it comes down to your own health, and here we have a case of black and white. Health has everything to do with what you eat, so if you're not healthy, the cause is something you eat. My health was degraded significantly as I ate a diet with minimal meat and a huge increase in grains. I was even consciously trying to eat whole grains, natural products, minimal refined sugar, etc., but I never felt optimal like I used to when I ate more meat (read my entry from February 25).
So, vegans, when I was faced with the decision to restore my health by eating more meat or continue to boycott the production methods of meat at the expense of my own body, I chose to live. I have also made the decision to buy meat & dairy from places with humane & environmentally holistic practices. People have different bodies with different dietary needs. I implore vegans to work together with non-vegans to abolish the current factory farming and industrial agriculture systems, and implement a new system that is healthier, sustainable and more just towards humans and animals.
There are always extremes, however, that represent the opposite swing of the pendulum. There are some black and white issues, such as animal cruelty, human torture, violence, etc., and there are some issues with a vastly greater degree of complexity, such as what is appropriate for humans to eat.
All of us should follow the lead of vegans that are bold enough to take action against the cruel and inhumane practices of the food industry. Here's the rub: the vegan ethos becomes a separate thing altogether when the urgency about the treatment of animals becomes the encapsulating bubble around morality in general. The debate over eating animals versus plants IS MORE COMPLEX than that. When someone claims superiority based on a matter of physical nature, that is not a singular fight for justice, that is religious fervor - the same damaging protocol espoused by all organized religions: to convert or be exiled.
Any person other than myself does not know what it feels like to be me. You do not know how my hunger works, or how eating three meals of wheat products every day makes me feel, or how many beers it takes to make me sick. You do not know what triggers my migraines, or if my muscles are sore for days after running one mile, or if I've ever been to the hospital for malnutrition.
You do not have the right to tell me I'm immoral because of my dietary choices (cannibalism excepted). Like I said, I am a comrade in the fight against animal cruelty, but I'm not of the persuasion that eating meat is morally wrong. Vegans need to accept the reality of nutrition and stop trying to fit it into their mold. Humans have evolved in a specific way: the exact nutrients we need to be healthy come from eating certain foods - from both plant and animal sources. I'm not making this up to suit my fancy. If you really believe that humans should no longer eat meat, you're going to have to wait another 600,000 years for our biology to change. I have another issue to raise with you, however, if that's the case: the available amount of land on our planet that is suitable for growing the crops for a vegan diet is already in use - there is no more. The solution to world hunger through more plant-based food is not viable or sustainable. I'm ready and willing to discuss other options...
I've been a proponent of several different diets - diets with meat, diets without meat, raw food, vegan food... but it comes down to your own health, and here we have a case of black and white. Health has everything to do with what you eat, so if you're not healthy, the cause is something you eat. My health was degraded significantly as I ate a diet with minimal meat and a huge increase in grains. I was even consciously trying to eat whole grains, natural products, minimal refined sugar, etc., but I never felt optimal like I used to when I ate more meat (read my entry from February 25).
So, vegans, when I was faced with the decision to restore my health by eating more meat or continue to boycott the production methods of meat at the expense of my own body, I chose to live. I have also made the decision to buy meat & dairy from places with humane & environmentally holistic practices. People have different bodies with different dietary needs. I implore vegans to work together with non-vegans to abolish the current factory farming and industrial agriculture systems, and implement a new system that is healthier, sustainable and more just towards humans and animals.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Some Discretion Required
I recently came across a new (I'm unsure of when it began) website created by the USDA (Dept. of Agriculture) called "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food" that is promoting the re-engagement of local consumers with local farmers and producers. I've put the link to the site in my links at the bottom, but I wanted to think through a concern I have about supporting any new initiatives that are undertaken by a large/corporate/monopolizing and/or governmental institution with a vested interest in the money to be made.
Take a look at this website... I have perused the mission statement and the headings of all the main areas that this new initiative encompasses: supporting local farmers; strengthening rural communities; promoting healthy eating; protecting natural resources; and offering grants, loans, and non-monetary support. I also skimmed over the bios of each member, and I have to say I do like the concept and the way this appears to be set up.
