Well Duh

Slashdot | The Reality Distortion Field Is Real: "Researchers at Duke University subjected participants to subliminal images of the iconic Apple and IBM logos (during what subjects thought was a visual acuity test), and those who were shown the Apple logo generated more creative ideas after the test than did those who were shown the IBM logo."

(emphasis mine)

Blogger and OpenID

For fun, here's some background on Blogger's OpenID functionality.








Society for the Abolishment of the Penny

This all makes perfect sense.


Michael Pollan at Stanford

Michael Pollan gave a talk at Stanford a few nights ago, about his new book. Here are my notes:

Nutritionism premises
- the nutrient is what's important
- we need experts to help us understand them
- at any given time, there are good and bad ones (historical: oat bran, betacarotines, omega 3s, etc)
- the point of eating is health

- reducing foods to nutrients hasn't worked very well
- digestive system has as many neurons as the spinal cord
- nutrition science has a *long* way to go
- nutritionism did rise to solve a very real public health problem: western diet-related diseases
- science will eventually figure this out, but eaters don't need to know the science to reduce disease and be healthier
- we've turned diseases like diabetes into a lifestyle (ads for diabetes gear on primetime TV, etc.)

- relying on science hasn't worked thus far, nor should we rely on MP
- prior to science, we had culture to understand these things
- last 1/3 of book explores various cultural rules for eating
- examples: don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food, or anything with more than 5 ingredients; shop the perimeter of the grocery store; don't eat food that won't ever rot ('cause mold and bacteria aren't even interested); don't shop the super market (go farmers market instead)
- eat until you're full, eat slowly
- "defending food and meals should not need to be done"

- supporting local food isn't just about energy and carbon footprint - it's fresher, tastier, keeps land from being developed, supports local economies
- we have to keep fighting for a transparent food system, and we can't depend on the government to make it happen (sugar/UN/WHO/Dubya example)
- we're not connecting the dots between food problems and health problems
- "1 cheer for meat eating" regarding whether or not to eat animals; in some narrow bioregional and evolutionary contexts, it's ok
- some folks do really well eating lots of meat (like the Masai, but they get lots of exercise), but there are many factors affecting it (how it's raised, cooked, etc); grass-fed beef doesn't compete with humans for nutrients
- eating 20% less meat (per person) saves as much carbon as downgrading from a sedan to a hybrid
- eggs: cage-free is the first priority, pastured is ideal (they eat grass and bugs); ask at farmers market if they cruise on grass or dirt