Blog Post 4: The Power of Logic

In In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan explores a variety of issues concerning the food habits of Americans. He puts his main solution to this problem in seven simple words: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly Plants.” He pleads with his readers to stop yielding to the cultural fads and scientific studies that make up the “western diet” and revert back to their natural human instincts about what they should eat. The way Pollan defines the “western diet” and his logic about using common sense when deciding what to put in your mouth seems to be so natural that the reader wouldn’t think twice about agreeing with him. This convincing flow of logic is what makes his work so effective.

Pollan begins to draw the reader into concurrence with him in the introduction. He brings up the fact that this phenomenon of humans questioning what they should eat is a relatively new concept. For centuries, we have managed to choose which foods were good for us without consulting a nutritionist, a food journal, or a diet book. For the vast majority of human history, we didn’t need these kinds of resources. And frankly, we were healthier. So what has changed? Pollan argues that “what mom says to eat” has fallen to what scientists, the government, and the food industry presents to us. We crane over recent studies that disprove everything we have ever been told, and instead choose to follow the no-carb diet or the cranberry juice diet to make us healthy, productive people. We buy foods that contain hardly any nutrients but are packed with processed food-like substances. Sound crazy? That is exactly what Pollan wants his reader to think. His depiction of our current state of being, our “western diet”, inevitably makes you question its validity and wonder why we followed it at all. The modern idea of what is real and factual when it comes to food is being broken down. This is not a predicament that we, as humans, like dealing with. If the western diet it not the answer, how do we get out of this mess? As Pollan says, doesn’t it make sense to just follow our gut (literally) and eat what comes naturally to us again? That is what had been done since the beginning of time. And if the reader is in sync with Pollan’s definition of the western diet, then this is the obvious choice. He leaves no room for rebuttal.

The sequence and flow of Pollan’s argument is hard to dispute. After reading only a few pages of In Defense of Food, today’s nutritionism culture sounds absolutely ridiculous. And maybe it is. But it doesn’t really matter, because the reader is already on Pollan’s side. The effectiveness of the author’s reasoning assures the reader that Pollan has to be on to something. His research and statistics definitely help support his stance, but they are like mere sidekicks compared to the power of his simple logic. Eat Food? Obviously. Not too much? Alright. Mostly plants? Sounds reasonable. This convincing course of thought is Pollan’s greatest strength and the backbone of In Defense of Food.