Homework 9- Freakonomics Response

Correlation and Causation

    In the Documentary, Freakonomics, Steven Levitt and Stephan Dubner address the fallacy that "correlation is causation". They believe that when two things go together, one causes the other. Like the fallacy that most black people cant swim because their black. Thats not the reason that they can't swim. The statistics would show that its because less blacks are around swimming areas often, or that they weren't given swim lessons as a child.     

     This documentary acknowledged that correlation is not causation. There was an example in the movie about how there's a common idea that if you have a "black name", you won't be successful, or you will automatically act "ghetto". But Levitt and Dunbar argue that the name isn't what causes the low rate of success and quality of life, it's the environment that goes with the name. Statistics in the movie proved that the someone named Shaniqua is more likely born to a single mother, who has a low income, and little education. These factors lead to Shaniqua having poor quality of life, not the fact that her name is Shaniqua. This example helps Levitt and Dunbar prove correlation is not causation.

Evidence

In the documentary most of the evidence that Steven Levitt and Stephan Dubner used were accumulated statistics. Which is what most people use for evidence. But there were some ways of finding the evidence and statistics that were innovative. One of the ways was they looked at tests to see if teachers were filling in correct answers to help students (which actually isn't helping students at all). The way they did this was by comparing the answers from the beginning of the tests to the answers from the end, (the ones that would be left blank), and found that the answers from the end had a much higher rate of being right. Which was a very innovative way to collect and the use statistics. They did an effective job of using their evidence to prove their points. 

Freakonomics serves as an inspiration and good example to our attempt to explore the "hidden-in-plain-sight" weirdness of dominant social practices.

I agree with this statement completely. The movie took things that seemed so simple and made it to be more. Like, with the names, who really thinks about what a name could do to decide the future of a person. Or how we think about grades being important, when some people are getting paid for certain grades. All these things are right in front of us all the time, but we don't think about them that they are. One idea from the book "Omnivore's Dilemma" that relates back to this movie was the idea of labels. The food we eat comes with all these labels, "organic", "Free-range", "Cageless". These label's affect what food is bought and what's considered "good food". People are labeled, like different things go into what makes an acceptable, or a "Ghetto" name.

Homework 7c- Omnivore's Dilemma

Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 11-

Summary:

Joe Salatin's farm basically runs itself. He does as little as possible to interfere with the natural aspects of his farm. He only gives hid farm what it can take. Not too many animals on the farm so there's no destruction, not too many vehicles so there's no pollution. He also keeps forest life around the farm to keep animals shaded and cool in the summer, absorb water, and to keep predators out. He uses all natural defenses for his animals and farm. All of this protection leads to a lot of food being produced every year.

"Gems"-

"I asked Joel how much food Polyface produces in a season, and he rattled off these figures:

30,000 eggs

12,00 broilers

800 stewing hens

50 beeves (representing 25,00 pounds of beef)

250 hogs (50,00 pounds of pork)

800 turkeys

500 rabbits." Page 222

"The woods represented a whole order of complexity I didn't take into account. I realized that Joel didn't look at this land the same way I did" Page 224

Thoughts:

Anybody that thinks that this method of farming isn't efficient like standard farming is clearly wrong. This 100 acre farm produces a lot of food each year. Exceptional numbers for a farm of that size. When people in the corn industry want to talk about efficiency being priority, look at this farm. Enough said.

How will our depletion of forests and woods affect our farming techniques?

Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 12-
Summary:
Alternative farmer, Joel Salatin shares a problem with any other farmer, alternative or not. He has to slaughter his animals. He isn't allowed to slaughter cows or pigs on his farm due to USDA regulations, but he can slaughter chickens. So he takes advantage, slaughtering all his chickens on his farm. Joel believes that this way he is expanding his world view, and preserving the natural cycle that he has built. By killing his own chickens, Joel is making sure that the chickens weren't processed, and that the guts aren't turned into "protein feed" for farm animals. While Joel enjoys this process of slaughtering, I did not. But I understand how it is better to slaughter in the way that Joel does. He wishes that the strict regulations for slaughtering and processing were lifted so he could slaughter all of his animals himself.
"Gems"-
"Joel is convinced that "clean food" could compete with supermarket food if the government would exempt farmers from the thickest of regulations that prohibit the processing and selling of meat from the farm." Page 236
"'We do not allow the government to dictate what religion you can observe, so why should we allow them to dictate what food we buy?" Page 236
Thoughts:
- I found the slaughtering process to be pretty cool. I would like to see it myself, or even try to slaughter a chicken. I definitely find Joel Salatin's set-up and process to be better then a large-scale slaughtering house. It seems cleaner, and it's ultimately better for the farm.
-I agree with Joel's Salatin's views on the USDA regulations, they're aimed at the big farms and feedlots. There is nothing wrong with his methods, and the food can end up safer and cleaner.
-What changes would we see in the market if farmers could slaughter and process animals from their farms?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 13-
Summary:
All of the food that Polyface farm produces isn't shipped across the country like from an industrial farm. It is sold only to local consumers. Due to regulations on food processing, and the low industrial prices, the food from Polyface costs about a dollar more a pound compared to industrial food products. But if you look at the quality, there isn't any medicine, pollution, or food-borne illness in Joel's food. That's where the extra dollar comes from. In the long run, buying from Joel's farm could save complications, in some cases money, and it's better to know where the food is coming from.
"Gems"-  "'Why do you have to have a New York City? What good is it?' If  there was a dark side to Joel's vision of the postindustrial food chain, I realized, it was the deep antipathy to cities that has so often shadowed rural populism in this country.'" Page 245 
Thoughts:
-I like the fact Joel isn't shipping products across the country. It really fits into his ideals. He is also recognized as a real person, unlike someone like George Naylor, who can't even be linked back to his food. It's a good way to distribute food, by keeping it local.
-I don't think that the food from Polyface should cost more then the food that was industrial grown, it should cost less if anything. Joel's system makes so much more sense, as it protects the earth, and keeps everything natural.
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 14-
Summary:
At the end of my week on Polyface, I cooked a dinner for my friends, Joel and his family. I used food only from the farm. For the meal I slow roasted two chickens, cooked corn, made a salad, and used the farms eggs to create a soufflé. The meal was very good, and was at a higher nutritional value, as it lacked the corn-fed animals, pesticides, antibiotic treatments, not to mention the added omega-3 and vitamin E that the chickens gained from eating the grass.
"Gems"-  "When chickens get to live like chickens, they'll taste like chickens, too." Page 270
"As long as one egg looks pretty much like another, all the chickens look like chickens, and beef beef, the substitution of quantity for quality will go unnoticed by most consumers." Page 269
Thoughts- 
-This seemed like a nice little meal. It made me appreciate what a home-cooked meal means. For them, their food comes from their home. Like Michael Pollan, I might have been hesitant to want to cook and eat the animals from the farm, considering how connected he was to them, how he saw the process in which they had died. But then you think, "a mans gotta eat."
- I enjoyed how in-depth he went about the preparation of the food. It makes me want to duplicate his meal.
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 15-
Summary:
After exploring two very different food chains, I am going to go a different route, and make my own meal out of all foraged foods, relying only on the wild for food. Though, with a task simple enough, I'm not prepared for it yet. Growing up on the agricultural food chain, and without exposure to the wild, this leaves me uncomfortable. But with the help of a hunter education course, I will achieve my goal. I believe this process will give me a new outlook on life.
"Gems"-  "Otherwise it's hard to explain why humans would have ever traded such a healthy and comparativly pleasant way of life for backbreaking, monotonous work of agrculture." Page 279
"Anthropologists estimate that typical hunter-gatherers worked at feeding themselves no more then seventeen hours a week, and were far more robust and long-lived then agriculturists."
Thoughts-
-Even though I have spent every summer of my life in the woods, around wild plants, and around wild animals, I could not imagine trying to gather those plants and hunt those animals for food. That may be because I spend the other ten or so months in New York City, but I feel almost the same way as Michael does. 
- If we never switched over to agriculture, how different would our society be today?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 16-
Summary:
Humans come equipped with a brain much larger then their stomach, and that allows us to recognize a varied selection of tastes and foods. Because of this we get that very familiar and repetitive question, "What should I eat?" We are influenced by our culture, the cost, the health benefits, and most importantly the taste. Americans wonder how other cultures stay healthy, as Americans may be some of the most unhealthy eaters. It all comes down to how people handle the omnivore's dilemma. 
"Gems"- "There is a short and direct path from the omnivore's dilemma to the astounding number of ethical rules from which people have sought to regulate eating for as long as they have been living in groups" Page 298
"Being an omnivore occupying a niche in nature is both a boon and a challenge, a source of tremendous power as well as anxiety." Page 295
Thoughts-
-You never really think about how much variety we have to eat, and how much that effects the way we eat. But as we are allowed to go out to eat in our school, by second period you start thinking about how much money you have for lunch, and where your going to eat. But to be healthy we should be thinking less about the cost and more about nutrition.
-Would life be easier if we didn't have so much food to choose from?

