Knowing vs Doing

It is one thing to know what should be done, then there is the doing. We know that motivation lies in between. And overcoming obstacles, objections, changing habits.

Changing habits of any kind is process in it's self. Prochaska and Diclemente say there are six stages: precontempation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance, and termination. In permanent change, it is desirable to remain in the changed stage. 

There is yet another issue; change or suspension of a behavior. In the past there has been change, but that change has not been enough to completely remove the issue. I am still addicted to wheat, as the addiction never leaves. There are traces everywhere, and occasionally a deliberate cookie/butter tart/ fruit cake/ etc, which ought not be eaten but the will is weak and flesh is strong, pulling... So that is suspension of behavior, not actual change.

One meal a day, or skipping meals makes sense, from actual practice. I quickly become habituated, and the hunger is less then, but the hunger is always present. Having identified a wrong thought, or eidos, one that says I should eat when I am hungry, I can work on removing that thought, or replacing it with the behavior to only eat on schedule, but the schedule is also leaving me with a ongoing low hunger. One of the common causes of low hunger is a stress re-feed issue; stress causes adrenaline and cortisol release, which drives glucose release... and then is followed by hunger. I question the stress of life that I experienced daily growing up under that pair of control freaks. That is likely why I found QC environment to be so free of stress. It was not, but it was less than I grew up under. Oh well.

Knowing what to do is tough; there is so much miss information and wrong information; all with some logic and story. It is just choose one and go with it, or is there some try it and see how it goes method of choosing. It is all to difficult. The other way is to choose, not on what is right, but by what we can do. Base the plan on my previous and current doings, bad grammar and all. That brings doing, knowing, and planing closer together.  Oh well, it is only for a few years anyway at most and then I will be dead... Life is so impermanent. As are governments, thankfully.

So is it change or suspension of behavior that I seek; It seems to me that change should be easier in the doing and more or less permanent. In the past I know that I take on diets like a job, something to just be done. That is obviously, well maybe, just suspension of behavior. After it was over, the weight just came back, but slower... so there was some changes, longer term. Or was the doing just a habit that operated like an environmental control... no food, no eating. Is it the doing that establishes the habit, or is it the change in thinking, ideas, eidos, concepts, attitude, or knowledge that separates change from suspension of behaviors, and thus effects a change in the knowing/doing situation.

Socrates or one of this elk said that man does not knowing do wrong, but some of us drop into an automatic mode when eating, where thinking is mostly bypassed. It is that mode that allows us to operate equipment efficiently, or for some to type fast... there is no thinking, just doing. That is the way I am when eating. Oh well, in the end we all just die anyway.

Fatal Attraction.

Not Yet Fatal Attraction... to food. It has not yet killed me, but it is making life miserable.So is the attraction to food something we can escape from?

Is free will, morality, and choice real or a illusion? Sam Harris thinks free will is not what we think it is. The Stoics realized that free will was not entirely free, it was only for the things up to us. So if food addiction is real, as it seems to be, how does one escape the grasp? Religion seems to have a partial answer, but religion is based on lies, so those who are susceptible to lies have an out. But what about those of us who reject religion, and try to rely on reality?

Some things are up to me and some are not. OK. But how does one resits the ongoing desire to eat in the presence of food? That is the reality.

Plato had his concept of knowledge. There is the object, our opinion of the object, and that is a low form of knowledge. There are concepts, eidos, that we learn about, that are eternal, unchanging, and real. There is also fiction, that masquerade as concepts; no these are concepts, just not real ones. Gods are just fiction concepts. It is part of thinking, all handling concepts, eidos, some of which are real and some which are not. Simple. It is all eidos or concepts. Oh well. Where does this leave us.

Free will and will power are just concepts, eidos. Each person has various amounts and that varies on the subject. Food, I have little free will to choose, for I was trained at an early age, second nature, epigenetic, what ever. Memory and understanding are two separate facilities, which are overrun by habit, also a separate facility. That is the problem, so what is the fix?

Dangerous Foods

From the view of a person trying to eat less, there are dangerous foods. These are foods that make us more hungry after we eat them than we were before. We should also include high calorie low nutrition foods as well.

Let me first say that this effect may not be universal, and it is not rational. But I can assure you that the effect is real for some of us. It has been suggested that it is an insulin generation issue, but for me this is also true of some fats, proteins, meats, and other assorted foods. Most foods as a mater of fact.

Food is intended to reduce hunger, or so reason suggests. So when it does not? 

Resolve Stress Eating

How does one resolve stress eating?  There is a variety of advice out there on the net. None of it worked well for me.

