In his new book “In Defense of Food,” Michael Pollan argues that western diets should escape from the nutritionist approach and follow the common sense approach. He establishes a statement that people should not depend too much on nutruitionism because it is “bad science”. He advises people should “eat food, not too much, mostly plants” to escape from nutruitionism. However, after reading his book, I am confused about his opinions of science. Although, Pollan is trying to criticize that science does not work on food, he still uses a lot of scientific evidence and analysis to prove the argument. In my view, his arguments are not effective and comprehensive enough for readers.
Pollan uses many professional scientific terms to establish his arguments, but they are not necessary. For example, Pollan writes abstruse words such as cell membranes to explain what Omega-3 and Omega-6 are and how they affect people. Nevertheless, do readers really care about how Omega-3 and Omega-6 work scientifically in the human body? The answer is no. Readers are not scientists, so they are not interested in understanding every complicated scientific word. They only care about the fact that people who consume less Omega-3 become less healthy.
Though Pollan always uses science to explain how food affects people’s health, the scientific reasoning can be proven wrong. For instance, Pollan suggests people to drink wine because scientific research shows that people who drink wine are healthier. However, wine may not make people healthy at all. People who drink wine are on average richer than people who do not. Rich people certainly have better house, better health care, and cleaner environment in which they live in, plus they dramatically worry less about financial problems. All of these can be the reasons that they are healthier.
Although Pollan points out that science cannot explain the nutruitionism very well in the beginning, he still uses a lot of scientific analysis to claim how and what we should eat in the later part of the book. For instance, Pollan argues that calories cannot indicate whether food is healthy or not. Nevertheless, he also encourages people to eat more plant-based food later because plant-based food has fewer calories, which protect people from many types of cancers. On the one hand, Pollan mentions that nutritionism is “bad science,” but on the other hand, he uses science to explain that plant-based food is healthy. This contradiction confuses the readers and weakens his arguments. Another advice is more illogical: although he says food cannot be simply broken down into nutrients, he still suggests to “being the kind of person who takes nutrimental supplements (multivitamin-and-mineral pill).”
Pollan does not offer enough evidence and arguments from different perspectives. Culture, history, and environment in addition to science are also critical to change eating habits. In fact, they affect people's eating habits more than science does. For example, the Japanese eat fish because of their culture and living environment, but not because of science. Although he mentions some influence of culture, his analysis of culture is too brief to convince readers. In his book, he presents an unbalanced load of different categories of arguments, as the scientific arguments exceeding all the rest by a significant quantity.
In all, Pollan uses too much scientific analysis and evidence for his arguments. Many people do not truly understand these arguments and become even more. After reading his book, I do not have impression on his main idea that nutritionism is bad science. Perhaps the best way to encourage readers to eat more healthily is to write the book in layman style and not pack the readers’ minds with too much science.