Homework 8- Eating My Sprouts

    The experience of growing my own food wasn't that special, because my family has a garden and we eat blueberries and stuff that we grow. I was actually surprised in how little care and time it took to grow the sprouts. The process was fairly easy, as watering seeds in a jar twice a day takes two minutes or less. But as my sprouts grew fine, I know there was some peoples that didn't. So while my process was fast and simple, it could have been long, tedious, and frustrating. The one thing that I did like about growing my own food was that I knew where my food was coming from. That usually doesn't happen, as the food in supermarkets is from around the country, and around the world. It made me realize that like 99% if the time I don't know where my food originated from.

I ate most of my sprouts on stuffed peppers. The rest I ate straight out of my jar. The taste to me was very grassy, except there was a few hints of spice throughout.

Homework 7B- Reading Response Monday 2

Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 6-
Summary-
Ever since the 19th century there has been mass production of corn. Because of this, since the 19th century Americans have been mass consuming corn. One of the biggest contributions to corn consumption was the use of it in alcohol. The use of corn over this time period has indirectly led to many health problems. The consumption of corn is not slowing down, Americans are consuming more corn, and are having more health problems.
"Gems"- "That at least is what we're doing with about 530 million bushel of the annual corn harvest. Turning it into 17.5 billion pounds of high-fructose corn syrup." Page 103
Thoughts-
-We have all these health problems that can be related back to corn, yet we still rely on it more then any other grain, or any other food for that matter. 
-When will we acknowledge the health risks we have, and change our diets to move away from corn?

Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 7-

Summary:

Most americans eat fast food. It's appealing because of it generally has low prices, good tastes (grease and salt), and kids love it. What americans don't know is how unhealthy and even dangerous the food their eating is. A typical Mcdonalds meal will fulfill half the recommended amount of calories per day your supposed to eat. If you go into a Mcdonalds and order any two items off their menu, they would probably similar in at least one way; they would be involved with corn. There is very little variety on fast food menus. Almost all of the items involve corn as an ingredient, or to be cooked in (corn oil). Fast food also uses a lot off energy and fossil fuels to produce the food that is killing us ever so slowly.

"Gems"-  "19 percent of American meals are eaten in the car."
Thoughts-
-I eat fast food usually like at least once a week. I hear how bad it is all the time, but I don't really think about it while I eat. I think about how good it tastes. Will this book stop me from going to Mcdonalds tomorrow and ordereing three mcdoubles? Not at all. But I'll know what I'm eating. I'll be aware.
- Can the fast food industry grow anymore then it has already? What changes will it make to become more healthy?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 8-
Summary:
Joel Salatin  a farmer that wants to take organic to the next level. He has made a farm where every organism plays a part. Unlike feedlots and other farms, Salatin's animals are fed grass, and the manure the cows produce is used as fertilizer (cause, well you know, IT'S NOT TOXIC). When you think of old McDonald's farm, this is the about the closest you'll find to that cheery farm life picture. Why? Because it's an ecosystem based off of grass. This takes organic to the next level, considering that Joel Salatin was saying how industrialized organics have become, due to the broadness of what organic means.
"Gems"-
"Salatin is the choreographer and the grasses are his verdurous stage; the dance has made polyface one of the most productive and influential alternative farms in America" Page 126
Thoughts-
-These types of farms, the alternative farms, should be the dominant farm across the country. They are the ones producing quality food, using natural methods. But that wont ever happen. People like Naylor have gone to far to change their farming ways. And the consumer has given up the search of quality, and now has moved on to finding the quantity. With corn-based farms there's no quality, but the quantity is sure there.
- Will the remaining alternative farms survive in a country that doesn't care where what their eating is coming from?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 9-
Summary:
Over the past ten years, everybody has been on an organic craze. When people think of organics, they think of small little farms growing this healthy food. In reality, most of that food you find in that in an organic supermarket like whole foods was grown almost like the corn. The organic market has been industrialized, not as much as the corn market, but not that far off. Organics from the beginning were designed to provide a more healthy option of eating. Now organic is just a label to make yourself feel good. As Casey Smith put it, "Although organic food has more potential to be healthy, environmentally friendly, tasty, risk-free, and kind to animals and farmers, it still (more often than not) corresponds to animal cruelty, petroleum use and chemical intake." Because the organic lifestyle changed from being grown on small farms, to being grown like other foods, it has really become industrialized.
"Gems"- "No farms I had ever visited before prepared me for the industrial organic farms I saw in California." Page 158
"The free-range story seems a bit of a stretch when you discover that the door remains firmly shut until the birds are at least five or six weeks old."
Thoughts-
-There's really no point of eating organic foods anymore then. It's basically eating the same thing as regular foods, it just costs more. It's almost sad how the greed of people can take a good idea, and it's diminished for a profit. I think that people need to be more aware of the fact that eating organic isn't really eating that much better then regular produce, or regular chicken. Like it said in the book, free-range chickens are penned up the first 5 weeks of their life. Organic foods have really lost their meaning.
- How will the alternative farms, or truly organic farms compete with these industrial organic farms?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 10-
Summary:
 Joel Salatin has a self-proclaimed "beyond organic" farm. He doesn't use the cheaper method of running his farm on corn. He uses grass. He grows grass, feeds grass to his animals, and because this doesn't create toxic feces like corn, he uses it to type fertilize. The methods that Salatin uses are better for the earth then traditional corn farming. The government doesn't show appreciation to this of farming, offering no commodities for the food they produce. They give the money to farmers like Naylor for corn production. Farmers like Joel Salatin are under appreciated.
"Gems"- "If the sixteen million acres now being used to grow corn to feed cows in the United States became well managed pasture, that would remove fourteen billion pounds of carbon from the atmosphere each year, the equivalent of taking four million cars off the road." 
Thoughts-
-Just that quote above shows how much better alternative farms are compared to normal corn farms. American corn farms damage the earth. They could be replaced with these "beyond organic" farms, but that won't ever happen. People think more about money then anything. Thoughts of money aren't limited to the rich mans mind either.
-What would it take to see a major reform leading away from the dependence of corn?

