In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
Book Review: Compelling
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the first blockbuster I've ever reviewed on Amazon. Usually I defer to the droves of other reviewers to cover every point, but this book is just too compelling. I devoured it in two days, an extraordinary rarity for an unusually slow reader like me.
Here, Pollan firmly repudiates the "Western diet" and the scientific, industrial, and political complex surrounding it. He challenges the tenets of scientific nutritionism and its tendency to lionize or demonize various chemical components of food within a framework of a highly processed industrial diet of "food-like products." Rather, he argues for a return to older patterns of eating, more in tune with traditional cultures and whole foods, that are more conducive to physical, social, and ecological health. He distills this into a seven-word mnemonic: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." The sweep of this message makes the reader a little queasy - would we all have been better off as pre-agricultural nomads? - but it is well-researched and closely argued, so it ultimately makes a convincing case.
The book satisfies on an intellectual level as well. It opens the reader's eyes to the depth of the perversion of governmental, agricultural, and academic interests to satisfy the profit motive. It shatters the whole reductionist (nutritional facts labels?) way of thinking about food. And it comprises a convincing, real-world example to support a skeptical epistemology when confronting the biological and ecological worlds.
Years ago, while I was still a child, I was trying to choose between medicine, biology, or chemistry as a career path. I chose chemistry for ethical and aesthetic reasons - I was scared by the ethical ramifications of tampering with living things, and I liked the idea of doing experiments on simple systems that can be quite fully characterized. Pollan teaches us about a related ethical issue - the danger of scientific hubris when applying reductionist methods to complex systems, particularly in fields like nutrition where powerful political forces want to take one's results out of context. If there's one thing I do not like about the book, it is how Pollan - a journalist - takes numerous cheap potshots at nutrition science while using some of its recent results - omega-3 vs. omega-6 fatty acids, the polyphenols in red wines - as the principal evidence for some of his points. But he acknowledges this himself, and ultimately he stimulates genuine thought about the responsible conduct and communication of research and the role of its results in industrial or governmental practice. The book could thus serve as an effective component in the education of a young scientist or policymaker.
To recommend a bestselling book to friends, students, and family is rare for me - just as rare as reading such a book quickly and reviewing it on Amazon. Nevertheless, I will be recommending it to everyone I can.
Book Review: You Will Never Read A Food "Study" The Same Way Again
Summary: 5 Stars
There is so much to like about this persuasive, thoughtful essay. It's really a snap to read -- breezy, informative and very funny in spots. Pollan reduces food and nutrition information to its essence, and who doesn't need that kind of crystallized advice in this day and age? Perhaps my favorite section is how he exposes the thinking and "science" behind the various food studies which have informed our thinking to date. In short, this section breaks down how hard it is to isolate one influencing factor for a study. Hard? Nearly impossible. That section is called, appropriately, "bad science." I think about how many nutrition studies I've read (about) in newspapers and heard (about) on television over the past decades....and how little information is really imparted about how the study was conducted. One of the primary issues, of course, is how you "control" for what's being studied, and how hard it is to draw conclusions without that "control." And there is no control. There are so many factors that influence the impact of a change in diet, from genetic makeup to environmental factors, that it's nearly impossible. You could just skip to the last "Eat Food: Food Defined" and gather all of Pollan's bottom-line advice. But the rest is so interesting and full of information that it would be a shame to miss the build-up. Confused about food? Read this. I mean, consume it. Book Review: Voice of Reason, Voice of Revolution
Summary: 5 Stars
This may be one of the best books I've read this year. I came across it mostly by chance, when browsing the biology books. Michael Pollan has written a book about the evolution of fruit-trees, and when looking at that, "In Defense of Food" came up too. Since it's very popular, I naturally wanted to see what was shaking!
I wasn't disappointed. I originally assumed that Pollan was a wacky independent thinker, but actually he's a professor of journalism at Berkeley, and a regular contributor to the New York Times. He's not a Green radical or militant vegan either. In fact, Pollan's book is eminently reasonable, almost conventional, but precisely for that reason, revolutionary!
