This is a transcript of Amy Goodman interviewing Michael Pollan about his newest book, the bestselling In Defense of Food.
http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/76987/?page=entire
I wonder whether Pollan has read Taubes, specifically Good Calories, Bad Calories. I wonder what those two think of each other. For all the great insights Pollan has, he still seems to be under the impression that red meat is not good for humans to eat. But maybe that's because he hasn't come upon the same source materials in the course of his work that Taubes has.
He does, in this interview, use words like "probably" when talking about whether it's good or bad, and he exonerates cholesterol early on here. However, the mantra of "Eat food. Mostly plants. Not too much" (other articles call it a mantra; I didn't come up with that myself) is what people quote over and over.
His idea of "nutritionism" as ideology is priceless.
A link to an MP3 audio file of this interview can be found in the third (non subthreaded) comment.
1 comment:
Pollan mentions Taubes in In Defense of Food, rather dismissively, I thought. It wasn't completely clear to me whether he'd finished the book.
I agree with you - I'd love to see a panel-style discussion with Taubes and Pollan. I respect much of what Pollan has written, but it is abundantly clear that Taubes can kick Pollan's butt on the science. Of course, since what Pollan seems to be saying is that we don't need scientists to tell us what to eat, I'm not sure that he would be persuaded by the science anyway.
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