April 29, 2009
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Eat Sunlight Instead of Oil
Wow. Has Michael Pollan been using this phrase for a while already? It is genius. From the latest Long Now email newsletter:
Eat sunlight instead of oil, and eat as if your health depended on it. American agriculture and food marketing can be reorganized around those goals.
It’s like a chemistry lesson and a parable, all in five words. Poetic, scientific, and mythic all at once. Totally abstract and symbolic, but it also renders a vivid image: Mmm, warm sunlight! Eww, gross oil.
Pollan is doing a Long Now talk next week in SF. Very excited.
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Comments
He said something similar in an October letter to the eventual winner of the Presidential election.
"...we need to wean the American food system off its heavy 20th-century diet of fossil fuel and put it back on a diet of contemporary sunshine."
I also love his "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." advice.
After reading his letter last year, I am worried that eat sunshine is just a stepping stone to subsidize sunshine.
I feel like all I read about agriculture is Pollan, is anyone else suggesting that oil-agriculture can successfully morph into something more environmentally friendly?