As you no doubt have guessed, "In Defense of Food" is a critical book about the American food processing industry. But not just the industry! What makes the book so interesting, is that Pollan *also* criticizes the nutritionists and their health fads. At first glance, this may seem strange. Aren't nutritionists and the food industry adversaries? Don't the nutritionists often criticize the food processing industry for producing unhealthy food? Isn't it a good thing that government regulations force the food companies to make healthier food?
Pollan's answer is: well, no, not really. In his opinion, the nutritionists are part of the problem. Indeed, the industry and the nutritionists are two sides of the same coin! Artificial, processed food (such as margarine) has *always* been marketed with the argument that it's more "healthy", "scientific" and "nutritious" than the real thing (in this case, butter). Conversely, the nutritionists have never criticized the production of processed food as such. They only criticize it for lacking this or that nutrient, this or that vitamin or fatty acid. The food companies can easily "solve" the problem by simply manufacturing a new artificial product, and pretend that's "health food". Besides, the federal regulations aren't exactly water-tight, and allows companies to market even snacks and candy as health food!
About a century ago, people had no problem with what to eat. They simply ate what they had always eaten, for generations, and this seems to have worked very well! As Pollan puts it: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants". Or "Don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't have recognized as food". While more people died of infectious diseases a century ago, fewer people died of heart attacks, diabetes and other food-related conditions. A person who made it into ripe old age was less likely to die of food-related conditions in 1900 than today. In plain English: food was healthier and more nutritious in the good old days (and no, Pollan doesn't sound like a paleo-conservative). What went wrong?
The industrialization of food productions, that's what went wrong. Together with mass marketing and mass lobbying of Congress, the food industry created a situation where what we eat was no longer decided upon by culture and tradition. Rather, eating became a matter decided upon by corporate executives, lobbyists, politicians and nutritionists, many of whom were employed by the food processing industry itself. Naturally, they recommended that we eat more processed food. And when this food turned out to be dangerous, the industry responded to pressure by simply producing even more processed food, now with some extra "nutrient" added to make it look healthier. Once again, there is a connection between the phoney food produced by modern industry, and the periodic health fads and health crazes. (Pollan's argument is more subtle and complex than I can summarize in a short review, but this is the bare gist of it.)
So what's the solution? Pollan describes an interesting experiment in Australia, where a group of Aborigines who lived a modern and unhealthy lifestyle (they had developed both diabetes and insuline resistance!) were persuaded to return to their original hunter-and-gatherer way of life. After a very short period, they became *much* healthier. Of course, modern Americans can hardly "go native" in the same way, but Pollan believes there are things one can do, such as buying food from farmers' markets, or straight from farms, rather than from supermarkets, or at least avoiding the most obviously artificial foodstuffs in supermarkets. He also makes a compelling case for common meals (real common meals, as in the good old days), and calls on people to stop snacking all day long.
On the face of it, this sounds like pretty obvious advice, almost boring. No sensational new diets, no extraordinary health cereals or chocolate bars, no genetically engineered or irradiated superfood. And no New Age meditation! Just plain, old-fashioned cooking: "Eat (real) food. No too much. Mostly plants". Come again?
Actually, Professor Pollan's advice is revolutionary. Although Pollan himself is presumably pretty main-stream, this must be the most revolutionary book published this year! It's obvious from his analysis that the food processing industry is a powerful special interest group that simply cannot stomach this kind of reasonable advice. Why not? Pollard points out that the food processing industry would loose a large part of its profits if people would go back to traditional cooking. Since food cultures that existed for centuries tend to be naturally conservative, there would be less room for innovation, and hence for windfall profits. Naturally, profits would fall if people ate less, and skipped the snacking altogether, or bought more food from local organic farms rather than from multinational supermarket chains. The author also points out that the food processing companies have a vested interest in marketing bad eating habits, such as snacking in the car, children eating alone after preparing food in the microwave oven, etc. In other words, the proposals of "In Defense of Food" would threaten the commodification and marketization of food! They point in the direction of a Green community.
If that's not revolutionary, what is?
