Michael Pollan says, 'don't listen to scientists'

[fuelair]

Unlike god, science knows it's not infallible.

Well. you have to BE to know!

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Enough to accomplish what?

Discredit him.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

I see the foodborne illness issue as completely separate from the nutrition issue. It does not seem to me to be a very advanced scientific concept that contaminated food is unhealthy food. Not only that, but incidents involving serious and widespread consequences from foodborne illness are becoming increasingly frequent, and I'm prepared to argue that our modern system of food production and distribution is causing those problems rather than alleviating them.

You are aware that several e-coli outbreaks have been traced to "organic" farms, right?

 

[Dymanic]

You asked for medical conditions related to diet, and that is what you received.

Related to "poor diet". I submit that foodborne illness is not a result of poor diet. We're talking about things like E. coli contaminated spinach, for cryin' out loud. If spinach isn't part of a healthy diet, what is?

Again, compared to the time around 1900, still plenty of advancement.

In the ability to identify foodborne pathogens and trace them to their sources, yes. Of course, the pathogens have been advancing as well, but I'll give you this much: It does seem possible that at least some of the increase in incidents involving contaminated food is due to improvement in detection methods.

 

[Dymanic]

Discredit him.

And precisely how does it accomplish that?

You are aware that several e-coli outbreaks have been traced to "organic" farms, right?

I'd suggest that reading this article may help you to understand why it might not always matter all that much just where the original source was:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33164820/ns/health-food_safety/

(Hint: even beef "raised organically" may be processed at the same facilities as beef from other sources).

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

And precisely how does it accomplish that?



I'd suggest that reading this article may help you to understand why it might not always matter all that much just where the original source was:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33164820/ns/health-food_safety/

(Hint: even beef "raised organically" may be processed at the same facilities as beef from other sources).

Not to mention Pollen does not praise organic farms in the Omnivore's Dilemma. He's pretty objective. IIRC he noted only one organic food source, Earthbound Farms, had a net positive organic claim and the others pretty much were a wash because of whatever factors played a role such as the environmental contribution of distribution to the product. Something like that anyway, it's been a couple years since I read it. He definitely was not gushy about organic farming.

 

[Polaris]

Maybe after I retire.

Too busy, aye? Eh, I understand.

 

[quadraginta]

Did they? More so than today?

Is that a fact that (at least partly) drives our modern obsession with nutrition, or is it an assumption that just sort of logically follows along after? I mean, we now take a scientific approach to eating -- as well as farming, and preparing food (which we now call "processing"). A lot of time and energy has been devoted to developing that science, and even though trying to keep track of the various findings can be like having a net's-eye-view at a tennis match, we must be getting something of value in return for all of that. Right? So what evidence is there that eating-related medical disorders were more common "back then" than they are now?

Arbitrarily, say the year 1900 -- a dozen years before a fellow by the name of Casimir Funk coined the term "vitamin". About a third of the US population lived on farms. What sort of eating-related medical conditions were common at that time (or, if you prefer, at some other point in time of your choosing)?

Scurvy. Rickets. Pellagra. Beriberi. Goiter. Osteoporosis. Anemia.

... not to mention inhibited growth, mental acuity, ...

It gets to be a long list if you spend much time thinking about it.

It is worth noting, I think, that Funk's own work was focused on diet related illnesses, common ones, and that is the reason he and others determined the significance of vitamins in nutrition. (The term he coined, BTW, was "vitamine". It was later changed to "vitamin" when it was determined he was mistaken about the singular importance of "amines" to the process. Some "vitamins" were. Some weren't.)

 

[quadraginta]

<snip>

I recommend Classico brand. My favorite varieties, like Tomato & Basil, and Spicy Tomato and Pesto, contain no added sugars. The varieties that do at least use sugar rather than HFCS. As a general rule, I prefer sauces that contain no more than 6g of sugars per serving.

<snip>

When I read the highlighted phrase it keeps coming out, "... at least use sugar instead of sugar."






(We like the Classico brand, too. It does taste better. I wish it didn't cost twice as much. I'm more apt to buy a cheap brand and use it as a 'starter'. I'll add some more veggies and 'shrooms, and herbs and spices of my own choosing. I know how make good spaghetti sauce from scratch, but when I do it "right" it's an all day procedure. I can pad out a store sauce in less time than it takes just to blanch the 'maters.)

 

[Dymanic]

Scurvy. Rickets. Pellagra. Beriberi. Goiter. Osteoporosis. Anemia.