First I must say that the stress we feel is not about the situation but our thinking about the situation. Second that some things are up to us and some are not. This allows us to step back from the situation that is outside of us, and let the situation go. It is all in my mind.

When I was testing soil, self employed, I would take a cone penetrometer worth $13000, and shove it into the ground, sometimes 20 metres, then withdraw it to measure soil strength. That induced considerable stress in me, for if it was loss or damaged, it was at my expense. I have the same concern stress over many things. Oh well, it is what I think, how I value money, and equipment. It is not about the situation, but my thinking about the situation. I was not in control; I was at the mercy of fate, for the lack of a better word.  That feeling was the same over much less valuable situations as well.

So to deal with stress, we can remove ourselves from the situation, or change our thinking. The situations that we are ignorant of do not cause us stress, yet they go on.  Perhaps we just need to stop caring about the situation, or just realize that the situation has nothing to do with us... and everything to do with our, my thinking about the situation.

So I need to change my thinking.

Stress Hunger

A short choppy look in the rear view.

Stress creates hunger. When we are hungry, we tend to eat. Eating leads to obesity. Eating when stressed leads to obesity. Well for some. I was taught to eat when hungry, and stress, or my reaction to the situation was relieved by eating. Therefore I ate most of the time from age 6 to 18 when I left the home I grew up in, and that habit continued. I was raised to be farm labor. That was what I saw as my reason for existence, and that is what I was told. Not a nice outlook. My main objective was to come of age so that I could leave. I had no plan for the future beyond leaving. I knew what I did not want to do, but not what I wanted to do. Is there any doubt as to why I rate "family" so low in my priorities?

So I found a job, and another, and another, then I lit in one, where I liked the work, and became comfortable enough to realize I need education, and they helped me get started on my way. The selection was made on the basis of elimination and cost. Not on skill, desired, or interest, but on what was available. That was just before electronics, computers, and technology radically changed the world we live in.

But stress has been a constant, or my reaction to the changing situation, the desire to eat. It is just stress, but eating has always been the way that I dealt with that feeling. I have always felt pushed to do more, to learn more, to desire more. I grew up harnessing horse for light jobs, through the calculator time, computer, satellite phones, cell phones, to what we have today. The Fax has come and gone. Change and pressure to change has been considerable, and my reaction was to eat or want to eat in response to the changing situation, and I reluctantly went along, but my reaction remained. I never really saw the stress until I realized that many people just live their life without any desire to grow in productivity, or improvement, like I was trained to do, aka create a situation that demanded performance, and induce stress is myself.

And my reaction to any situation I find stressing is to eat or want to eat due to what I interpret as hunger. It was not until recently that I could see this clearly. So the real problem is my reaction to the situation, and my interpretation as hunger. Obesity is the end result. But we can cut the cycle at the situation stage, or at my reaction stage.   

One More Cause

There is something about beliefs that we grow up with, and never question, that drive us like nothing else. Most of us are liberal, somewhat. There is a issue with labels, for it is each issue that needs the label, not the entire person. Some of our concepts are liberal, once we move to a society, we as a species became liberal and progressive; we always were adaptive. Some of these liberal attitudes take us too far, then we need to cut off that concept, back up the damage, and revise.

One such concept that I gathered from others is that I should never be hungry. This is problematic for me because I seem to be hungry all the time. Buddha said that "life is suffering."  This can be translated as unsatisfactory, problematic, painful, discomfort, from physical and emotional pain, stress, chaos, life in general. Hunger is just one more of those things. Is it all about learning to live hungry? Here is the first noble truth.

Unsatisfied is our natural state. We are a liberal species. The discomfort I feel is a result of my thinking about the subject, not the situation or condition. The cause are my delusion about what life should be and my expectations of what life should be. It is my thinking that is the problem, something that I did not learn as small child. I was taught to develop expectations and now need to understand that what I was taught was just wrong. It is all about our individual thinking. Much of it is just wrong, and when I considered this, one line at a time, one concept at a time, it becomes clear: life is suffering caused by my thinking. It is not the situation, but my thinking about the situation. Here is the second noble truth.

There is a solution, and that is the third noble truth. I can develop a "grateful martyr" attitude, all the while knowing that it is just a thought defense. It is a struggle to go against society predominant idea or situation, even when it is wrong. Oh well, we live until we die, and are no more. Nothing lasts. Impermanence. Change. Birth - life - death cycle, and from the remains of our spices, the next may come... or not.

The solution is to follow a plan, and ignore the discomfort, because the discomfort is from my thinking about the problem, not the actual problem. There may also be some minor discomfort from the actual problem, but this is beyond my control... but could eat... and that is the other problem... so I must choose the lesser weevil... or for the grammar police evil. Essentially, this is the fourth noble step, but the plan is a specific part of the eight fold path. Here endith the lesson for today.

