Questions About Food and Nutrition

¶ … insect with the highest protein content was the caterpillar, with 28.2 grams of protein per 100g. Americans at this point are unlikely to adopt insects as food in the near or even medium term. Objectively, the squeamishness factor doesn't make sense -- how on earth can someone eat a Big Mac and not eat a chapulines taco? Insects are infinitely cleaner and healthier than some of the crap people eat, and realistically ground beef that has been sprayed with ammonia, had color added back into it, and was raised pumped full of antibiotics and hormones is pretty nasty stuff. Bugs are nothing compared to that. There are a lot of people who are open-minded about food, but to overcome barriers is going to require creativity. Yes, chapulines are tasty, and in Vietnam they fry up locusts with pork fat, and these things are delicious, but Americans will need to see that level of preparation just to give the idea of eating insects half a chance. It will be a tough battle, and ultimately needs to be led by immigrant communities that know how to raise and cook insects well.

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3) The article about minerals highlights the role that minerals play in nutrition. Each mineral has a specific function. Calcium, for example, not only helps build bones, but is crucial for the proper functioning of the kidneys, muscles and nerves. Other minerals are used by the body as antioxidants. Chromium helps to keep the arteries clear ("Food Sources of Minerals," 2015).

There are two types minerals, major minerals and trace minerals. The division is based on how much of each mineral your body needs. In the case of major minerals, these should be ingested at a rate of 100mg per day or more, while trace minerals can be taken at less than 100mg per day. There are a number of food sources of minerals. Fruits and vegetables are typically excellent sources, since they absorb minerals from the soils in which they grow. Dairy products, grains and legumes are also good sources, for the same reason. These are the important primary sources of minerals that we need to survive, and ultimately a diet full of processed food fails to deliver enough minerals ("Food Sources of Minerals," 2015)..

With the video, I find everything about her behavior to be disturbing. This women has a mental illness. The fact that she is completely and utterly obsessed with food, calories and her weight is not right, and it leads her to do all of the awful things that she does to her body. But clearly, she is obsessive about this issue, and cannot get it out of her head. She is methodical, planning what to eat and when to vomit, but none of this methodical behavior is rational -- she is applying her mental capabilities to self-destructive acts, rather than positive ones, and she needs help to break this cycle. There is nothing about her behavior that isn't disturbing.

4) I think one of the reasons why it took so long to discover vitamins was simply that we did not have microscopes for the longest time -- we did not conceive of the molecular world in which these things exist. We did not envision that our food was simply contained of various elements. So in that sense, we had no real concept of nutrition at all, and ended up not even thinking about it. When people started to learn more about molecules, this started us down a path of inquisitiveness, but it took a while. Navigators took a couple of generations to properly integrate knowledge of scurvy, for example