I want to believe that the USDA is committing itself to these courses of action because the government necessarily should be behind the changes we need to make as a country, including the sacrifices we have to make for our survival - which involves every aspect of our economy. I am skeptical, however (and perhaps cynical), that this initiative has altruistic intentions in addition to its profit motive. I do realize, of course, that everyone needs to earn a living, but my point here has more to do with a shift in how we as consumers respond to the seemingly positive actions of a corporation. I want to be wary of confusing a marketing spin with a real and honest dedication to these issues.
Here's the thing: farms can begin or transition over to organic methods, cease to use chemicals, growth hormones and pesticides, and humanely raise/pasture their animals, but then those smaller farms can grow larger and be purchased by a large company - DuPont, for example - that owns a large diversity of other companies that are not operating sustainably, and that spends a great deal of money lobbying the government to increase our importing of oil. That's a simplification of the issue, but the question remains: Am I really supporting that organic farmer by buying her yogurt, or am I giving my dollars to an industry (oil, tobacco, GMOs, etc.) that I'm trying not to support by buying from an organic farmer?
Is the USDA really tackling these issues through "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food"? Are they aligning their expertise and experience with the goals of reorganizing our agriculture, dismantling the industrial food system and creating a new system that ensures access to and affordability of healthy, fresh food to everyone?
Take a look at this website... I have perused the mission statement and the headings of all the main areas that this new initiative encompasses: supporting local farmers; strengthening rural communities; promoting healthy eating; protecting natural resources; and offering grants, loans, and non-monetary support. I also skimmed over the bios of each member, and I have to say I do like the concept and the way this appears to be set up.
I want to believe that the USDA is committing itself to these courses of action because the government necessarily should be behind the changes we need to make as a country, including the sacrifices we have to make for our survival - which involves every aspect of our economy. I am skeptical, however (and perhaps cynical), that this initiative has altruistic intentions in addition to its profit motive. I do realize, of course, that everyone needs to earn a living, but my point here has more to do with a shift in how we as consumers respond to the seemingly positive actions of a corporation. I want to be wary of confusing a marketing spin with a real and honest dedication to these issues.
Here's the thing: farms can begin or transition over to organic methods, cease to use chemicals, growth hormones and pesticides, and humanely raise/pasture their animals, but then those smaller farms can grow larger and be purchased by a large company - DuPont, for example - that owns a large diversity of other companies that are not operating sustainably, and that spends a great deal of money lobbying the government to increase our importing of oil. That's a simplification of the issue, but the question remains: Am I really supporting that organic farmer by buying her yogurt, or am I giving my dollars to an industry (oil, tobacco, GMOs, etc.) that I'm trying not to support by buying from an organic farmer?
Is the USDA really tackling these issues through "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food"? Are they aligning their expertise and experience with the goals of reorganizing our agriculture, dismantling the industrial food system and creating a new system that ensures access to and affordability of healthy, fresh food to everyone?
Friday, March 18, 2011
Framework
I'm currently reading "Good Calories, Bad Calories" by Gary Taubes, which is fundamentally one long discourse on all of the diet/disease hypotheses out there, and the relative truth claims of each one. I am blown away by how often misinterpretation of available data is represented as the truth, and by the amount of refuting evidence that is ignored by the nutrition industry. Taubes uses this book to lay out the shortcomings of the prevailing theories on nutrition and disease, and to present the available data/research that runs counter to them.
These quotes set the tone of the book.
