Posts

Nutrition Intelligence - The Sofia Additions

Image
As we continue our food and nutrition journey, it’s time to discuss what to add to our diet. We have been focusing on deduction on the obesogenic environment so far (don’t eat this, consume less of that), but it is also important to understand addition, which is food we should deliberately include more of. With deduction, we shield ourselves from harm; with addition, we empower ourselves from within. Let’s introduce the Sofia additions. Sofia refers to a set of often-forgotten, nutrient-dense foods: sprouts and young greens(S), oceanic foods (O), fermented foods (F), innards (I), and antioxidant-rich plants (A). Collectively, they are powerful sources of minerals, vitamins, fibres, healthy fats, and lean proteins. Depending on cultures and personal habits, some categories of Sofia are often overlooked. For example, some families regularly eat fish but rarely consume fermented foods like cheese and kimchi. Others might eat plenty of berries and colourful plants rich in antioxidants, bu...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nutrition Intelligence - Live Leptogenically, Bob and Alice

Image
To maximise the possibility of living healthily and happily in this obesogenic world, we can make conscious choices to protect ourselves from the relentless push to consume calories. To illustrate the difference that conscious choices can make when buying, preparing, and consuming food, let’s imagine there are two people, named Bob and Alice, throughout this journey. Bob and Alice live in the same city, work similar hours with similar levels of stress, share similar financial situations, and have access to similar supermarkets and restaurants. Bob and Alice both find that their fridge and shelf are empty and decide to go to the supermarket. Bob decides to go immediately. With his car keys grabbed, off he goes. Bob does not pay attention to his hunger right now. He hasn’t eaten anything in the last four hours, and ghrelin is building up in his bloodstream, sending signals to the hypothalamus to increase the urge to eat. His brain’s reward centre is also activated, partly because of Bob’...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nutrition Intelligence - The Obesogenic World

With a relationship with food defined, let’s see how the modern world is dragging us into permanent holiday mode. For over 300,000 years, the human brain has developed a very simple rule regarding food: find carbohydrates, find fat, and find protein, then eat as much as you can. Our physiology has also evolved into an extremely efficient machine for using or storing every molecule of carbohydrates, fat, and protein. For example, a healthy human body will have exactly zero sugar (representing carbs), fat, and protein in urine. If there are even tiny amounts of sugar or protein in someone’s urine, it indicates that this person has a non-trivial medical condition (diabetic if urine has sugar, or kidney malfunction if urine has protein, and serious digestive problems if fat appears in urine). That the healthy body prevents each drop of carbs, fat, or protein means that, after millions of years of evolution, our body has become so accustomed to an environment where nutrition is scarce that ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nutrition Intelligence - Relationship with Food

Image
Relationship with Food There are many relationships everyone needs to develop and maintain in life. Some are necessary, while others are optional; some are simple, while others are complex. Relationships with partners, friends, and colleagues are often complex. Throughout life, these choices are optional—we can choose our friends, change jobs to have new colleagues, decide with whom to partner, or even choose not to marry. Relationships with finance are necessary but can be straightforward (simply spending earnings). The relationship with food, however, is absolutely essential (a person with an average first-world lifespan will eat about 80,000 times in their lifetime) and complex (considering health, weight control, diet, allergies, mood, social factors, exploring the world, family traditions, culture, fun, cravings, alcohol that entices, enriches, and encloses us…). Let’s introduce a framework based on five attributes to break down the complexity of the relationship with food. Using ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Information intelligence - Sleep, Exercise and Nutrition

Intelligence Mixer - Sleep and Information Processing So far, we’ve explored how information flows in this chapter. From attention to priming, bias, and learning, we examined how information moves from perception to understanding. We now turn to consider how other pillars of intelligence—sleep, exercise, and nutrition—can support information processing. Although later chapters (chapter 7 for sleep, chapter 6 for exercise, and chapter 5 for nutrition) will discuss these pillars more fully, here we focus on how they intersect with information processing. Sleep can enhance information processing in at least three ways: it improves memory, decision making, and insight formation. We’ve all experienced or seen moments like, “after a good sleep, I can recall what I couldn’t yesterday,” “I made a good decision that morning after a good sleep,” and “an answer to this tricky problem suddenly popped into my head when I woke up.” Let us examine these phenomena more closely at the physiological lev...
Post a Comment
Read more

Information Intelligence - How to Learn Anything

Image
How to Learn Anything To deepen our understanding of information intelligence, let’s explore how knowledge or skills become part of ourselves—learning. There is a strong connection between mastering a skill and happiness. Whether for work or a hobby, if someone can effectively learn the necessary skills and knowledge, they are more likely to feel a sense of achievement and earn recognition both professionally and socially. We want to be good at things, and the key to becoming proficient is learning. As a middle-aged man, I recall many people teaching me specific skills—math, drawing, piano, violin, swimming, riding a bicycle, chess, solving a Rubik’s Cube, playing basketball…. However, I cannot recall anyone teaching me how to learn in general. Learning about learning itself is absent in my life. If this resonates with you, I hope the five steps of learning outlined below will provide insight. 1. Understand the Depth. To learn anything, the first step is to grasp the subject’s depth. ...
1 comment
Read more

Information Intelligence - The Gingery Sunglasses

The Gingery Sunglasses My optometrist is a lovely person with a warm smile, a professional manner, and a good sense of humour. I especially like that she always cleans my glasses spotless after each eye check. However, she’s not the type to pay close attention to details. For example, a few months ago, when I ordered a pair of clear-lens sunglasses, I was surprised to find a pair of coloured lenses waiting for me at the pick-up appointment. “Well, it is the exact same prescription. I am very sorry that I placed the wrong order. We can order the correct one right now, and it should arrive in 2 weeks.” My optometrist apologised a bit awkwardly. “It looked alright,” I looked into the mirror with the gingery lens on. “I only use it when driving, so a coloured lens shouldn’t bother me much. I can take it.” “That is very nice of you. If you do feel the need to change it to clear lenses, let me know and I will replace it for you,” My optometrist replied with a slight relief. So that is how I ...
Post a Comment
Read more