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Around where I live: Architecture, Parks, Nightlife, Food, Wildlife! Freight Car Art

An unusually good design on a wagon that transported grain from the prairies.

rail_art_img_2630_lu_small_by_tricky_trees-dagi8wo.jpg

Cheers, Mike.
 
Who is the Devil in the picture? Perhaps the most famous rendition of Sympathy for the Devil was by the Rolling Stones at the Altamont concert. My version of the Devil is Ansel Keys, a charismatic scientist responsible for some good work on nutrition but also for bad research that led directly to nutritional recommendations in multiple countries about their relevance to heart disease. Although you can read about him briefly in Wikipedia, if you're really interested, read Nina Teicholz's book (referred to in the Wikipedia entry) that provides the most comprehensive review of information.

Keys propagated an hypothesis that that a diet low in animal fat protected against heart disease and that a diet high in animal fats led to heart disease. Acceptance of this hypothesis by physicians, disease prevention agencies, nutritionists, governments and big business likely led to suffering that included the loss of hundreds of millions of life years across the world during the past half-century. It wasn't that Keys was an evil man, just a very smart and persuasive scientist who got it wrong, wasn't ever prepared to admit it, and was skilled enough to co-opt followers and fight off all opponents. Hannah Arendt's proposition of the 'banality of evil' made sense about the Holocaust, but Keys exemplifies a charismatic side of wrong-doing that seduced generations of those who care for our health or profit from our ill-health. We, the poor victims of these machinations, are portrayed on the left side of the picture.

Who is the elephant? Why it's John Yudkin. Yudkin in 1972 wrote a book summarizing evidence that over-consumption of sugar greatly increased the incidence of coronary thrombosis, was certainly involved in dental caries, obesity, diabetes and liver disease, and possibly in gout, dyspepsia and some cancers. No reasonable scientist nowadays can doubt that Yudkin was right. Yet Keys fought off his rival, ridiculed his hypothesis and helped destroy his career. So the diminished elephant in the picture tries unsuccessfully to put out the fire stoked by the work of the Devil.
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Who is the Devil in the picture? Perhaps the most famous rendition of Sympathy for the Devil was by the Rolling Stones at the Altamont concert. My version of the Devil is Ansel Keys, a charismatic scientist responsible for some good work on nutrition but also for bad research that led directly to nutritional recommendations in multiple countries about their relevance to heart disease. Although you can read about him briefly in Wikipedia, if you're really interested, read Nina Teicholz's book (referred to in the Wikipedia entry) that provides the most comprehensive review of information.

Keys propagated an hypothesis that that a diet low in animal fat protected against heart disease and that a diet high in animal fats led to heart disease. Acceptance of this hypothesis by physicians, disease prevention agencies, nutritionists, governments and big business likely led to suffering that included the loss of hundreds of millions of life years across the world during the past half-century. It wasn't that Keys was an evil man, just a very smart and persuasive scientist who got it wrong, wasn't ever prepared to admit it, and was skilled enough to co-opt followers and fight off all opponents. Hannah Arendt's proposition of the 'banality of evil' made sense about the Holocaust, but Keys exemplifies a charismatic side of wrong-doing that seduced generations of those who care for our health or profit from our ill-health. We, the poor victims of these machinations, are portrayed on the left side of the picture.

Who is the elephant? Why it's John Yudkin. Yudkin in 1972 wrote a book summarizing evidence that over-consumption of sugar greatly increased the incidence of coronary thrombosis, was certainly involved in dental caries, obesity, diabetes and liver disease, and possibly in gout, dyspepsia and some cancers. No reasonable scientist nowadays can doubt that Yudkin was right. Yet Keys fought off his rival, ridiculed his hypothesis and helped destroy his career. So the diminished elephant in the picture tries unsuccessfully to put out the fire stoked by the work of the Devil.

Then, who are the humans?
; )
 
Then, who are the humans?
; )

Hi Nicholas. The beige figure with brown hair to the left of the Devil symbolizes the human collective:).
Of course, this is just one of many variants on a David and Golliath story told and retold many times. In this example, though, Goliath 'slew' David during their battle, with the latter beginning to emerge victorious only decades later.

Of course, the artist that painted this picture never envisioned such an interpretation. I wonder if any specific symbolism was in his or her mind. And why do I suspect that the artist was a bright, technically skilled but not necessarily young man, with the painting done in daylight? Does anyone here know anything about rail car artists and the reaction of railway companies to them? It must be expensive to paint over graffiti on a regular basis.
 
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