... not to mention inhibited growth, mental acuity, ...

It gets to be a long list if you spend much time thinking about it.

There can be little question that people "back then" experienced medical conditions related to diet and nutrition. At issue is whether these were more prevalent and more serious than those experienced today -- in particular, with whether that was the case in the US, as most of what "Michael Pollan says" is directed toward systems of food production, processing, distribution, and marketing in the US, and with the reciprocal relationship between the economics and government policy aspects of those, and how all of that influences (or even dictates) dietary choices made by individuals.

I haven't spent hours trying to chase down historic data on the prevalence of the items on the above list, but it seems worth noting that they are mostly associated with famine, and I am unable to find anything to indicate that widespread famine has ever been a serious ongoing problem in the US, so I'd be surprised if the numbers turned out to be impressive compared with the current ones on, say, obesity, now regarded as epidemic in the US and listed among the leading preventable causes of death worldwide.

The Pellegra example is interesting. There was apparently a Pellegra epidemic in the Deep South during the early 1900s. It appeared first in institutions (prisons, orphanages, sanitariums) and a fellow by the name of Joseph Goldberger figured out by running some experiments using prisoners(!) that it could be cured by a diet including fruits and vegetables, though he never figured out why. That insight came some decades later when another guy nailed it down as niacin deficiency; an essential nutrient missing from the ubiquitous poor Southern diet of fatback, cornbread, and molasses -- but, interestingly, and very relevant to this topic -- not until a change was made in the way cornmeal was milled: degermination, introduced shortly after 1900. So after a bunch of people died, the scientists finally figured out that an essential nutrient had been accidently removed, and today that is avoided by adding niacin back into the degerminated cornmeal. Score one for nutrition science (I guess).

reference:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2589605/?page=1

It kind of drives home the point, though, doesn't it? Pollan's third precept: "mostly plants" would have covered it. And have mothers not been admonishing their children with "eat your vegetables" since the dawn of time? Perhaps they only started saying that when scientists started telling them to say it, but it would take some evidence to overcome my personal incredulity.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

When I read the highlighted phrase it keeps coming out, "... at least use sugar instead of sugar."






(We like the Classico brand, too. It does taste better. I wish it didn't cost twice as much. I'm more apt to buy a cheap brand and use it as a 'starter'. I'll add some more veggies and 'shrooms, and herbs and spices of my own choosing. I know how make good spaghetti sauce from scratch, but when I do it "right" it's an all day procedure. I can pad out a store sauce in less time than it takes just to blanch the 'maters.)

There is mixed research results re HFCS and sucrose. That single researcher from the industry front group, the Corn Refiners' Association has published research with conclusions there is no difference and there are other studies that have different results. We had a thread on this subject or maybe more than one, I can't recall.

Obesity in the US increased with the increased consumption of HFCS. There are other possible variables and of course total calorie consumption increased. But the claim that the body processes all forms of carbs the same is not true. Concentrated calorie consumption does trigger insulin production. The calories are quickly utilized or stored and the blood glucose drops stimulating one's appetite. This cycle is believed to affect some people causing weight gain.

Whether the fructose differs from sucrose which is broken down into glucose is unclear. But I'm certainly skeptical of bought and paid for science of the Corn Refiners front group.

 

[JoeyDonuts]

Seriously. Making your own simple red sauce couldn't be easier. I can knock out a very passable red sauce in about 30 minutes.

2 tbsp Olive Oil (No need for EV - save the money)
1/4 c Minced Garlic/Onion (Easily the most time consuming part of the the whole process)
1 8oz can of Tomato Paste (These are dirt cheap, and I go with the No Salt Added variety)
1 tbsp Baslamic Vinegar (can use any other sort in a pinch, but Balsamic has about the best taste)
Herbs (Whatever you want, but I stick with a pinch of crushed arbol chiles, and basil/oregano/thyme.)
1 tbsp Brown Sugar (This is what makes the sauce for me. You could get away with using whatever sweetener you like, but brown sugar lends an awful lot to savory dishes. I use it in chili, homemade barbecue sauce, and marinara.)
Salt/Cracked Black Pepper (To taste - or not at all.)

Note: Amounts approximate. I never measure when I make this recipe.