Exposure on/in blogging

Thanks Val, you got me thinking about exposure.

I am not thinking about some of the there possible meanings of exposure, as the Greeks and our Amerinatives did to the newborns, for a bit of time, if they survived, they tended to them, and only the tough survived... I am thinking of exposing ourselves to the net, but fully clothed, for all to take a run at our ideas.

First we need to have an idea, and to express the idea, and have a second real human read, understand, and acknowledge the idea as real, valuable and worth considering. If they agree, already, it is just a yha, ok. Nothing further. It is only when they oppose the idea strongly that there is any comment. Even then, with the opposed, so many times, it is just "idiot", as I do with the religious, flat earth, political, and contrarians. I could well imaging if one of those locked on for any reason, and I became a target. I might need to ignore the internet for a while. I feel sorry, no pissed off at those who do this, but also realize that I could, for a bit, but then the "why bother" would set in and I would be off to my next crusade.

The next thought about this is how much of the traffic is real humans and not bots of some type, either scanning for something or looking for a place to "lay eggs" or drop little virtues. There is no way to know. If we assume that all these peak from one source are bots, then I have few that are real people. Oh well, I write because it helps me, not others. It does not matter.

Sticking to a topic may also help. I think that I have offended people over the years by some of my statements, atheist, political, environments, a-religious, etc. Too bad, reality sucks. We all have our causes, and our own reality. I doubt that the Muslims are comfortable on my sites, for 'there is no god' has been stated more than once. I also am a nihilist...depending on the definition, well there is no purpose other to produce the next generation, and we do that too well now. There is no meaning... there never was... but we can paint on a purpose and we are off to the races... no meaning required. But I digress from my food/overeating issues, which few know anything about. And I have not found a solution that really works yet. I expect there is a multitude of causes... and different treatments work for different causes... yet there is one more, that I have not explored yet.  I know this because there is still a problem.

I expect that there is some physical cause, and the only solution is not eating and learning to live hungry while surrounded with food. Such is life.

To Blog or Not TO Blog

The blog-a-sphere is shrinking. I have been blogging irregularly now for eight years and sporadically since 2006 spring, but the service provider I first used is gone, along with the first four years of posts. It does not matter. I blog primarily as a outlet, I often do not know the answer until I express it, and my memory is getting so bad; rereading a post is an new experience. Somebody said something like every author remembers ever word they have written. I do not. 

Many of the old bloggers die off, or just suddenly stop. There last post is just there last post. We have no further information. I assume they died off or similar event, and did not just stop blogging. It does not matter.... we all die off in the end.

I miss the comments though, and the though provoking statement, some of which we know are wrong... but which concept is wrong, and which are the same effect, just expressed in such different terms that it is not recognizable as being the same. Religions are likely the first coping systems, but nobody calls them that. They are group delusions, well yes, with many fanciful concepts, but in reality, they are all just coping systems... oh well, in the end we all just die anyway.

The traffic has diminished to the point that I can say anything without drawing fire, yet, as blogging is also a coping method, it does not matter. I get an audience, perhaps it is only bot clicks, but it does not matter. I have been able to express what I need to say to my imaginary friend that read this blog. It does not matter, it is just a coping mechanism, like religion. And after, I feel better, or not, it does not matter.

Sometimes I read something that I take for information, if it fits with what I already believe, or I let it go as fiction. Some will be held in abeyance until I forget it, it does not matter.  

Life is Suffering

Buddha said it. Life is suffering. Perhaps a bit of overstatement, but for sure life contains suffering. It is a bitch to be on a diet, hungry and all around us is food, good food. So perhaps it is not overstatement but reality; life is suffering.

All religions are coping mechanism, something to do and think to avoid thinking about the more unpleasant reality of now. Overpopulation. Pollution of our atmosphere, our waste exhaled carbon dioxide, and the waste of ever oxidation process that we depend on, and the earth scrubs the atmosphere, but has not been able to keep up since 1960 or about then. Oh well. in the end we all die. Death. Other unpleasantness. Overstatement can be a form of negative visualization, or we can use positive visualization rather than reality. Both are, well, self deception.

Buddha said the cause was delusion, aversions, expectations, and the like. The Stoics said some things are up to us and some are not, and provided a list of things that are up to us, our opinions, our beliefs, our thoughts, our motivations. It is those vary things when wrong that cause us suffering... more or less. Buddha gave us a prescriptive method of getting on with life, while the stoics provided an objective coarse out of the dilemmas. Both work, just do it verse build a plan and then do it. Both allow time to pass, the situation can change or not, and in the end we just die anyway. Depressing or freeing, I will chose freeing, for it is all about living until we die. Nothing more. Pass on information to the next generation, create the next generation. There will be a sixth extinctions. Will humans survive?

