Omnivore's+Study+Questions

1. What prompted the “low carb/high protein” movement of the early 2000s? 2. Name four things that the author states would never happen in a stable food culture. 3. What is the “omnivore’s dilemma”? 4. Describe three ways in which our brain size helps us deal the omnivore’s dilemma. 5. How does the lack of a stable food culture leave us vulnerable? 6. How do humans differ from other eaters in nature? 7. How has industrial agriculture changed our reliance on the sun for our energy? 8. Define biodiversity and describe how the grocery stores would appear to promote it. 9. Cite five reasons as to why corn has come to narrow the biological diversity of the foods from which we choose. 10. What advantage do C4 plants have over C3 plants? 11. What are isotopes? 12. Citing evidence from carbon-13 levels in human tissues, explain why North Americans are found to have ingested more corn than Mexicans, whose staple food is corn? 13. Cite five reasons why corn appealed to wheat growers in North America. 14. How did genetic changes in teosinte lend to the success of corn as a food source, yet caused it to become dependent on humans? 15. Define the parental generation, the F1 generation and the F2 generation. 16. Why has the F1 generation hybrid become the center of industrial technology? Why is the F2 generation not as successful? 17. How does the production of today’s farms compare with the production of farms during the early 20 th century? 18. What makes George Naylor’s farm a “food desert”? 19. Why does Naylor not plant genetically modified corn? 20. How has the F1 hybrid affected the competitive attributes of corn? 21. How did corn affect the biodiversity of farms? 22. Prior to the 1950s, what methods did farmers use to replenish the nitrogen levels in the soil? 23. Why is nitrogen necessary for living organisms? 24. Why is the Haber process considered to be “the most important invention of the 20th century?” 25. What do you think it would take to switch America’s agricultural economy away from corn? Do you think this is likely to happen? Why or why not? 26. What’s the connection between our use of synthetic fertilizers and the “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico? (47)
 * Introduction **
 * Part I – Industrial Corn **
 * // Chapter 1 – The Plant: Corn’s Conquest //**
 * // Chapter 2 – The Farm //**

Chapter 4 – The Feedlot: Making Meat 28. How much of the commodity corn goes to feed livestock? 29. Explain how government policies have produced suburbs for humans and cities for animals. 30. Describe the economic and biological repercussions of CAFOS. 31. What is the ecological benefit of cows feeding on grass? 32. What is the benefit of feeding corn to cows? Why is it unhealthy for us? Chapter 5 – The Processing Plant: Making Complex Foods 33. About how much actual corn does each person eat per year? 34. Describe what happens to each part of the corn kernel. 35. What is the purpose of the endosperm in a seed? 36. In what ways does the wet milling process mimic digestion? 37. What is high fructose corn syrup? 38. What is the benefit of processing food? 39. What is resistant starch and what is its appeal?