Most people, when cooking onion and garlic, hit it with high heat. I don't. I do about a tablespoon and a half of olive oil in the bottom of a small sauce pan, and toss in the onion/garlic over a low flame for about 5-10 minutes. The onions will get a little softened, and the lipid-soluble flavors will infuse the oil rather well, while still leaving the onions some flavor to give. Then just dump everything except the herbs into the mix, adding water to achieve a consistency a little looser than what you like. Simmer for about 20 minutes, toss in your herbs, simmer for another 5, covered.

The great thing about this recipe is it's fast, dirt cheap, and easily scalable. Keep the basic proportions right and you can make enough for two, or to freeze for a month or two.

I've made an all-day sauce starting with fresh tomatoes, and while it was awesome...it took all friggin' day. Try my "between paydays" marinara sauce, tweak it a little, make it your own - and you won't be buying pre-processed sauce ever again. I haven't in about five years.

 

[WildCat]

(I don't want any sugar in my spaghetti sauce. Clearly it's popular with others, but I feel my food choices are limited when there is HFCS in every spaghetti sauce on the shelf. I understand a little sugar does something to tomatoes that is desirable in the sauce. But when HFCS is in the ingredients, the sauce is much too sweet tasting.

Have you considered making your own sauce? If you get one of those giant commercial cans of quality canned tomatos in sauce (like this) you can make enough to can 4 jars and it will be better tasting too!

 

[!Kaggen]

Michael Pollan mentiond Joel Salatin in "The Ominivores Dillemma" as a pioneer of progressive farming.

In terms of his comments about food safety referenced in the OP I would recommend reading Joel Salatin's book

Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal: War Stories From the Local Food Front

http://www.amazon.com/Everything-Want-Do-Illegal-Stories/dp/0963810952

Here is an article summarizing Joel Salatin's arguments.
www.acresusa.com/toolbox/reprints/Salatin_Sept03.pdf

On a side note relating to the comments about preparing ones own food then cannin, bottling or freezing it.
I recently attended a seminar where one of the so called expert consultants in Food Safety said she would never buy any food at a farmers market including homemade jams, sauces etc since it was dangerous!! If these experts had their way they would ban all food prepared in Aunt Maggie's kitchen and only allow mass produced corporate food which was prepared in kitchens which she or her kind inspected and they had all the paperwork in place.
This argument is ridiculous as it assumes that a home kitchen entrepreneur has the same risk exposure producing 100 bottles of jam a week compared to a factory producing 10 million. As Joel Salatin points out in his article above it is like the aftermath of 9/11 were rational statistical risk was thrown out of the window in favour of emotional non-statistical risk. A sample of one does not a risk make. Also having actually been involved in large factories which pass these " food safety experts" standards it is very obvious very soon that abstract paperwork becomes primary and actual daily hygiene is secondary or worse completely discounted.

A "food safety expert" visited my factory on friday and his comments about an area which would be actually physically difficult to clean was not close that area off from the rest of the factory so that it does not pose a potential contamination risk, but make sure you have a written record that it has been cleaned!! In the end it is the written record which counts and not the actual physical risk. I am sorry but all that these co-called "food safety experts" have done is criminalise your grandmother in order to make their work appear rellevant. The joke that Salatin mentions in his book is that it is perfectly legal to bake cakes for a school function in your home kitchen and serve them up to a class of 1st graders, but don't try to sell these same cakes at the farmers market. There is no science behind this law and that is what Pollan is refering too.

 

[jj]

Why am I not surprised to hear yet ANOTHER anti-religion diatribe from you jj?

So you confuse people who practice a religion with the teachings of the religion? Or what? How can you possibly justify this attack?

Science is not infallible. In fact, "experts" of all types turn out to be wrong much more often than most people realize.

Of course, Science is always tentative, and based on the current best understanding.

It's still better than dogma, superstition, or blind belief.

Finally, is there some reason you falsely insinuated that I said things that I did not say?

Perhaps we should start a thread somewhere on global warming, then?

 

[jj]

I don't think it's appropriate in this thread, but I'd be glad to discuss the making of sphaghetti sauce in an appropriate thread. For those in the Seattle area, it's not out of the question to even drop by to make a huge batch we could all share out.

 

[quadraginta]

There can be little question that people "back then" experienced medical conditions related to diet and nutrition. At issue is whether these were more prevalent and more serious than those experienced today -- in particular, with whether that was the case in the US, as most of what "Michael Pollan says" is directed toward systems of food production, processing, distribution, and marketing in the US, and with the reciprocal relationship between the economics and government policy aspects of those, and how all of that influences (or even dictates) dietary choices made by individuals.

