Omnivores Dilemma Extra Credit Part 1

Chapter 1:

At the beginning of this chapter, supermarkets are compared from back then, until now, briefly. We move on to the questions "what should I eat? " being related to "what am I eating?" and " where did it come from?" These are things we don't necessarily think about when we are out grocery shopping or even just buying ourselves something quick to eat. From there we go on to read about what everything really is, were it all "started" you can say. Corn, is the "the great edifice of variety and choice" in an American supermarket. We learn that corn is what feeds what we eat such as chickens and steer and pigs and turkey,even the salmon. So pretty much everything we eat is corn. It is as though we are having "corn over corn"
Now what about if there was no more corn? What other resource can we use that will make pretty much everything that we eat? I for one did not know that corn was in pretty much everything that we consume, even in our drinks. I'm guessing that most people don't know this either. Some people read the back label, but i doubt they really focus on the fact that everything has some sort of corn in it. If they did,would that even change the way we see things, or our eating habits? i don't believe so.

Chapter 2:

Farming has changed over time. It went from going out and plowing, to either one or two farmers driving trucks and producing more crops. Due to this change, the soil is worsening, causing it to damage to a point of no repair, because of this farmers need even more land. As stated in chapter one, corn is one of the main plants grown, since everything we eat has corn.
The farmers fertilize their lands, which is only affecting the world in a negative way.
" The ultimate fate of the nitrates that George Naylor spreads on his cornfield in Iowa is to slow down the Mississippi,into the Gulf of Mexico,where their deadly fertility poisons the marine ecosystem.....By fertilizing the world, we alter the plants composition of species and shrink biodiversity."
We know that farmers nowadays want to be able to do all their work the fastest way possible, even if this means that it will cause a negative reaction. Fertilization is not a good thing, even though it might make a fast or easier way of farming, are the risks actually worth it? What if we go back to how farming was done back then? will we be able to adjust back to that after so many years with the new technology? I think farmers would think its is not in their best interest to change the way things are being done.

Chapter 3:

Corn gets piled onto the ground, and if necessary just railed down. America is being compared with Mexico and the way the corn is pick. Showing that we do things in a fast manner, trying to get the job done in the fastest way possible. We got back to the idea of corn being in all our products. These products taste less like the actual corn. For us it seems to be quantity over quality with more than just corn. We can see this in the farmers, trying to get the most possible crops, instead of the best tasting. In our daily lives this is a problem as well. We want to have so much of something for the wrong reasons.
What is we started changing the way we think, the fact that quantity comes before quality? Would the change of QUALITY over quantity, affect the amount available of lest say,corn? How would we get affected by this if at all?