O'Reilly The Information Diet
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1. Amazon com lists nearly 20 000 books available for purchase on diets As of this writing 681 books have been released in the past 30 days with another 112 coming soon In the first six months of 2011 more than 2 000 books on weight loss were released We know beyond any scientific doubt that being fat kills For more than a century and a half the medical community has known that sugars and carbohydrates make us fat But we keep eating despite all of the information and transparency from this month s 681 diet books to the nutritional labels on every item in the grocery store to chains of Weight Watchers and Jenny Craigs across the country Food s scrumptious properties aside perhaps the diet books have something to do with our obesity problem It certainly seems as though the number of diet books available to the public correlates to obesity rates While any economist would predict that the number of books to help people be less fat would grow with the number of fat people in the market at what point does causation flow the other way around Maybe all these diet books are making us fat by making it harder to figure out what a healthy diet is At the very least the modern obsession with weight over diet brings us a significant health issue Imagery of being perfectly shaped and skinny trumps being healthy and happy and as a result scores of people suffer and die from eating disorders No matter which way you turn abundant i2. It took just 30 years to double it again between 1920 and 1950 It took 15 years from 1950 to 1965 and 10 between 1965 and 1975 Food production has continued to grow exponentially as science and the demand for food has caused our agricultural industry to industrialize In the words of food activist Michael Pollan In the past century American farmers were given the assignment to produce lots of calories cheaply and they did They became the most productive humans on earth A single farmer in Iowa could feed 150 of his neighbors That is a true modern miracle This drive and industrialization is necessary actually By 2050 the UN estimates we ll need to double our food production again to maintain projected population growth The miracle of abundance comes with a remarkable set of consequences Today America s heartland is empty only 17 of Americans live in rural communities Efficiency also means fewer jobs if a single farmer can feed 150 neighbors it means you need fewer farmers Today less than 2 of the United States population is directly employed in agriculture Another significant consequence of industrialization is a rise in occupational health hazards Agriculture is now one of the most dangerous professions in America According to the Centers for Disease Control agriculture is dominated by giant factory farms with livestock packed at huge scale It s what allows just four companies to produce 81 of the
3. middle of winter in the coldest regions of America the season has all but stopped killing us In 2010 according to the U S Natural Hazard Statistics report there were only 42 deaths from winter in the United States and another 34 from cold You have about as much chance of dying from the cold as you do from lightning The fresh warm Krispy Kreme donut on a cool fall morning does more than treat and trick the tastebuds That sort of food production allows the planet to sustain ever larger populations we ve now surpassed seven billion human beings with cheap calories Once the biggest threats America faced were the Famed Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse war famine pestilence and disease But we ve traded them in for a new killer Today 13 5 million people die each year of heart disease and stroke and 4 million from diabetes related complications far more than die in automobile accidents Heart disease is now our number one killer and it takes more people to the grave in the United States in five years than all our war related deaths combined Instead of dying from the cold of winter we find death in cholesterol 10 http www weather gov om hazstats shtml 11 http www who int mediacentre factsheets fs3 10 en index2 html 12 http www worlddiabetesfoundation org composite 976 htm CHAPTER 1 LESSONS FROM OBESITY 15 The Modern Diet Today nearly a century and a half after Banting s diet recommendations
4. Leland Swenson president of the U S National Farmers Union before the House Judiciary Committee September 12 2000 14 PART I INTRODUCTION Let s be clear a chocolate chip cookie for most people is superior in every way to a head of lettuce and if one could make a chocolate chip cookie as good for you as a pile of spinach the salad industry would be in danger of being obliterated by Mrs Fields It s a cruel joke that the stuff that tastes the best is often the stuff that s worst for us But the reason behind it makes a lot of sense From way back during mankind s foraging days until just a few centuries ago less than a blink through the eyes of human history we didn t have a lot of food to go around We never knew where our next meal would come from and thus our bodies became wired for scarcity Over the millennia we evolved into energy conservation machines It s why we crave that salt fat sugar combination and why as far as I m personally concerned the most dangerous place in America is between me and a chicken wing Our bodies are programmed to acquire as many resources as possible and to take what we don t need and store it as fat fat that will keep us warm and supply us with energy during the harsh winter when there s a lot less out there to eat For modern society neither winter nor famine is the same threat they used to be Not only can you get fresh tomatoes at your grocery store in the