Homework 7- Reading Response Monday

Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Introduction-
Summary: America's food industry has been changing very quickly. People are eating totally differently then they had in the past. This book will take the reader deep into all parts of the food industry, showing what people are eating and where it comes form.
"Gems": "Different as they are, all three food chains are systems for doing more or less the same thing: linking us, through what we eat" Page 7
Thoughts:
-This book seems like it will be very interesting and insightful. I think that it will start off objective, and show more and more bias as it progresses.
- Why did America's food inidustry and ideas about food change so rapidly?


Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter one-
Summary: Most of Americans diets consist of mostly corn products. Humans, at least in America, rely on corn to live the way they do. Corn relies on humans to reproduce and without them, it would had never have grown to the crop it is today.
"Gems": "If you do manage to regard the supermarket through the eyes of a naturalist, your first impression is apt to be of it's astounding biodiversity. Look how many plants and animals (and fungi) are represented on this single acre of land! What forest or prairie could hope to match it?" Page 16.
Thoughts and Insights: 
-I knew we relied on corn, but I always learned about it from the economic point of view. Corn is really the center piece of american society. It is the single most important crop in the country. If we couldn't grow it or import it, it would be the equivalent the irish potato famine or worst.
- Where would we be now without the discovery of corn?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter two-
Summary: There has been a new type of corn developed to make industrial farming easier, hybrid corn. Hybrid corn is bred to have the acquired traits. This corn is stronger then average corn, allowing more of it to be harvested. The corn can't be there on it's own, the farmers, and their techniques are very important to corn farming, and the food industry in America.
"Gems": "'Growing corn is just riding tractors and spraying'" Page 40
Thoughts:
- Science has come so far, they should be able to engineer super corn! I don't care if it's natural, it is effective and doesn't put us in danger so there's nothing wrong with it.
-Will the hybrid corn crops kill off the regular corn crops?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 3-
Summary: 
Corn is harvested and kept in grain elevators. All different farmers bring their corn to these grain elevators, when it is bought, and after that it is mixed and untraceable back to the farmer. It is all classified as "Number 2 Corn", meaning that it is acceptable corn to eat. After that corn is shipped off to be processed or fed to the country's livestock.
"Gems": "My plan when I came to Iowa was to somehow follow George Naylor's corn on it's circuitous path to our plates and into our bodies. I should have known that tracing any single bushel of commodity corn is as impossible as tracing a bucket of water after after it's been poured into a river. " Page 63
Thoughts:
- This chapter changed my perspective on how I see american farming. I thought that every farmer individually sold their corn to the public, or at least individually to the corporations. As it turns out, the corporations couldn't tell you where they got their corn from.
- If all this corn is thrown together, and a disease comes out of it, how can we identify where the disease is coming from?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 4-
Summary
Cows aren't being fed grass anymore, they aren't even living on farms anymore. They're living on feedlots now. Feedlots are places where cows are kept in crowded pens, and fed corn. The corn is not healthy for cows, which is why they're also on a steady diet of antibiotics. The corn is so unhealthy for them, that they're manure is toxic. In the pens that cows are kept in, they're knee deep in manure. Overall, there aren't good living conditions for our country's cows.
"Gems":  "So then why is it that steer number 534 hasn't tasted a blade of prairie grass since October? Speed, in a word, or, in the industry's preferred term, 'efficiency'....Fast food, indeed" Page 71
Thoughts:
- Right now were in a stalemate. We can't go back to having cows eating grass on farms because all the farms are gone. The corn is so unhealthy for cows we need to stop feeding them it. We have no solution.
-What happens when there's no corn to feed our beef? When petroleum runs out?
Michael Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter 5-
Summary:
Corn is currently the most important part of our food chain. It is broken up and we use every part of the kernel. When it is processed, it is broken up into different parts. It is basically taken apart and put back together in food. Which is a long and energy consuming process. But it works, as corn can be turned into many different ingredients.
"Gems": From Lucas London"s blog:   "There's money in food, unless you're trying to grow it." (Pollan 95)
Thoughts:
-Basically corn can be turned into anything. It is able to be broken up so small and has so many different properties, it works to put in all our food.
-How hard would it be to live without corn in your diet?