Yes, our beliefs are up to us. We have the power of assent too or rejection of any proposition. It all can be reduced to a series of propositions to assent too or reject. The problem arises when we are young and assent too something that is wrong, often religion, because we are told to, not because it is right. We base everything after that on what we believe, and is pushed onto us in our youth. We, as adults, need to clean our beliefs of all wrong concepts. That is the responsibility of becoming adult and taking responsibility for our selves. The computers do not make that easy to do; the generations growing up with computers and too much information will have the big problems. Oh well.

The only thing that can "save the human race", long term, is population control; a world wide one child policy. The population will age and die off, but the young will be enough to keep things going, more or less, and know that one child policy is required to maintain earth, until the Co2 level returns to below 300 ppm. But it does not matter, the earth will survive after man is gone... be it super-humans, germs, or nothings... or the next random survivors of sixth extinction. It does not mater, I will not be here. And if I cannot stop eating, it will not be long.

Inandof Itself

Aristotle suggest that diet (things) must be enjoyed for there own sake, not for what they might bring. He termed this "in and of" itself. Inandof itself becomes a term that is the first derivative of change, while weight change is the integration over time. It is the diet that we must come to like, not the effect if we are to be successful over time. And yet my body screams for sugar, and proteins.   

Which causes which?

https://paleodiabetic.com/2018/09/04/tighter-blood-pressure-control-may-reduce-age-related-memory-loss-how-low/

Are they more active with less memory loss, and that reduces the low blood pressure, or are the more active because they feel better with low blood pressure, and feel better, and that reduces the memory loss?

This may all be concurrent issues like metabolic syndrome.

 

What controls Hunger?

 It takes a vet to answer that one. My opinion of th medical profession keeps going down. They are good at dealing with only what they know.

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2018/09/insulin-makes-you-hungry-7-superoxide.html

Yah, But

tsthewooo.blogspot.com/2018/07/the-strawman-cih-is-not-supported-by.html

There is one underlying issue here. The only way to lose weight is to eat less than we are currently eating, somehow.

I am not convinced that obesity/overeating is not a mental defect like religion. It is part tradition and part not understanding that beliefs are separate from facts and reality.

What would be the effect of redefining for yourself what hunger is. Consider the light hunger/could eat hunger. If I were to ignore this and wait until I had that miserable hunger in the gut, then eat a few "grains of rice", and that were the standard of our society, I would not have a weight problem. I am suggesting that the weight issue is a society problem, at least within a subset of society. Eat, eat, is the cry of grandmothers. And advertising. And of mothers, well some mothers, certainly where I was raised. Is overeating just an ingrained mental defect? Like religion.

Will redefining hunger really work? The only way to know is to test the concept.

Finally, and yet...

From Dr. Sharma:

Psychological or Hedonic Factors

In contrast to hyperphagia resulting from physical hunger, over‐eating for emotional reward or as a coping strategy is regulated by the hedonic system and has little to do with the body’s real or perceived need for calories. The range of psychological or emotional factors that can initiate and influence eating encompass virtually the entire range of emotional responses including stress, frustration, loneliness, anxiety, anger, disgust, fear, grief, joy, relief, all of which can significantly alter dietary restraint or promote disinhibition. Typically, hedonic hyperphagia is associated with the selection and consumption of highly palatable energy‐dense ‘comfort’ foods, although homeostatic hyperphagia also tends to be associated with the preferential consumption of palatable foods.

In addition to simple ‘emotional’ over‐eating, specific psychiatric conditions that affect food intake or can pose important barriers to maintaining a healthy diet must be considered. Increased appetite is a feature of atypical depression and can be interpreted as ‘self‐medicating’ with food – particularly in cases where these foods affect the serotonergic and reward systems to improve mood. Binge eating, night eating and other abnormal eating behaviours must also be seen in the context of underlying emotional or psychological processes that are distinct from homeostatic ingestive behaviour. Other mental health conditions that can significantly affect eating include attention deficit disorders, post‐traumatic stress syndrome, sleep disorders, chronic pain, anxiety disorders, addictions, seasonal affective disorder and cognitive disorders. Particularly sleep deprivation has been associated with increased appetite and ingestion of highly palatable snacks as well as increased risk for diabetes. Patients with obesity resulting from emotional eating or hedonic hyperphagia are most likely to benefit more from psychological and/or psychiatric interventions rather than simply from dietary counselling.

http://www.drsharma.ca/factors-that-can-affect-ingestive-behaviour-psychological-or-hedonic-factors

yet after separating and finding hedonic overeating, there is no public funded treatment in Alberta.

