[extropy-chat] evolution of food

[Emlyn]

I think we'll get more and more tempting food, causing continuing
problems until we finally get the heavily demanded magic-fix-me-up
pills that we need to deal with all this crap. I hope so, anyway...
who says you can't have your cake and eat it too?

-- 
Emlyn

http://emlynoregan.com   * blogs * music * software *



On Tue, 17 Aug 2004 23:33:26 -0700, Spike <spike66 at comcast.net> wrote:
> Think of the very best cook you have ever known in your
> life, the meals that masterful chef prepared, and how you
> loved to devour those delectable viands, which would tempt
> the palates of connoisseurs from both hemispheres.  To
> those of more delicate sensibilities, they would add a
> still more aesthetic charm.
> 
> Now what if that chef were cooking for you three squares
> a day, 7/52.  What would happen?
> 
> Remember those frozen dinners that showed up in the 1970s,
> how vile they were?  How much better they are today.
> Like life forms, food is evolving.  Those foods which few
> people devour soon fall off the radar screen, replaced by
> robust Krispy Kremes, those toxic toroids of luscious
> lipoproteins, McDonalds burgers and other such life-threatening
> delights.  It occurred to me that all the mechanisms that will
> cause food to evolve quickly have been put in place in the past
> half century: worldwide distribution networks, franchises,
> centralized supply sources which can study which foods
> sell best in which places.  These mechanisms quickly tune up
> the process, propagating the best food memes and rejecting
> the only slightly less successful.  The result is that food
> is becoming ever more tempting, contributing to the alarming
> increase of human adipose all over the world.  It is analogous
> to having our favorite chef available more and more often.
> 
> Extrapolate this trend into the future.  Is there any
> reason to believe that food is as good as it will ever
> get?  Why?  If it continues to get ever more irresistible
> as time goes on, what scenarios can we imagine?  Will flab
> continue to overtake an ever larger percentage of people?
> Or will we eventually reverse course and demand less tasty
> foods?  Will better nutrition education help?  Will more
> and more people perish of diabetes and weight related
> heart disease, or will it soon level off?
> 
> spike
> 
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