What Price Are We Paying?

Photo from www.theatlantic.com

The Atlantic recently published an article entitled, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” The article discusses how the internet has diminished our attention span and our ability to concentrate. It is worth reading.

On Eating Responsibly

Wendell Berry’s collection of essays published in What Are People For? includes a particularly interesting essay entitled “The Pleasures of Eating.”

In this essay, Berry asserts that our culture has turned the act of eating into an utterly passive act so that the eater becomes merely a passive consumer. This problem results from how little most eaters know about the agricultural process of producing food. He writes, “When food, in the minds of eaters, is no longer associated with farming and with the land, then the eaters are suffering a kind of cultural amnesia that is misleading and dangerous” (What Are People For?, page 146). He warns that there is a danger in not knowing about the food process, whereby we support an industry that only concerns intself with volume and price.

Photos by my husband.

Berry gives seven tips on how to eat responsibly:

1. Participate in food production to the extent you can. He suggests having a little garden and making your compost to fertilize it.
2. Prepare your own food. This gives you measure of “quality control” because you know what has been added to the food you eat.
3. Learn the origins of the food you buy, and buy the food that is produced closest to your home.
4. Whenever possible, deal directly with a local farmer, gardener, or orchardist.
5. Learn as much as you can about the economy and technology of industrial food production. Berry says this is a matter of self-defense.
6. Learn what is involved in the best farming and gardening.
7. Learn of the life histories of the food species.

Healthy Substitutions

After visiting this website, I collected some useful tips on how make what you eat a little more nutritious…

• Use fat-free or low-fat yogurt instead of sour cream in recipes and as a topping.
• Try salsa or fruit chutney on meat, fish, or poultry instead of sauces and gravies.
• Substitute air popped popcorn for another snack.
• Use fat-free or low-fat milk instead of water in your oatmeal and hot cereals.
• Top a baked potato with fat-free or low-fat yogurt. For dessert, make pudding with fat-free or low-fat milk.
• Use vinegar and oil or a light vinaigrette on salads instead of thick, creamy salad dressing.
• Use vegetable oils for cooking instead of solid fats like stick margarine, lard, or butter.
• Try chopped fruit or pureed berries on pancakes and waffles instead of butter and syrup.
• Use sliced bananas, berries, raisins, or diced fruits to sweeten breakfast cereals or yogurt.
  

Bad Plastics

Responding to the increasing concern over polycarbonate, my husband and I nostalgically said “good-bye” to our old Nalgene bottles. We ordered new, safe water bottles yesterday. Some helpful information on the subject is available here and here.