Empathy begins the process of connecting us with others, as we share their emotions. Our own life experience enables us to understand something of the life experience of others. That emotional understanding is the distinction we call empathy: “. . . the capacity to share the feelings of others . . .” “Empathy is a complex capability enabling individuals to…
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Value for Tuesday of Week 09 in the season of Sowing
Satisfaction
Satisfaction of material needs is preferable to want/deprivation.
- When a man’s stomach is full it makes no difference whether he is rich or poor. [attributed to Euripides]
- May the roof over your head always be strong. [Irish blessing]
- If all the needs are unsatisfied, and the organism is then dominated by the physiological needs, all other needs may become simply non-existent or be pushed into the background. It is then fair to characterize the whole organism by saying simply that it is hungry, for consciousness is almost completely preempted by hunger. All capacities are put into the service of hunger-satisfaction, and the organization of these capacities is almost entirely determined by the one purpose of satisfying hunger. [Abraham Maslow, “A Theory of Human Motivation” (1943).]
- If the physiological needs are relatively well gratified, there then emerges a new set of needs, which we may categorize roughly as the safety needs. All that has been said of the physiological needs is equally true, although in lesser degree, of these desires. The organism may equally well be wholly dominated by them. They may serve as the almost exclusive organizers of behavior, recruiting all the capacities of the organism in their service, and we may then fairly describe the whole organism as a safety-seeking mechanism. [Ibid.]
The point seems obvious: adequate nutrition and hydration – food and water – are essential to sustain life. The most familiar list of our material needs and wants cites food, clothing and shelter. We can consider these both through satisfaction and through its opposite, want. Satisfaction of each of these basic desires also brings pleasure, which we will consider in the next section.
Most fundamental is hydration. Without enough water, a human being will die within a few days. Fatal dehydration can result from fever, exertional heat illness, gastroenteritis, norovirus illnesses and other pathologies.
Adequate nutrition from food is essential to brain development, physical growth, health and happiness. An entire field of science has grown up around the subjects of nutrition, nutritional epidemiology (on the relationship between nutrition and disease), government policy and nutrition research. Criteria have been developed for adequate nutrition in children. Malnutrition causes heart disease, cognitive deficits, stunted physical growth, protein deficiency, anemia, hypertension, diabetes, childhood tuberculosis, and dementia and other geriatric syndromes in Alzheimer’s patients. Malnutrition in childhood appears to cause obesity in adulthood. A refeeding syndrome can develop when previously malnourished individuals resume nutrition. Displaced peoples are especially susceptible to malnutrition. Nutrition science ranges in scope “From Molecules to Populations”.
Shelter from nature’s harsh elements can be essential to survival. For many people, an igloo, a hut or a log cabin was essential to survival. In more developed environments, homelessness is associated with poor health, though adverse health effects may be due to factors besides lack of shelter itself. Lack of shelter can lead to injuries due to exposure to cold, and exposure to heat. Public health and housing is a public policy concern. Particular attention is devoted to housing for children. Home foreclosure appears to have numerous adverse health consequences.
We humans – naked apes – are the only species to make and wear clothes. Lacking fur, we use clothing to protect the skin and prevent skin cancer, quite apart from the widespread taboos associated in with nudity. Clothing serves as an interactive barrier during exercise. Protective clothing is essential for healthcare workers, firefighters, military personnel and police officers, industrial workers, astronauts, and athletes such as football players. Of course, a vast fashion industry has grown up around clothing, and professions such as teaching, law and clergy rely on clothing for status and authority. But then, the culinary arts go far beyond nutrition.
Because we humans are social creatures, the company of others is also a basic need for most of us. Companionship with other people buffers against illness, and promotes mental health. Loneliness can contribute to early death. Many people find satisfactory companionship with non-human animals. I will discuss this more fully in a later section on companionship.
Satisfaction of our basic needs and wants nurtures us, making health possible, and facilitating pleasure, happiness, fulfillment and longevity. Because it is essential to life itself, it is not amenable to analysis along the domains of Being.
Real
True Narratives
Narratives about food as a life necessity:
- Lizzie Collingham, The Taste of War: World War II and the Battle for Food (The Penguin Press, 2012): an account of what happens when a life necessity is hard to come by.
- Mark Bittman, Animal, Vegetable, Junk: A History of Food, from Sustainable to Suicidal (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021): “. . . a comprehensive treatise on humanity’s relationship to food . . .”
Narratives about shelter (housing):
- Norbert Schoenauer, 6,000 Years of Housing (W.W. Norton & Co., 2000).