Book Review: Terrific
Summary: 5 Stars
The book? It was terrific. If you eat, you should read it. Period. If you read one book this year, then...well...you're just not reading nearly enough books. Read several books, and make this one of them.
BTW, I am completely confused by the 1- and 2-star reviews. I read through them, and the people who wrote them clearly didn't even read the book and are just out to do a hatchet job. The 1-star reviewer says:
"Pollan also wants to associate (blame?) increasing heart disease on nutritionists - but what about the fact that it is decreasing?"
As a matter of fact, in the book, Pollan addresses this specifically, discussing how the *mortality rate* due to heart disease is decreasing (due to better medical treatments), but the *incidence rate* is not. One would think that someone reviewing a book would have bothered to read it before deciding to sit down and make it clear to all that he, well, didn't actually read the whole thing. Maybe he's an every-other-paragraph sort of reader?
A 2-star reviewer took Pollan to task for "his lack of adequately referencing or explaining his statements" - err, did we buy the same book? My copy has an appendix titled 'Sources' which stretches for over 20 pages - single spaced - in which hundreds of references are listed. My girlfriend's 400 page PhD dissertation was only *slightly* more heavily referenced!
I don't get why people are making things up, seemingly just to make this book look bad. Are these competing authors or publishers? Or did the book catch some people mid-Twinkie, hmmmm??
The fact is, this book will make you completely rethink your relationship to food and diet. It clarifies where the 'Western diet' has gone wrong (he notes [and references] studies showing numerous groups who do not eat a Western diet have never seen a toothbrush or dentist, and yet have perfect teeth with zero tooth decay!) and why.
He discusses the evolution of cuisines over thousands of years or longer - these would not be around today had they not kept the people eating them healthy. Pretty common sense stuff here, yet it's astonishing how revolutionary these insights seem to be in today's fast food culture. Makes you wonder just how long the relatively new Western diet would last in similar circumstances.
If you wanna keep drinking Coca-Cola and eating Twinkies while watching American Idol, this is not the book for you. However, if you want a highly entertaining, informative and thought provoking book which can help you effect positive change in your life, pick this one up ASAP.
Book Review: For Natural Foods and Against Nutritionism
Summary: 5 Stars
Instead of repeating other reviewers, let's focus mostly on other content. Our need for constant dental care stems from our western diets (pp. 96-97). Oddly enough, our digestive tract has as many neurons as the spinal column (p. 63). This suggests that the digestive process is a much more complex one than simply the breakdown of foods.
What if "western diseases" occur simply because people now live long enough to develop them? Pollard rejects this thinking, and presents evidence that a 70 year-old today is more likely to have diabetes or cancer than his counterpart a century ago. (p. 93)
Pollard notes that the Polish biochemist Casimir Funk discovered vitamins. In this book, he takes a middle view of them. He suggests taking supplements, but also warns that they may be ineffective when out of the context of their foods.
In fact, Pollard's warnings about "nutritionism" may be illustrated by one common natural food: "Milk through this lens is reduced to a suspension of protein, lactose, fats, and calcium in water, when it is entirely possible that the benefits, or for that matter the hazards, of drinking milk owe to entirely other factors (growth hormones?) or relationships between factors (fat-soluble vitamins and saturated fat?) that have been overlooked." (p. 31)
Pollard generally agrees with those who suggest that overconsumption of nutritionally-barren refined carbohydrates is harmful (p. 59, 112-113). However, he cautions that the scientific reductionism of low-carb thinking as the full answer should be avoided.
There is no single "natural diet". Evidently-healthy diets centered around seafood, meat, dairy products, and vegetarian products, have all been found worldwide (p. 97).
Although Pollard recommends the "Avoid eating anything that your great-grandma wouldn't recognize" rule, the "Don't eat anything incapable of rotting" rule, and the "Eat more vegetables rule", it may not be so simple. For one thing, farm vegetables may be short on nutrients because they had been bred for rapid growth, and because chemical fertilizers indirectly deplete nutrients (p. 115). In fact, the obesity in the west may be partly the result of the body attempting to accumulate enough nutrients through the overconsumption of low-nutrient foods (pp. 123-124).