5. Melanie Yarbrough Cover Designer Mark Paglietti Proofreader Melanie Yarbrough Illustrators Robert Romano and Cover Designer Mark Paglietti Jessamyn Read Printing History January 2012 First Edition Revision History for the First Edition 2011 12 13 First Release 2012 01 20 Second Release See http oreilly com catalog errata csp isbn 97 81449304683 for release details Nutshell Handbook the Nutshell Handbook logo and the O Reilly logo are registered trademarks of O Reilly Media Inc The Information Diet the image of the Information Diet Nutrition Label and related trade dress are trademarks of O Reilly Media Inc Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks Where those designations appear in this book and O Reilly Media Inc was aware of a trademark claim the designations have been printed in caps or initial caps While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book the publisher and author s assume no responsibility for errors or omissions or for damages result ing from the use of the information contained herein ISBN 978 1 449 30468 3 CW Contents PrefaC asne ere whats ty ae ana a Saag ee ee 8s E Vil PART I INTRODUCTION 1 Chapter 1 Lessons from Obesity 0 cece ewer ee eens 9 Chapter 2 Information Power and Survival 0 200 19 Chapter 3 Big NIG 4 65 0 44 640 6546 he
6. is accelerating we re getting fatter faster than we were 20 years ago What has happened The same things that have always happened Food is cheaper We can afford more of it And we increased the number of steps between our food s source and our bellies so much so that our food doesn t even look like food anymore To start with calorie dense foods are now less expensive and more readily available than ever According to the USDA we re now producing 3 800 calories per person per day That number is an increase of several hundred calories since 1970 And accordingly 62 of adult Americans are now overweight according to the National Center for Health statistics in 1980 that number was 46 3 http www usda gov factbook chapter2 pdf 12 PART INTRODUCTION The Birth of Industrial Agriculture In the twentieth century agriculture went through profound changes both in the United States and globally At the beginning of the twentieth century the rural farmer was the largest demographic in the United States Nearly a century ago more than 50 of the United States population lived in rural areas and farming represented 41 of the American workforce Then industrialization happened The development of the Ford Model T the tractor pesticides and other agricultural technologies brought a new drive for efficiency into America s heartland It took a century to double food production from 1820 levels to those in 1920
7. PERERA EERE SS 29 Chapter 4 We Are What We Seek 0 0 c eee eee eens 43 Chapter 5 Welcome to Information Obesity 53 Chapter 6 The Symptoms of Information Obesity 63 PART II THE INFORMATION DIET 75 Chapter 7 Data Literacy 3 40 2 dae hae wena ee be a ed Os 79 Chapter 8 Attention Fitness 0 0 cece ee ee ee 87 Chapter 9 A Healthy Sense of Humor 2 000 e eee 97 Chapter 10 How to Consume eee eee ee eee eee ene 101 PART Ill SOCIAL OBESITY Chapter 11 The Participation Gap A Special Note Dear Programmer 4 Appendix A Further Reading 6 6 swe eee ee bas Vi CONTENTS CHAPTER 1 Lessons from Obesity What we know about diets hasn t changed It still makes sense to eat lots of fruits and vegetables balance calories from other foods and keep calories under control That however does not make front page news RMarion Nestle Food Activist William Banting learned the hard way that you are what you eat and as a result he invented what we know today as the modern diet An undertaker from Great Britain Banting found himself suffering from failing sight and hearing an umbilical rupture requiring a truss and bandages for weak knees and ankles He reported not being able to walk down stairs without help or to touch his toes He went to see many doctors for his various conditions but claimed t
8. The Information Diet A Case for Conscious Consumption Amount Per Serving 10 27 2 advice and Recommendations Notes and Citations Outcomes 32 2 Healthier Lifestyle Increased Civic Effectiveness 50 10 Stronger Relationships Higher Productivity Bias 15 25 Ideological 10 Professional Experiential O REILLY 25 65 Clay A Johnson Want to read more You can buy this book at oreilly com in print and ebook format Buy 2 books get the 3rd FREE Use discount code OPC10 All orders over 29 95 qualify for free shipping within the US It s also available at your favorite book retailer including the iBookstore the Android Marketplace and Amazon com O REILLY Spreading the knowledge of innovators oreilly com The Information Diet by Clay A Johnson Copyright 2012 Clay Johnson All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America Published by O Reilly Media Inc 1005 Gravenstein Highway North Sebastopol CA 95472 O Reilly books may be purchased for educational business or sales promotional use Online editions are also available for most titles safari oreilly com For more informa tion contact our corporate institutional sales department 800 998 9938 or corpo rate oreilly com Editors Julie Steele and Interior Designers Ron Bilodeau and Meghan Blanchette Edie Freedman Production Editor