- Satoshi Baba, Economic History of Cities and Housing (Springer, 2017).
Technical and Analytical Readings
Abraham Maslow, “A Theory of Human Motivation” (1943) proposes that human needs are built in the mind like a pyramid, with physiological needs at the base, followed up the pyramid by safety and security, love and belonging, self-esteem, and self-actualization. “Anticipating later evolutionary views of human motivation and cognition, Maslow viewed human motives as based in innate and universal predispositions.” Satisfaction of basic needs is the base of the pyramid.
On food, hunger and starvation:
- Robyn E. Cutright, The Story of Food in the Human Past: How What We Ate Made Us Who We Are (University of Alabama Press, 2021).
- Steven Shapin, Eating and Being: A History of Ideas about Our Food and Ourselves (University of Chicago Press, 2024).
- Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft & Merry White, Ways of Eating: Exploring Food through History and Culture (University of California Press, 2023).
- E.M. Young, Food and Development (Routledge, 2012).
- Ancel Keys, Josef Brozek & Austin Henschel, The Biology of Human Starvation: Volume I; Volume II (1950).
- Raymond Tallis, Hunger: The Art of Living (Routledge, 2014).
- John R. Butterly & Jack Shepherd, Hunger: The Biology and Politics of Starvation (Dartmouth College Press, 2010).
- Paul Robinson, Finn Skårderud & Bente Sommerfeldt, Hunger: Mentalization-based Treatments for Eating Disorders (Springer, 2019).
- Thomas Marchione, ed., Scaling Up Scaling Down: Overcoming Malnutrition in Developing Countries (Routledge, 2013).
- Joyee Goswami Vachani, Failure to Thrive and Malnutrition: A Practical, Evidence-Based Clinical Guide (Springer, 2023).
- David E. Sahn, ed., The Fight Against Hunger and Malnutrition: The Role of Food, Agriculture, and Targeted Policies (Oxford University Press, 2015).
- Jennifer Tappan, The Riddle of Malnutrition: The Long Arc of Biomedical and Public Health Interventions in Uganda (Ohio University Press, 2017).
- Raghav Gaiha, Raghbendra Jha & Vani S Kulkarni, eds., Diets, Malnutrition, and Disease: The Indian Experience (Oxford University Press, 2014).
- Robert Coles, Still Hungry in America (1969).
- Alitta Kullman, Hunger for Connection: Finding Meaning in Eating Disorders (Routledge, 2018).
On shelter (housing):
- Gregg Colburn & Clayton Page Aldern, Homelessness is a Housing Problem: How Structural Factors Explain U.S. Patterns (University of California Press, 2022).
- Katrin B. Anacker, Housing in the United States (Routledge, 2024).
- Katrin B. Anacker, Mai Thi Nguyen & David P. Varady, eds., The Routledge Handbook of Housing Policy and Planning (Routledge, 2019).
- Sean McNelis, Making Progress in Housing: A Framework for Collaborative Research (Routledge, 2014).
Photographs
Documentary and Educational Films
Imaginary
Fictional Narratives
Poetry
Wherever you fall, maize, / whether into the / splendid pot of partridge, or among / country beans, you light up / the meal and lend it / your virginal flavor.
Oh, to bite into / the steaming ear beside the sea / of distant song and deepest waltz. / To boil you / as your aroma / spreads through / blue sierras.
But is there / no end / to your treasure?
In chalky, barren lands / bordered / by the sea, along / the rocky Chilean coast, / at times
only your radiance / reaches the empty / table of the miner.
Your light, your cornmeal, your hope / pervades America's solitudes, / and to hunger
your lances / are enemy legions.
Within your husks, / like gentle kernels, / our sober provincial / children's hearts were nurtured, / until life began / to shuck us from the ear.
[Pablo Neruda, from “Ode to Maize”]
Other poems:
- Pablo Neruda, “Ode to Salt”
Music: Composers, artists, and major works
Compositions:
- Kurt Weill, Der Silbersee (The Silver Lake): Ein Wintermarchen (A Winter's Tale) (1933) (approx. 105-120’) (recordings), is a musical drama about two hungry gravediggers who rob a grocery store.
Albums:
- Rabih Abou-Khalil, “Hungry People” (2012) (56’) is a humorous musical essay on food.
Music: songs and other short pieces
Visual Arts
- Vincent van Gogh, An Old Man Putting Dry Rice on the Hearth (1881)
- Jean-Francois Millet, The Gleaners (1857)
Shadow side:
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