A diet zealot

A diet zealot: well that must be one who sticks to a diet, regardless of all else. It is one solution.

The zealot does not need a rational reason, they can just latch on and do it, it being a diet with little food, or specific food. Consider a kibble diet, as has been suggested. Boring. Economical. High fiber. adequate protein. As we have no need or low need of carbohydrate, and the purpose is to get us to burn our own fat, there is little need for either of those ingredients. That sounds to me like the steak diet.

I once knew a lady, I use that term loosely, who weighted or measured every morsel, exercise yes, no time for actual work of value. She did fund raising for charity as a way of generating revenue for herself, and a bit made it to the charity. She drove a new Cadillac, annual lease, and had a life style, and dressing style, very expensive, and it was all at the charity expense. Oh well. Well in addition to the food there were protein shakes, and odd coloured shakes, and many little pills. And she claimed to be living a healthy lifestyle. Looking back, I now see her as a sociopath, but it is all history now.

There was the anorexic girl who dried to to guide the obese in weight loss, the obese who are in the process of losing, but never become stable, either weight wise or mentally. Oh well.

There are the sociologist who never had a weight problem, and does not like most foods, and her advice rolls off her tongue, directly from the "good food guide" or similar approved guide.  Yet it leaves some of us hungry and unsatisfied. That is why we cycle.

There are a bunch of deep cycling men, 100 pound losses plus, and we all have stability issues, and live a cycle. Oh well. It is easier to lose that to be stable. That is the essence of the problem. We like food. That simple. Oh well. It is time to go onto a losing cycle.

So what does all this data say? https://www.atheistrev.com/2018/06/collecting-data-for-your-atheist-blog.html

If we actually say something new, exciting, wonderful and god forbid "useful" will others read and understand and use it, or if they are not in the mind state to receive and understand "it" what is one to do? As a atheist, occasionally we must acknowledge our evolution to where we are today with near meaningless phrases like "god forbid". (or should that be "god forbid.")

It is often not about what we say, who we know or where we are listed, it is often just about what we get from saying it.



    

Eating Disorder

And one more theory of why: thewooo.blogspot.com/2018/06/dopamine-system-abnormalizes-in-obesity.html

A Moral Solution

Overeating is a bitch of a problem with many causes. The solution is a moral choice to not eat, and learn to live hungry. Moral means : concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character. It is doubtful if many people overeat intentionally, and for overeating to be a moral problem, that would need to be the case; therefore, overeating is not a moral problem, but the solution is a moral solution. But the only solution is to willfully not eat, or to willfully follow a food budget of some kind. That is the moral thing to do. There is a space between moral and immoral. That is where overeating for any of the many reasons falls.

That space between moral and immoral is the wild human space, the natural response zone, the untrained zone. There was a time when humans naturally did not have this fight, before electronics, mass two way communication, before we learned we had choices about how and where to live. I knew as a child I could not be happy as an adult in the desolate and savage life that I was born into, and knew that I had to leave, the sooner the better. That discontent may have been part of the food issue. Oh well.  

Overeating is the base problem of obesity, to beat obesity, one must first beat overeating.  Then, over time, the weight issue corrects itself. Well, that is the theory anyway.

When we examine the lives of those who have beaten overeating, we find find people who are strict with their food intake; some weight and/or measure every morsel, every taste. If it is not a scheduled time, all food is rejected. Some are so prickly rigid.  .  .   Those ripe berries are not picked, or picked and saved for the next meal, not picked and eaten. That single first asparagus spear will remain untasted until it becomes part of a meal. It is a way of life, not yet my life, that must come by moral choice. It is the choice, the response, that is moral, not the reaction to a physical desire, the craving, the hunger. The problem is not moral, the best solution is the most moral behavior.

Recovery from overeating is a difficult process, not well understood by those involved, those that suffer, nor those who try to help. It is not a single path to victory. It is not a clear path to victory... or even what victory look like. Some of the people are just miserable in recovery, for the lack of a better word. They are miserable to be around, and are best just avoided. Some of us recognize this fact, and try to isolate ourselves. Some of us are just uncomfortable all the time. Oh well, that is our nature, like Sisyphus rolling his bolder, we do not want to talk about it, but it would be nice if we can remain happy, satisfied, and enjoy life.

  

Causes of Overeating

In discussion, the question was asked. Here is a regurgitation the groups of " the causes of overeating" more or less:

Physical: A catch group for numerous mixed problems with a physical component. The subject may need to learn to live hungry, never being satisfied, always craving, if they wish to remain normal weight. Also note that hunger is normal on any weight loss diet. Hunger may (will) continue unabated for some, life becomes learning to live hungry.

