The Philosopher's Diet


Book Description

This toothsome classic takes on the combined challenges of discovering the meaning of the universe and eliminating fat at the same time. Its topic sentence contains a promise that should sell millions: In this book, I tell how to take weight off and keep it off. He doesn't stop there, but continues, The book also embodies a philosophy of life. The weight program is the content of the book, the philosophy of life is its form. If Descartes had sat down to write a treatise on losing weight as a metaphor for maintaining discipline amidst life's vicissitudes, it would have read much like this.Clearly, Mr. Watson has not written a low-fat, new-age, easy-fix solution for the weight challenged. After all, losing weight is hard work. But for our money, it is the most erudite, fascinating, and eccentric book ever written on the subject of weight control, a combination of common sense (driven by human experience), Cartesian philosophy, and the presumption that understanding the mysteries of weight loss and the universe are somehow compatible, even sympathetic, ambitions.The author is (of course) a professional philosopher, and this extraordinary exegesis is at once a moral manifesto, a philosophical discourse, and a practical manual (although the chapter on How to Live and How to Die take it a few steps beyond the ordinary). We love this book for its humor, its iconoclasm, and its weird and wacky mixture of high seriousness and low humor. Read it. Even if you're not overweight, it's a book to treasure.




The Philosophy of Food


Book Description

This book explores food from a philosophical perspective, bringing together leading philosophers to consider the most basic questions about food. Each essay analyses many contemporary debates in food studies. Slow Food, sustainability, food safety, and politics, and addresses such issues as happy meat, aquaculture, veganism, and table manners.




Philosophy Comes to Dinner


Book Description

Everyone is talking about food. Chefs are celebrities. "Locavore" and "freegan" have earned spots in the dictionary. Popular books and films about food production and consumption are exposing the unintended consequences of the standard American diet. Questions about the principles and values that ought to guide decisions about dinner have become urgent for moral, ecological, and health-related reasons. In Philosophy Comes to Dinner, twelve philosophers—some leading voices, some inspiring new ones—join the conversation, and consider issues ranging from the sustainability of modern agriculture, to consumer complicity in animal exploitation, to the pros and cons of alternative diets.




Raw Veganism


Book Description

Human beings are getting fatter and sicker. As we question what we eat and why we eat it, this book argues that living well involves consuming a raw vegan diet. With eating healthfully and eating ethically being simpler said than done, this book argues that the best solution to health, environmental, and ethical problems concerning animals is raw veganism—the human diet. The human diet is what humans are naturally designed to eat, and that is, a raw vegan diet of fruit, tender leafy greens, and occasionally nuts and seeds. While veganism raises challenging questions over the ethics of consuming animal products, while also considering the environmental impact of the agriculture industry, raw veganism goes a step further and argues that consuming cooked food is also detrimental to our health and the environment. Cooking foods allows us to eat food that is not otherwise fit for human consumption and in an age that promotes eating foods in ‘moderation’ and having ‘balanced’ diets, this raises the question of why we are eating foods that should only be consumed in moderation at all, as moderation clearly implies they aren’t good for us. In addition, from an environmental perspective, the use of stoves, ovens and microwaves for cooking contributes significantly to energy consumption and cooking in general generates excessive waste of food and resources. Thus, this book maintains that living well and living a noble life, that is, good physical and moral health, requires consuming a raw vegan diet. Exploring the scientific and philosophical aspects of raw veganism, this novel book is essential reading for all interested in promoting ethical, healthful, and sustainable diets.




Human Diet


Book Description

Our ancestral diets have been critical to our success as a species. This volume brings together experts in human and primate ecology, paleontology, and evolutionary medicine. Authors offer their unique perspectives on the evolution of the human diet and the implications of recent changes in diet for health and nutrition today.




Why It's OK to Eat Meat


Book Description

Vegetarians have argued at great length that meat-eating is wrong. Even so, the vast majority of people continue to eat meat, and even most vegetarians eventually give up on their diets. Does this prove these people must be morally corrupt? In Why It’s OK to Eat Meat, Dan C. Shahar argues the answer is no: it’s entirely possible to be an ethical person while continuing to eat meat—and not just the "fancy" offerings from the farmers' market but also the regular meat we find at most supermarkets and restaurants. Shahar’s examination forcefully echoes vegetarians’ concerns about the meat industry’s impacts on animals, workers, the environment, and public health. However, he shows that the most influential ethical arguments for avoiding meat on the basis of these considerations are ultimately unpersuasive. Instead of insisting we all become vegetarians, Shahar argues each of us has broad latitude to choose which of the world’s problems to tackle, in what ways, and to what extents, and hence people can decline to take up this particular form of activism without doing anything wrong. Key Features First book-length defense of meat-eating written for a popular audience Punchy, accessible introduction to the multifaceted debate over the ethics of eating meat Includes pioneering new examinations of humane labeling practices Shows why appeals to universalized patterns of behavior can’t vindicate vegetarians’ claims that there’s a duty to avoid meat Develops a novel theory of ethical activism with potential applications to a wide range of other issues




Before Dinner


Book Description

Both issues refer to the social and cultural aspects of food.




The World Peace Diet


Book Description

Incorporating systems theory, teachings from mythology and religions, and the human sciences, The World Peace Diet presents the outlines of a more empowering understanding of our world, based on a comprehension of the far-reaching implications of our food choices and the worldview those choices reflect and mandate. The author offers a set of universal principles for all people of conscience, from any religious tradition, that they can follow to reconnect with what we are eating, what was required to get it on our plate, and what happens after it leaves our plates.




Perfect Health Diet


Book Description

The simple, science-based, “Paleo perfected” (Vogue) diet that promotes effortless weight loss and peak health—written by two Harvard scientists. In Perfect Health Diet, Paul and Shou-Ching Jaminet explain in straightforward terms how anyone can regain health and lose weight by optimizing nutrition, detoxifying the diet, and sup­porting healthy immune function. They show how toxic, nutrient-poor diets sabotage health, and how on a healthy diet, diseases often spontaneously resolve. Perfect Health Diet makes weight loss effortless with a clear, balanced, and scientifically proven plan to change the way you eat—and feel—forever!




Cooking, Eating, Thinking


Book Description

Philosophy has often been criticized for privileging the abstract; this volume attempts to remedy that situation. Focusing on one of the most concrete of human concerns, food, the editors argue for the existence of a philosophy of food. The collection provides various approaches to the subject matter, offering new readings of a number of texts—religious, philosophical, anthropological, culinary, poetic, and economic. Included are readings ranging from Plato's Phaedo and Verses of Sen-No-Rikyu to Peter Singer's "Becoming a Vegetarian" and Jean-François Revel's Culture and Cuisine. This reader will have particular appeal for philosophers working in social theory, feminist theory, and environmental ethics, and for those working on alternative approaches to such traditional subject areas as epistemology, aesthetics, and metaphysics.