MBlume comments on Enjoying food more: a case study in third options - Less Wrong

20 Post author: MBlume 16 March 2011 06:23AM

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Comment author: Zvi 16 March 2011 08:06:08PM 7 points [-]

I heartily endorse eating better food, including making trade-offs with time and/or money to do so. There can be little doubt that there's a trade-off between long term health and hedonic value of food as well, but certainly most of us are not at the frontier.

I would recommend also:

Step four: Be willing to throw food away.

A lot of people attach strong negative emotions to throwing away food, even if the food is no longer worth eating. Some of it is pure sunk costs, but often it goes beyond that and many people look upon it as a moral issue, or that it means somehow taking food away from someone else who needs it. It isn't one, and you're not.

Comment author: MBlume 16 March 2011 09:40:52PM 2 points [-]

Step four: Be willing to throw food away.

Excellent point -- I can't think of a way to move away from the hedons/health frontier faster than by feeling obligated to eat food you don't even want anymore.

Comment author: jmmcd 16 March 2011 09:57:16PM 1 point [-]

I agree with Swimmer963 -- my quite strongly enforced rule not to throw food out nudges me to buy less and waste less. In fact I think it's quite similar to the way that your rules 2 and 3 nudge the brain to make better decisions.