9. by the Atkins Foundation the organization dedicated to Robert Atkins who would come along more than a century later and encourage people to go on a very similar low carbohydrate program But neither Banting nor Atkins nor any of the thousands of others solved the problem of obesity In recent years it has run rampant through America The Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta provides annual data on a state by state basis regarding our obesity epidemic Figure 1 1 shows what obesity looked like in 1990 _ NeData 7 lt t0 E 10 14 f1sx 19 20 24 Fj 25 29 Fj esox Figure 1 1 A map showing annual obesity rates for each state in 1990 While the CDC does not have data for five states in 1990 none of the states for which data was collected had obesity percentages higher than 14 Figure 1 2 shows what that same map looks like with data from 2010 CHAPTER 1 LESSONS FROM OBESITY 11 _ NoData lt 10 E 10 14 fi 15 19 7 20 24 fj 25 20 fj as0x Figure 1 2 A map showing annual obesity rates for each state in 2010 In 20 years we went from an obesity rate no higher than 14 in any state to an obesity rate no lower than 20 in any state and an obesity rate higher than 25 in most states Twelve states Alabama Arkansas Kentucky Louisiana Michigan Mississippi Missouri Oklahoma South Carolina Tennessee Texas and West Virginia now have obesity rates greater than 30 Moreover our obesity rate
10. cows 73 of the http www ers usda gov publications eib3 eib3 htm Scully Matthew Dominion p 29 St Martin s Griffin 2003 http longnow org seminars 02009 may 05 deep agriculture http www un org News Press docs 2009 gaef3242 doc htm http www cdc gov niosh topics agriculture ON DWN fF CHAPTER 1 LESSONS FROM OBESITY 13 sheep 57 of the pigs and 50 of the chickens in America But with a relatively homogenized and industrialized production system toxins travel faster in our food supply and affect more people Packing animals in makes them more susceptible to disease which means that more antibiotics and other drugs go into our livestock decreasing their effectiveness for treating human diseases And locating these farms near places where produce is grown means an increased risk of food contamination While calories have become more affordable the nutrients in our food have slowly disappeared before our eyes only to be replaced with corn based sugar soy based fat and protein and a whole lot of salt Sugar corn and soy are the three crops of America and they are the crops that make it into our animals and onto our dinner tables Our grocery stores are full of manufactured foods made mostly from corn and soy that aren t particularly good for us and as Michael Pollan says not something that your grandmother would recognize as food We don t grow our food anymore we manufacture it And in the 1970s we e
11. d good sales in France Germany and the United States The medical community treated it as old news Their critique wasn t an assault on the idea but they questioned why Banting s letter was so popular in the first place Similar works had been published prior to his but they were written by physicians for physicians Letter on Corpulence was written by a suffering person for suffering people His message resonated People were ready to hear it And Banting provided it in a form they could understand In the fourth edition of his letter Banting spends upwards of seven pages defending himself against a medical fraternity that disputed his story claiming that he must not have sought the attention of particularly good 10 PART I INTRODUCTION doctors if it took him that long to get well or worse that Banting s recommendation of four meals a day would cause more corpulence His response My unpretending letter on Corpulence has at least brought all these facts to the surface for public examination and they have thereby had already a great share of attention and will doubtless receive much more until the system is thoroughly understood and properly appreciated by every thinking man and woman in the civilized world A Modern Epidemic Banting was right about all the public attention the commercial success of his pamphlet helped create an industry of diet books coaches and consultants His documents are preserved online
12. g calories in the first place Some of this is unavoidable in a free society the right answers healthy information compete side by side with the answers we may want to hear but which may not be true Only the highly nutritionally literate can easily tell the difference The best food journalists distill this complex world of choices into healthy ones Michael Pollan Knight Professor at the University of California at Berkeley is a leading example The beginning of his In Defense of Food Penguin is a seven word diet guide Eat food Not too much Mostly plants And there it is right up front We can take those three simple rules those seven words into the grocery store and win While our collective sweet tooth used to serve us well in the land of abundance it s killing us As it turns out the same thing has happened with information The economics of news have changed and shifted and we ve moved from a land of scarcity into a land of abundance And though we are wired to consume it s been a key to our survival our sweet tooth for information is no longer serving us well Surprisingly it too is killing us CHAPTER 1 LESSONS FROM OBESITY 17 O Reilly Ebooks Your bookshelf on your devices PDF Mobi APK DAISY When you buy an ebook through oreilly com you get lifetime access to the book and whenever possible we provide it to you in five DRM free file formats PDF epub Kindle compatible mobi Andro