Food Diary Analysis

I successfully logged what I ate over the last forty-eight hours. I think that it's supposed to show my usual eating habits. Well I was unsuccessful in that. Because I missed two meals. One lunch, and one dinner. This is unhealthy because I didn't intake any of the required nutrients necessary for a healthy life. Looking from a nutritional stance, my food wasn't horrible. Except for the four slices of pizza that I had. Which honestly made me sick. Other then that, my meals incorporated a mix of fruits, carbs, and protein. Though I usually don't worry about what the nutritional facts of the food I'm eating are, but if it will fill me up or not. Though since I have started this class I've thought more about eating healthier.

Looking back at the food I ate, I realized a couple of things. Most of the food I eat doesn't mean anything to me, and I don't usually have a big variety in meal choices. The first realization came from when I was reading the question about the connections and why were were eating the foods we were. I realized I don't have connections with my food, I don't know why I was eating it. The only thing I could think was that it tastes good. And I couldn't figure out why some foods taste better then others to me. So I thought about reasons to eat the food I do. I realized in the morning I eay whatever is in my cabinet. For lunch I eat whatever will fill me up for around five dollars. For dinner I eat whatever my parents give me. I don't really think much about what I eat. I just figure its there and I can eat it. So I do. Now maybe I'll think about what I'm about eat before I eat it. Think about where my food is coming from,what it was before processing, and how it's made. Because with most foods I have no idea.

Food Diary: 9/29-10/1/10

9.29.10- Breakfast

Two blueberry pop-tarts and a glass of milk

~500 calories

Thoughts about this meal: Not a bad breakfast, it could have had more nutritional value with a cup of orange juice or a fruit.

      9.29.10- Lunch

Four slices of dollar pizza and a mango Arizona drink

Thoughts about this meal: Very unhealthy, a lot of carbs, but a great value. I liked the taste, which is a plus. The only nutritional value that it had for me is that there were a lot of carbs in it, which is good for when you play sports. I had a soccer game later this day.

9.29.10- Dinner

Nothing.

Thoughts about this meal: Well I was tired from my soccer game, and not really hungry, so I skipped dinner, and went to sleep. I did have a plum later that night though. I am not exactly sure if thats good for me or not.

9.30.10- Breakfast

Frosted Mini-Wheats with milk

~450 calories

Thoughts about this meal: I think this is a good breakfast, it's one of my favorite cereals so I enjoyed it.

9.30.10- Lunch

Starbucks Water

0 Calories

Thoughts about this meal: I skipped another meal, which I typically don't do. I just didn't have lunch money. Though I think not eating at all may have been healthier then eating at Wendy's (Where this photo was taken).

9.30.10- Dinner

Stuffed Peppers, with bread and bottled water

360 Calories

Thoughts about this meal: I think it may have been the most balanced meal I had in the 48 hours. It was low in calories, while still having more then a serving of vegetables, and protein form the beef. 

                                                                     

10.1.10- Breakfast

Special K(Strawberry) Cereal with milk

~350 Calories

Thoughts about this meal: The best breakfast of the week. It had low calories, low sugar, and a serving of fruit.