Chemical: Chemical in the foods are providing a chemical addiction feed back loop. Foods containing trace amounts of opioids or proteins that break to opioid peptides. Think wheat as gladin proteins, and casein proteins as found in dairy products. Identify and remove the foods will help.

Emotional: Common, but often not recognized and becomes habit or deep conditioned. Overeating as a cooping method for a bad situation. This is an internal reaction to a real issue. The overeating may become habit, addiction, or epigenetic.

Environmental: The conditions imposed on the over-eater are extreme and are causing the overeating as a reaction/cooping method. These must be removed and then the overeating can be dealt with. It may have become habit, addiction, or epigenetic.

Willful: This is a moral / mental problem, and is likely a reaction to poor parenting, conditions, or other problems.

Addiction: This is usually chemical but may become habit, deep conditioning, or epigenetic. Remove the food, and then deal with the other issues. Addiction can also occur to the act of overeating, and to other chemicals, both in the food and internally produced. It can be similar to a "runners high", an adrenaline rush, serotonin high, or dopamine high. Insulin and sugar together provide a relaxing affect to some. Others just crave more food.

Habit, deep conditioned or epigenetic: These final states are not true causes, but are what the food issue has become through life. The only way to overcome these are my reconditioning to a small consistent diet, but that will be resisted by society and current life style habits. An life makeover may be required, a life of busy enjoyable activity, away from food... whatever that may actually look like. 
 

Please note that these are not firm nor scientific, but rather discussion based divisions.

Sarah Hallberg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da1vvigy5tQ

Is food addiction real?

Short answer is yes, by all accounts, and by my experience.

What does one do about it? That is not so easy. First, how much background needs to be included in any description of treatment, and followup? Let us start with the followup. One cannot return to the same environment that one became addicted in. That will logically result in failure and re-addiction. Yet we need to return home, or to a new home.

Much of addiction is about behavior, so we need to change our behavior. But if we do not live alone, we may require change in the behavior of others living in the same environment. We, I, cannot sit and watch TV with food adds, next to a person who munches all evening. A choice is required. But the choices are not convenient. So what would a solution look like?

Is the CIA Taxing Drug Lords?

Speculation:

Is the CIA taxing drug lords to generate additional revenue? It would not do to take down a taxed drug lord. Is that the real difficulty in fighting the drug business?

So what is next? Life?

So now coffee will have a warning label but not glyphosate?

http://www.grubstreet.com/2018/03/california-judge-rules-coffee-must-carry-cancer-warning.html

Life is one of the prerequisites of life, so perhaps life should have a warning label. As Seneca said, why weep for parts of life when all of it calls for tears? Of course that was his final day, as the state had him terminated. Oh well, he was a voluminous author.

So the standard for medical testing efficiency is better than a placebo. Now how about a drug that has three times the suicides, and when the suicides are removed from the data, the results are about equal to the placebo results. Should the drug be approved? It was, and is heavily pushed by doctors.  

addiction, food addiction

https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2018/3/5/17080470/addiction-opioids-moral-blame-choices-medication-crutches-philosophy

So food addiction is blind, deaf and driven. So some foods digest into opioid peptides and that is what drives food addiction. Back to beef and cabbage I guess.

There are a few good lines in this one:

“wanting system,” which regulates our cravings for things like food, sex, and drugs using signals based in the neurotransmitter dopamine. The wanting system has powerful control over behavior, and its cravings are insensitive to long-term consequences.  

His behavior is being controlled by a part of his mind that is not his true self.

addictive behavior is often initiated and maintained by the purposes it serves in someone’s life, often as self-medication for physical or psychological trauma. Nor am I saying that addictive behavior is compulsive, irresistible,

it lies somewhere in between choice and compulsion.

She is just faced with cravings that are far harder to resist.

but that she is unable to use this understanding to control her behavior

If the source of addiction is overly strong automatic cravings

The charioteer, Reason, tries his best to guide the chariot along the road of virtue. But his horse, Appetite, is stubborn, “deaf as a post” and may gallop off the road at any moment. “Chariot-driving in our case,” Plato concludes, “is inevitably a painfully difficult business.” If we take that to heart, maybe we will start giving the addicted what they need to get their lives back under control.

So there is no solution offered.... other than just do it and suffer the rest of your life. 

Objectivism

Ayn Rand addressed long held beliefs of the US society and questioned them, abused them, and in the end turned some of them on their head. She was not a nice person. Some was part her, some was her first language thinking does not politely translate into a diplomatic conservation. She did not back down, and was often quite correct in her assessment. 