If you think I'm going to wear myself out chasing after those goalposts you're mistaken.

The simple fact is that there were more than a few illnesses caused by micro-nutrient deficiencies which were common around the world, including the U.S., and that we learned, through science, precisely what the causes were and the ways to address those illnesses.

You asked for some examples, and I gave them.

I haven't spent hours trying to chase down historic data on the prevalence of the items on the above list, but it seems worth noting that they are mostly associated with famine, and I am unable to find anything to indicate that widespread famine has ever been a serious ongoing problem in the US, so I'd be surprised if the numbers turned out to be impressive compared with the current ones on, say, obesity, now regarded as epidemic in the US and listed among the leading preventable causes of death worldwide.

Who said anything about famine? That's a red herring. Sure, famine is a cause of malnutrition, but it isn't the only one. People can get enough calories to survive quite nicely and still suffer from malnutrition because they aren't getting all the right nutrients. It doesn't require famine to make this happen. Monoculture is a more dependable cause, and that has been going on a lot longer than since the 1900s.

The Pellegra example is interesting. There was apparently a Pellegra epidemic in the Deep South during the early 1900s. It appeared first in institutions (prisons, orphanages, sanitariums) and a fellow by the name of Joseph Goldberger figured out by running some experiments using prisoners(!) that it could be cured by a diet including fruits and vegetables, though he never figured out why. That insight came some decades later when another guy nailed it down as niacin deficiency; an essential nutrient missing from the ubiquitous poor Southern diet of fatback, cornbread, and molasses -- but, interestingly, and very relevant to this topic -- not until a change was made in the way cornmeal was milled: degermination, introduced shortly after 1900. So after a bunch of people died, the scientists finally figured out that an essential nutrient had been accidently removed, and today that is avoided by adding niacin back into the degerminated cornmeal. Score one for nutrition science (I guess).

reference:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2589605/?page=1

Yes, the American pellagra epidemic is interesting, for a number of reasons. A couple that you are overlooking.

It didn't exactly "appear first" in institutions. That was where it was first noticed by the medical community of the time. Because there were doctors there, and they were monitoring those in the institutions more closely than the general population. Not to mention that the inmates and patients in those institutions had no control over their diet, which led to a higher incidence of the disease.

The American event cannot be taken as a microcosm. The proximate cause was a monotonous diet, not famine. It wasn't because they had suddenly started manufacturing cornmeal in a modern industrial manner. The Spanish and the Italians had first identified the disease in the 1700s. The very name of the disease was borrowed from the Italians. "Pelle agra", or "sour skin".

As the article you cite points out in its opening paragraphs, pellagra followed corn cultivation in Europe from the middle of the Eighteenth century. They didn't have to wait for modern milling equipment. This is the reason that those modern American scientists suspected corn as culprit in the first place. It had already been documented for a couple of centuries.

It kind of drives home the point, though, doesn't it? Pollan's third precept: "mostly plants" would have covered it. And have mothers not been admonishing their children with "eat your vegetables" since the dawn of time? Perhaps they only started saying that when scientists started telling them to say it, but it would take some evidence to overcome my personal incredulity.

"Mostly plants" works just fine, as long as there is an adequate selection of plants.

Along with monoculture it is interesting to note that before modern times many of these common nutritional diseases were also seasonal. Betcha can guess why.

 

[quadraginta]

There is mixed research results re HFCS and sucrose. That single researcher from the industry front group, the Corn Refiners' Association has published research with conclusions there is no difference and there are other studies that have different results. We had a thread on this subject or maybe more than one, I can't recall.

Yeah, I read that thread.

Obesity in the US increased with the increased consumption of HFCS. There are other possible variables and of course total calorie consumption increased. But the claim that the body processes all forms of carbs the same is not true. Concentrated calorie consumption does trigger insulin production. The calories are quickly utilized or stored and the blood glucose drops stimulating one's appetite. This cycle is believed to affect some people causing weight gain.

Whether the fructose differs from sucrose which is broken down into glucose is unclear. But I'm certainly skeptical of bought and paid for science of the Corn Refiners front group.

The thing is, sucrose is glucose and fructose. HFCS is ... glucose and fructose.

In the other thread you mention it was pointed out that the relative proportions of glucose and fructose in the two compounds are not significantly different. 5% or 10% on average. Sometimes not even that much.

