Eating Fruits to Save Puppies

cute-puppy-eyes
Photo by Patrick

“Let your food be your medicine and your medicine be your food” ~Hippocrates 460 - 359 BC

This is a guest post by Robin Li.

Taking vitamins and not eating fruits is the same as killing puppies! Not getting my logic? I sure hope not. Allow me to explain in detail. Some people like to argue that since oranges have lots of vitamin C, and vitamin C is good for you, then popping lots of vitamin C pills is just as good as eating lots of juicy oranges.

Introducing The Puppy Analogy

This logic sounds pretty good at first sight. Let’s apply it to a cute fluffy puppy. What makes a puppy so cute and lovable? Let’s apply the “vitamin logic” to a puppy’s furriness: if I give you a tuft of fur, you don’t get benefits of petting a puppy. Similarly, puppies always have those signature innocent puppy eyes, but do you really want me to spell out the outcome of applying the “vitamin logic” here? This kind of reductionist logic might be good when studying physics, but it does not work in a complex setting such as the interaction between the human body and food.

We have been trained through the Western science mindset, where the world is modeled to a set of distinct entities and the interactions between them are defined as a series of cause-and-effect relationships. The paradigm is excellent when studying physics and chemistry, since in a lab environment, different variables can be strictly controlled.

For the majority of the studies, it is crucial to have only one variable, with all the other factors fixed. With this kind of control, the variation in the result can be directly attributed to the change in a single variable. When there are more than one variable, how can we distinguish what exactly caused the result?

Since everyone is trained to think in this fashion, we naturally try to understand everything in life in a straightforward cause-and-effect fashion. However, we are ignoring many crucial differences, especially when it comes to the human body.

The human body is a vastly complex system with countless variables that are completely beyond the comprehension of modern science. With such a complex system, how can we study the effect of a single factor?

orange-citrus
Photo by Luke Cox

When it comes to nutrition, we can first look at what the really healthy people eat the most. Say, they eat a lot of oranges and fruits, then let’s find out what is in the oranges that makes the body function so well. Scientists in a lab then find there are chemicals called vitamins and one especially seems to have a crucial function in the metabolic process, namely, vitamin C.

Based on conventional wisdom, it would mean that consuming more vitamin C in a pill form would be the same as eating a bushel of oranges, which brings us back to the initial argument.

Vitamin C in a Pill Versus Vitamin C in an Orange

The Science Behind Nutrition

“I no longer prepare food or drink with more than one ingredient.” ~Cyra McFadden

For all the science lovers out there (including myself), I am not attacking all scientific studies. All experiments conducted without bias are good science, no matter how wrong or ridiculous the conclusion might be. I am, however, attacking how science is interpreted by the media and in advertisements.

Some people might pride themselves as having a good understanding of the science of nutrition, such as “carbohydrates make you fat” and “vitamins are good for you”. Yet few people have actually read the scientific studies beyond the title or the summary. To be honest, most of the scientific papers are rather boring, because they are not written for an audience of non-professionals. They are performed under controlled circumstances, it is impractical to apply them to everyday life.

However, companies are only too happy to take the results out of context and sell their products. The health supplement industry has been booming, yet people don’t seem to be getting any healthier. It is not really health the pills are supplementing, but the bank accounts of their creators and marketers.

The real answer to overall well-being has already been discovered and has been in the produce section at your local grocery store all along. Dr Campbell’s book “The China Study” has more in depth information about eating whole foods.

The Influence of Media on What We Eat

Today, consumers are exceedingly controlled by the media and the media are increasing its indoctrination to make sure the consumers do not awaken from the mind-spell. Consumers are taught that there is nothing they can do to change, and an external savior is the solution to all their problems.

Often, we hear a treatment or a medicine hailed as the miracle cure that we have been waiting for, yet it dies down just as fast as it soared into stardom. Only the consumers are left with fewer dollars in their pockets and more in the coffers of big companies.

However, the myth that marketing propagates is about to be shattered. The human body is capable of great things without any external influence. I don’t think the term “placebo” is too foreign an idea for everyone. It is generally cast in a negative light, though there is really no reason for such accusation. The placebo effect means when a person gets better after taking a sugar pill (placebo), and was told that the pill is a drug that is supposed to make him feel better.

It is not well-regarded by the medical community as it is out of their control, which would mean they cannot profit from it. It is actually quite a marvelous effect as it represents the power of one’s mind over one’s body. The mind can heal the body without any external influence, why shouldn’t it be encouraged?

eat-fruits-or-the-puppy-gets-it
Photo by Koen

Eat Whole Foods or The Puppy Gets It

Many alternative medicines try to trigger the internal defense system to fortify the human body, which is often scorned by the Western medical science as completely bogus because it cannot be differentiated from the placebo effect. My response to that is, if it works, does it matter whether it is the medicine or the mind that did the trick?

Furthermore, the body’s self-defense can save you from the numerous side-effects so “well-studied” by all the big drug companies. Health is in our own hands, not in the hands of doctors and greedy drug companies.

If you want to get healthy, believe in yourself and eat healthy. You are your best miracle cure and you don’t need a TV commercial to tell you otherwise. Next time you are tempted by a pill, think of a cute puppy and remember the favor you would be doing it by eating a whole orange.

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