She beat altruism into the ground, and established that self interest is the best foundation for moral conduct, that and not making slaves of others or allowing us to make slaves of ourselves. Her morality stands up to Aristotle, the Stoics, Buddhist, Confucius, and beats our familiar Christian by a long stretch. It is rationally derived from reason, perceptions, self-interest and similar foundations.

It appears that some of our long held beliefs in regard to live, food, and similar are OCD tough, and are just wrong. So once we (I) understand and correct these misconception, will the problem reduce. So note this foolery going on, and ask, "how much of this bullshit is there in real life?", and conclude, enough to cause all sorts of problems. And statins, the crap the drug companies peddle.

And then there the silent scream of climate sciences. We cannot engineer ourselves out of that problem. It is too late. I expect that some of the obesity problem is climate change. We humans have a issue with overeating when we are tired. We get tired as we run out of oxygen, and as Co2 goes up, we get tired. So at 300, we were ok, 400 not so much. There is a correlation, but is there causation?    

Relationships

Is there a relationship between the religion/philosophy and the general overeating issue we have in Canada/US? Being an atheist, I have kicked the supernatural parts, but is there still other values/concepts/behaviors that are part of the problem?

So the greatest vice we can have is allowing our mind to become unfocused. This implies that we should always be on. Well, how about when we are doing repetitive jobs? Yes. That is mindfulness. Thinking about what is important. OK. Thinking not eating. What is the digest thief of mindfulness? TV, radio, electronic background noise. Split attention.

So it take effort to stay focused.

Now how about all the virtues that we have been sold by religion. Altruism for example. Ayn Rand makes a good case for abandoning much of altruism. The highest value to my life is life it's self. That is not in doubt, so putting others in front of me is not right in traffic, for if I have the right of way, I should take it. I have seen others waste my time by giving up there right of way, and wasting my time. It is unsafe to proceed in front of a goof ball. So what is one to do? Objectitism, my objective is to live well myself, and let others take care of themselves. Do not allow slavery, or be part of being a slave. It is not right to give up the right of doing, nor to allow others to walk over me. I am the most important person to myself. If I do not look out for myself, who will?

So down with altruism, it is up to me to produce, and not be part of using others nor allowing me to be used... much. Enough. 

OCD Disinformation

https://www.harleytherapy.co.uk/counselling/managing-obsessive-compulsive-disorder-ocd.htm

A person with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) experiences irrational thoughts which create high levels of anxiety. They then engage in compulsive behaviours to gain temporary relief from these anxious feelings.

Wrong.  A high level of anxiety exist in the youth for whatever reason, a behavior reduces that anxiety, and that behavior becomes the compulsion. If the stress remains, obsession, wrong thinking remains, and it becomes a disorder when the non intended consequence become a problem.

I grew up isolated and mostly alone in a rural setting. My social skills were essentially non existent. At that time, we children were taken/sent to school in the spring for a few weeks before starting in grade one in the fall. As a child I was small, and when I went to school the first time, I was picked at. I vowed to grow big and end that, so I started eating, with the idea that if I ate, I would grow big, and could then beat up on my teasers/abusers. By grade one picture, I was obese, and still being picked at/on. The stress remained. The eating was OCD by then. I remained obese, or on a severe diet the remainder of my life, well until now anyway. 

Conventional wisdom holds:   "Cognitive-behavioral therapy is a treatment for OCD that uses two scientifically based techniques to change a person’s behavior and thoughts: exposure and response prevention (ERP) and cognitive therapy. CBT is conducted by a cognitive-behavioral therapist who has special training in treating OCD."  But there is a second treatment that when done is effective, well, as long as one does the treatment and that is the Schwartz method, which is more of a management of the problem method. The problem just keeps coming back, Schwartz is not a cure, but is an effective method of management. In that way, I can die with the issue, but not die of the issue, just as long as I have the motivation to do the method. With food it is not easy, as food is everywhere, and others keep pushing it in front of me. So that explains why I like to be a recluse.

Redirection is a big part of the treatment. We must keep busy doing other things. In the AA twelve step process, they provide many activities to keep on busy, all the while avoiding alcohol. Mind you, their whole program is based on the concept of a god, and some of us find that repulsive, as we know that religions also depend on gods, which there is absolute no evidence of.

So what is the solution? Perhaps to hold the body in a philosophy of stewardship.  We provide for it's needs, not for it's wants and keep it busy. The problem of body's desires, or lack of desire to do is a separate problem. Motivation or more likely, the lack of motivation is a big problem for everybody. Well, in the end we all just die anyway.



 

Is Obesity a Moral Failing

Many people say yes. Many of the medical profession seem to hold that opinion. All the obese need do is eat less, and there problem will go away. Bullshit is the only logical response.