13. hat not one of them pointed out the real cause of my sufferings nor proposed any effectual remedy The real cause of Banting s suffering wasn t that he couldn t walk down stairs it was that he was obese After he started losing his hearing he finally sought specialized medical attention and found himself in the care of the celebrated aurist Dr William Harvey The physician put him on a diet inspired by a lecture he d heard about treating diabetes five to six ounces of meat or fish three times a day accompanied by stale toast with cooked fruit Beer potatoes milk and sweets were not allowed Alcohol was though four to five glasses of wine a day a glass of brandy in the evening and sometimes even a wake up cocktail in the morning were called for Banting reported losing 13 inches off his waist and 50 pounds of weight over the course of a couple of years It was only then that Banting realized 2 http www althealth co uk news latest news diet study confusion will not change habits analysts that he had been treating symptoms not the root cause Once he fixed his diet his other problems went away He could walk down the stairs again We ve known that obesity is bad for a very long time In the fourth century BCE Hippocrates called the father of medicine by Western scholars wrote Corpulence is not only a disease itself but the harbinger of others And the Bible is filled with warnings about overconsumpt
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15. ion Proverbs 23 20 21 says Be not among winebibbers among riotous eaters of flesh For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags However for thousands of years obesity was usually a disease affecting only the most affluent Food especially the delicious calorie dense stuff was simply too expensive for the average person to obtain Few could afford to be fat and thus being so was often considered a way to display one s prosperity Then a great technological shift happened much like the one that we faced in the second half of the twentieth century New technology and new techniques increased our food supply The steam engine crop rotation and the iron plow revolutionized agriculture in Europe between the 17 and 19 centuries alongside a variety of sociopolitical changes including the rise of the merchant class The food supply became more abundant and access to it improved Obesity was no longer just for a fortunate few It was in this context that Banting decided to share his results with the world In 1863 he published Europe s first modern diet book Letter on Corpulence and sold an astounding 63 000 copies for a shilling each It was the first diet craze of the West called appropriately banting and thousands were inspired to lose weight with his diet The book also had global reach It was translated into multiple languages and according to Banting achieve
16. liminated requirements for calling artificial food artificial So right on the front of the packages in really big emotion grabbing type companies could create exciting new forms of false food without ever saying so Add to that the fact that this cheaper more highly processed food alters our taste sensation so that the organic stuff seems bland and it s easy to see why we ve gotten obese Figures 2 1 and 2 2 speak for themselves A New Set of Consequences As probability would have it I am one of the 62 of Americans considered overweight In fact according to my Body Mass Index BMI I m one of the 27 of us considered obese It s a terrible feeling compounded by my constant attempts at exercise I ve run a marathon and several half marathons gone through the constant physical mental and intellectual abuse of Tony Horton s P90x and endured the torture of vinyasa yoga My house is littered with high tech gadgetry from the Wii Fit to the Withings Internet powered scale it posts your weight on Twitter to the FitBit a little gadget you wear on your belt to tell you how many calories you ve burned by walking around I do all of this for two reasons so that I don t need to grease the doorframes to get out of the house and so that I can eat If you want to know why Americans are getting fat ask a fat person It s because for most of us food especially food that s bad for us is delicious 9 Testimony by
17. nformation makes it easy to distort our relationship with food into something unhealthy If you re looking to surf through a land of false promises spend a few minutes in the diet aisle of your local bookstore You can lose weight by thinking like either a caveman or a French woman or by eating only food that s cooked slowly You can lose it says the updated 2012 edition of Eat This Not That Rodale Books by simply swapping in a Big Mac for a Whopper with cheese In the diet aisle our relationship to food can take on social political and environmental significance A healthy diet mustn t just include the right number of calories and the right interaction of nutritional elements It must also produce the least amount of carbon and be as natural as possible It s no longer good enough to eat reasonable portions of lean meat the meat must come from a cow that could roam free and eat grass If time is of the essence you can get top selling weight loss books promising change based on your lifestyle just spend 8 minutes Eight Minutes in the 16 PART I INTRODUCTION Morning Harper 4 hours The Four Hour Body Crown Archetype or 17 days The Seventeen Day Diet Free Press If religion or the supernatural is your thing just look to the 159 diet books available containing the word miracle Most of what these books cover and the pseudoscience behind them appeals to the same emotional impulses as do the people peddlin
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