If you want to really up your fructose intake (as opposed to sugars in general) then stick with apples, raw cane sugar, and honey. But that wouldn't sound as good to the food alarmists, so they single out corn sugar, and ignore the rest.


I do not take issue with the idea that there is too much sugar in many processed foods, and it is probably true that the economics of HFCS has exacerbated that problem, but it doesn't do a bit of good to confuse the issue by waving around scarey words on a flagpole of bad science to try and make that point.

People are regrettably prone to think in dichotomies, and the sad fact is that when when corn sugar is demonized as "bad" there is a certain tendency to think of "not corn sugar" as "good". This leads to otherwise intelligent people looking at a label and saying "Yuck, corn sugar. I ain't buyin' that stuff." for no good reason, and then buying something else with just as much sugar that advertises its "goodness" because it uses different sugar source instead.

It's about how much sugar something contains. That's the lesson we need to teach, not that one product is healthier than another one because the sugar in it costs more.

 

[TheAnachronism]

Thought I'd add something I happened to read earlier today, from At Home by Bill Bryson (highly recommended):

The real breakthrough came in 1912, when Casimir Funk, a Polish biochemist working at the Lister Institute in London, isolated Thiamine, or Vitamin B1, as it is now more generally known. Realizing it was part of a family of molecules, he combined the terms ‘vital’ and ‘amines’ to make the new word ‘vitamines’....

Funk also asserted that there was a direct correlation between a deficiency of specific amines and the onset of certain diseases – scurvy, pellagra and rickets in particular. This was a huge insight and had the potential to save millions of shattered lives, but unfortunately it wasn’t heeded. The leading medical textbook of the day continued to insist that scurvy was caused by any number of factors – ‘insanitary surroundings, overwork, mental depression and exposure to cold and damp’ were the principal ones its authors thought worth listing – and only marginally by dietary deficiency. Worse still, in 1917 America’s leading nutritionist, E. V. McCollum of the University of Wisconsin the man who actually coined the terms Vitamins A and B – declared that scurvy was not in fact a dietary deficiency disease at all, but was caused by constipation.

 

[Dymanic]

If you think I'm going to wear myself out chasing after those goalposts you're mistaken.

I will repeat that my position is that most of what "Michael Pollan says" is directed toward systems of food production, processing, distribution, and marketing in the US, and with the reciprocal relationship between the economics and government policy aspects of those, and how all of that influences (or even dictates) dietary choices made by individuals.

As I see it, those are the parameters of this discussion. You may disagree -- or, you may agree, yet decide to ignore those parameters, but I don't see that they've changed.

The simple fact is that there were more than a few illnesses caused by micro-nutrient deficiencies which were common around the world, including the U.S., and that we learned, through science, precisely what the causes were and the ways to address those illnesses.

I don't dispute that.

You asked for some examples, and I gave them.

I asked whether there is a lower prevalence of eating-related medical disorders today than there was "back then". What I question is whether the best way of comparing overall prevelance and severity is by counting the number of eating-related disorders. What percentage of the 1900 US population was impacted by the disorders you listed (along with those you implied might also have been included) compared with the percentage of today's US population impacted by, let's say obesity alone?

Who said anything about famine? That's a red herring. Sure, famine is a cause of malnutrition, but it isn't the only one. People can get enough calories to survive quite nicely and still suffer from malnutrition because they aren't getting all the right nutrients. It doesn't require famine to make this happen. Monoculture is a more dependable cause, and that has been going on a lot longer than since the 1900s.

Yes, I see your point. "Famine" is a strong word, and though it does feature prominently in descriptions of the causes of some of the conditions you listed, it doesn't adequately capture some of the other circumstances that can lead to widespread malnutrition. Still, the word "famine" may be used to describe circumstances which don't necessarily involve massive numbers of people literally starving to death.

If we're talking primarily about things like sailors deprived of essential nutrients during long sea voyages, or people forced by drought (or poverty, or political unrest, or whatever) to subsist on monotonous diets of some staple food, or people who traditionally rely on limited diets primarily due to reasons having to do with local culture, soil, or climate, then nutrition science to the rescue, absolutely (though usually not without quite a bit of help from politics and economics).

But is that really what we're talking about? Is that what Pollan is talking about?

As the article you cite points out in its opening paragraphs, pellagra followed corn cultivation in Europe from the middle of the Eighteenth century. They didn't have to wait for modern milling equipment.

Did you catch the explanation for the absence of Pellagra in the Native American populations from which the practice of corn cultivation was borrowed?