Obesity is a miserable existence in many ways. It is less miserable than going through life with hunger and/or cravings that never go away. Many obese effectively choose to deep cycle, live with sufficient food to relieve the hunger/cravings, and then diet hard, fast, starve for a period of time. What else can we do? Many of us obese suffer from uncontrolled hunger and/or cravings that never go away.

I was recently at a "Ethics discussion", which resembled more one person stating the why's of atheistic morals, with the inference that his view was correct with "enlightened self interest" as the foundation. That is ok for him, but I doubt that the foundation for most people. We recently saw a Pew Research that showed a majority of religious people held their view because they want to be or though of as "good people", whatever that may be. I think that I believe closer to the Stoic like, that it is always right to do right, and that I desire to do right, because that is the way I was taught... there is that learned behavior part. The big question is what do we think "right" might be.

The Stoic natural life by virtue, with the cardinal virtues, prudence or self control, wisdom, courage and justice, without future hope, or past regret, in the now of today without guilt is appealing. If there is wrong done, it is not by me. Virtue is the primary good, vice the primary evil, and everything else indifferents. Knowing that the path to personal happiness and inner peace is through extinguishing all desires to have or affect things beyond ones control; and, through living in the present without hope for or fear of the future; beyond the power of opinions of others is also appealing.

It is like the question some seniors face, with the lost of motivation. Is it a loss of motivation, or just loss of need, loss of desire, or the realization that nobody but us cares anyway? Or why should we care what a nasty thinks. What about those who do things that just aggravate others, and just turn nasty if anything is said. It comes down the expected response is just nasty, why care? A bad relationship may be less valuable than no relationship. That need some more consideration.

So perhaps there is a big portion of self interest in any any decision we make, without much enlightened in the self interest. But under the cover of all this is an unspoken concept that our beliefs are right, without regard to reality, and all the obese needs to do is stop eating for a period of time. People are slow to change their opinions, if ever, and most of those opinions are biased or just wrong. Oh well, in the end we all just die anyway, even in an overpopulated world.

Ah, the new year

Once again we are in the season of diet commercials, and food company, and chain restaurants adds. Soon it will be roll up the rim. Oh well, in the end we all just die anyway. So we are being picked at for overeating enough to become fat, and at the same time pestered to eat more. Well at least there is Youtube that is clear of food adds... well sometimes.

So what is there for us old low energy people to do in the winter? Well we can study and learn something more that has little value in the real world, but it can keep us busy. We can evaluate our society, and find it lacking or economically unsustainable, but that is not of concern, because we will shuffle off this mortal coil before we plunge into the economic abyss, iff (if and only if) the rate of growth holds steady at the current rate of acceleration. Sounds like Hubble'c constant of economics. And then all life will end as the universe over the visual horizon in planer existence, so space, unlike the earth is flat. Ah yes. That is iff the climate change or Co2 rise does not get us first. It is a bleak outlook knowing the truth, something that the religious are unwilling to look at, for that would demonstrate there wholly books are wrong, or wronger. (or should that be holly books).

Judge not lest you be judged. But judgement is how we make decisions, so is it some judgements or all that they recommend we do not do? Without judgement, one cannot question. Without questioning, we would be submissive followers of the book. Not that is not correct, judge and leave the idiots behind. They have the right to live as they wish, as long as they do not interfere with how other want to live. Ah but any 'true' christian will tell you that the bible is right and gays have no rights, but that is imposing their beliefs on others, and that is wrong at a fundamental level. So there will always be conflict with christians, and muslims, and most religions. But all religions have this fundamentally wrong attitude... except for the buddhists who do not prothletise, you have to go to them or their books. 

The buddhists say right knowledge, but never get around to saying what that is. The Stoic`s provide  the tools to determine what is right and what is not, based on a few underlying and stated assumptions. And those who do not agree with the underlying assumptions can do as they like, but the Stoic system had so many solutions worked out... and those with family wealth and/or power were not happy, because the Stoics reasoned that power required servants or slaves, someone who feared or respected the powerful, and the Stoics saw the solution, no servitude, no fear, and respect to those who earned and maintained respect, not respect for a title. The true Stoic could not be cohered, but had to be lead by actions of the leader.

At the root was natural laws of freedom and equality, but with compassion for the downtrodden. Not forgives, but compassion and justice for all. The Stoics understand some things are up to us and some are not; we should not be held responsible for things that are not up to us, but we are responsible for what is within our control, but we must be ready to bring back into our control what we can. We have the right to walk away from bad actors and those who are yappy, have personalities of rusty buzz saws, and other forms of assholes. We may also choose to hang on them, for even assholes have uses.