"Men who have excessive faith in their theories or ideas are not only ill prepared for making discoveries; they also make very poor observations. Of necessity, they observe with a preconceived idea, and when they devise an experiment, they can see, in its results, only a confirmation of their theory. In this way they distort observation and often neglect very important facts because they do not further their aim... But it happens further quite naturally that men who believe too firmly in their theories, do not believe enough in the theories of others. So the dominant idea of these despisers of their fellows is to find others' theories faulty and to try to contradict them. The difficulty, for science, is still the same." (Claude Bernard, An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine; from Taubes, p.1)
"In reality, those who repudiate a theory that they had once proposed, or a theory that they had accepted enthusiastically and with which they had identified themselves, are very rare. The great majority of them shut their ears so as not to hear the crying facts, and shut their eyes so as not to see the glaring facts, in order to remain faithful to their theories in spite of all and everything." (Maurice Arthus, Philosophy of Scientific Investigation; from Taubes, p.60)
"The thing is, it's very dangerous to have a fixed idea. A person with a fixed idea will always find some way of convincing himself in the end that he is right." (Atle Selberg; from Taubes, p. 122)
"Forming hypotheses is one of the most precious faculties of the human mind and is necessary for the development of science. Sometimes, however, hypotheses grow like weeds and lead to confusion instead of clarification. Then one has to clear the field, so that the operational concepts can grow and function. Concepts should relate as directly as possible to observation and measurements, and be distorted as little as possible by explanatory elements." (Max Kleiber, The Fire of Life: An Introduction to Animal Energetics; from Taubes, p.136)
"Oversimplification has been the characteristic weakness of scientists of every generation." (Elmer McCollum, A History of Nutrition; from Taubes, p.153)
"The suppression of inconvenient evidence is an old trick in our profession. The subterfuge may be due to love of a beautiful hypothesis, but often enough it is due to a subconscious desire to simplify a confusing subject." (Raymond Greene; from Taubes, p.178)
We deserve to be better informed than we are about how our diet affects our health, even if science can only tell us that right now there is no answer (that is more helpful than falsely claiming to know). We can only build on what we know. The idea that we can only save ourselves through medicinal "cures" is suspect of ulterior motives. I'm not against using medicine, but much can be said about the evolution of our dietary habits with hardly any instance of modern diseases until the modern era. There is good reason to believe that the best "cure" for most of these maladies is prevention by way of nutritional choices (i.e. eliminating the foods that have become prevalent: refined grains, sugars, highly-processed and laboratory-manufactured ingredients).
These quotes set the tone of the book.
"Men who have excessive faith in their theories or ideas are not only ill prepared for making discoveries; they also make very poor observations. Of necessity, they observe with a preconceived idea, and when they devise an experiment, they can see, in its results, only a confirmation of their theory. In this way they distort observation and often neglect very important facts because they do not further their aim... But it happens further quite naturally that men who believe too firmly in their theories, do not believe enough in the theories of others. So the dominant idea of these despisers of their fellows is to find others' theories faulty and to try to contradict them. The difficulty, for science, is still the same." (Claude Bernard, An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine; from Taubes, p.1)
"In reality, those who repudiate a theory that they had once proposed, or a theory that they had accepted enthusiastically and with which they had identified themselves, are very rare. The great majority of them shut their ears so as not to hear the crying facts, and shut their eyes so as not to see the glaring facts, in order to remain faithful to their theories in spite of all and everything." (Maurice Arthus, Philosophy of Scientific Investigation; from Taubes, p.60)
"The thing is, it's very dangerous to have a fixed idea. A person with a fixed idea will always find some way of convincing himself in the end that he is right." (Atle Selberg; from Taubes, p. 122)
"Forming hypotheses is one of the most precious faculties of the human mind and is necessary for the development of science. Sometimes, however, hypotheses grow like weeds and lead to confusion instead of clarification. Then one has to clear the field, so that the operational concepts can grow and function. Concepts should relate as directly as possible to observation and measurements, and be distorted as little as possible by explanatory elements." (Max Kleiber, The Fire of Life: An Introduction to Animal Energetics; from Taubes, p.136)
"Oversimplification has been the characteristic weakness of scientists of every generation." (Elmer McCollum, A History of Nutrition; from Taubes, p.153)
"The suppression of inconvenient evidence is an old trick in our profession. The subterfuge may be due to love of a beautiful hypothesis, but often enough it is due to a subconscious desire to simplify a confusing subject." (Raymond Greene; from Taubes, p.178)
We deserve to be better informed than we are about how our diet affects our health, even if science can only tell us that right now there is no answer (that is more helpful than falsely claiming to know). We can only build on what we know. The idea that we can only save ourselves through medicinal "cures" is suspect of ulterior motives. I'm not against using medicine, but much can be said about the evolution of our dietary habits with hardly any instance of modern diseases until the modern era. There is good reason to believe that the best "cure" for most of these maladies is prevention by way of nutritional choices (i.e. eliminating the foods that have become prevalent: refined grains, sugars, highly-processed and laboratory-manufactured ingredients).
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