Nutrition expert, educator discuss whole food plant based diet advantages

Posted by Elena del Valle on September 19, 2014

Whole

Whole: Rethinking the Science of Nutrition

Photo: BenBella Books

T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D. has spent a lifetime studying nutrition, and Howard Jacobson, Ph.D. is a health educator and ecological gardener. They believe a whole food plant based diet without added fat, salt, or refined carbohydrates (such as sugar and white flour) is the essential foundation for a healthy life. In Whole Rethinking the Science of Nutrition (BenBella Books, $16.95) they explore the evidence to support their conclusions, including their belief that people’s eating habits haven’t changed despite the availability of information about nutrition to support their arguments.

Whole follows on the heels of the publication of The China Study (see Health, nutrition experts examine comprehensive China nutrition study), a previous book authored by Campbell and his son, which addressed similar issues and conclusions about nutrition. The 328-page softcover book is divided into 19 chapters and four main parts: Enslaved by the System, Paradigm As Prison, Subtle Power and Its Wielders, and Final Thoughts.

The authors examine the concepts of whole versus reductionist biology, where whole biology views the body as more than the sum of its parts while reductionist biology focuses on the individual organs or aspects of the human anatomy. They are convinced reductionism is the primary view today and part of the reason society, medicine and social policy favor reductionist nutrition.

They propose that readers change the way they view nutrition, medicine and health, taking into account the complexity of the human body and expanding their views to encompass reductionist and wholist approaches. The reasons society clings to old reductionist approaches to eating, they say, relate to a long standing belief in the healthy nature of animal proteins, the common view that the body is made up of a set of diverse and separate parts, and a profit oriented reductionist system.