Am reading a book on nutrition, called Healing with Whole Food. What attracted me to this book is that it propose to introduce side by side theories from traditional Chinese medicine and modern Western molecular-biology based nutrition science. Very interesting concept, but in reality as in this book, sometimes the two make uneasy bedfellows. I've only read about 25 pages, and feels the book is uneven so far.

The author came come from the Chinese medicine background, and I was initially impressed by the hefty number of references to scientific journals. But when he suggested that we can "renew" our genes and remove their "negative programming," which he probably meant to consciously change our genomes, I was slightly concerned. Also, one of his argument against genetically modified food: vegetarians will be "horrified" to learn that there might be animal DNA in the plant they eat! The horror, the horror. . . . And his next argument quotes that eminent expert on nutrition: Charles, Prince of Wales.

Perhaps all these years of science education has jaded me, but I was left very dissatisfied with the author's amateurish scientific musings and rote recitations of journals. But still, he does a service by introducing some principles and sound advices about nutrition. I still hope to see a good synthesis of Western and traditional Chinese system some day, but it would take someone who is very well-versed in both sides, and this author is rather lacking at least in the Western science side.