Species co-evolve with the other species they eat, and very often, a relationship of interdependence develops: I'll feed you if you spread around my genes. A gradual process of mutual adaptation transforms something like an apple or a squash into a nutritious and tasty food for a hungry animal.

The astounding variety of foods on offer in the modern supermarket obscures the fact that the actual number of species in the modern diet is shrinking. For reasons of economics, the food industry prefers to tease its myriad processed offerings from a tiny group of plant species, corn and soybeans chief among them.

A program to make municipal composting of food and yard waste mandatory and then distributing the compost free to area farmers would shrink America's garbage heap, cut the need for irrigation and fossil-fuel fertilizers in agriculture, and improve the nutritional quality of the American diet.

To the extent we push meat a little bit to the side and move vegetables to the center of our diet, we're also going to be a lot healthier.

I think cooking is really key because it's the only way you're going to take back control of your diet from the corporations who want to cook for us. The fact is, so far, corporations don't cook that well. They tend to use too much salt, fat, and sugar - much more than you would ever use at home.

In addition to contributing to erosion, pollution, food poisoning, and the dead zone, corn requires huge amounts of fossil fuel - it takes a half gallon of fossil fuel to produce a bushel of corn.

Meat is a mighty contributor to climate change and other environmental problems. The amount of meat we're eating is one of the leading causes of climate change. It's as important as the kind of car you drive - whether you eat meat a lot or how much meat you eat.

People in Slow Food understand that food is an environmental issue.

Every major food company now has an organic division. There's more capital going into organic agriculture than ever before.

I probably spend more on food than a lot of people, and I feel good about the whole food chain I'm supporting when I'm doing it. But even I have to remind myself. I'm always complaining about the prices at the farmer's market.

Soon after the inauguration, the Obamas gave Big Food a case of heartburn when, in the spring of 2009, Michelle Obama planted an organic vegetable garden on the White House lawn, a symbolic but nevertheless powerful act that thrilled the food movement.

We now eat at the end of a very long and opaque food chain. Food comes to us ready-made in packages that obscure as much information as they reveal.

Eat all the junk food you want - as long as you cook it yourself. That way, it'll be less junky, and you won't eat it every day because it's a lot of work.

There is nothing wrong with eating sweets, fried foods, pastries, even drinking soda every now and then, but food manufacturers have made eating these formerly expensive and hard-to-make treats so cheap and easy that we're eating them every day.

French cooking is really the result of peasants figuring out how to extract flavor from pedestrian ingredients. So most of the food that we think of as elite didn't start out that way.

The first step in reforming appetite is going from processed food to real food. Then, if you can afford organic or grass-fed, fantastic. But the first step is moving from processed industrial food to the real thing.

Perhaps more than any other, the food industry is very sensitive to consumer demand.

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. That, more or less, is the short answer to the supposedly incredibly complicated and confusing question of what we humans should eat in order to be maximally healthy.

Barbecue is an incredibly democratic food. It's cheaper than McDonald's in many places and far more delicious. On the other hand, the only reason it can be that cheap is they use commodity hogs, the worst of the worst, which is - you know, it's an industry kind of ruining North Carolina.

Even if you don't think you can cook well, you can cook better than the food industry.

You gotta understand, there are two different kinds of Asians - the kind who are good at school, obey their parents, go to college - that kind of stuff. And then you have my family - me, my brother, all of my cousins - we're just wretched people.

I think people just think I am crazy because they see me doing stand-up, but I am generally not. I am very sad. I'm one of those guys that lights candles and listens to Rachmaninoff.

I know I can get laughs anywhere, in front of any crowd, if I'm given the chance.

When I found stand-up, it was like finding home.

I grew up in a single-wide, three-bedroom mobile home with my family. And now I see them, like, half a dozen times a year. Figuring out how to come home and talk to them again and feel like myself has probably been the greatest challenge.

This is an old family secret, and I just found this out recently, and it almost broke my heart. My mother said to me, 'I had never told you this, but God, you were an ugly baby'.

I have never been so calculating as to sing some Barry White song to get a girl. But I do think it's very romantic to cook dinner and sit around the piano at night and sing together.

I also find it interesting that a lot of people in their 30s are not married and don't have kids. There are a lot of people in this age bracket that are out there dating and trying to find love. And I never thought that at my age I would be.

I wanted to do a show about a family that is absolutely black. Because as Du Bois has shown, we do have to live a double consciousness every day in the world. We have to walk our path and walk the mainstream path, and there's never really been a show that's talked about what that's like.

I don't necessarily believe that 'The Cosby Show' should disappear as a cultural reference, but it is. That's sad to me. I understand why. He was a man who possibly did some really bad things, and he should be punished beyond a doubt. But that show, and the impact it had not just on black culture, but culture, was amazing.

Jill Soloway is a friend of mine. She does 'Transparent,' and she's amazingly funny and brilliant and bright. And I love her show.

The thing that I get so often with network comedies - and, I think, some of the most brilliant people in the world do them - but it's easy to hide behind a joke. I kind of feel like when you have to face things, and you don't have humor, it becomes very vulnerable; it exposes your deepest and darkest fears in some aspects.

I consider myself a disciple of Norman Lear. And one of the things he did was topic-driven humor.

Comedy used to be a vehicle for change. Now, comedy has gotten to this quirky, nonsensical place, which I enjoy. But I do think there is room for discussion-based humor. We can tell those stories in a way that feels edifying.

Howie Mandel is my favorite. He's so friendly, and he's a family man. For a lot of celebrities, to keep a genuineness about them, I think, can be tough, but he really seems to work hard to do that.

When I was in college, I was in the theater department, which for anyone who has been involved in any kind of theater program, you know that it's really wacky and tight-knit, a real family. Me and my good friends from college would do random shows and plays that were sometimes serious, but most of the time really goofy and funny.

I am a really quiet person. I just like to be with my children and my family and being home. I live one day at a time, enjoying the best of life, just living.

The harder I train every day on the track and in the gym, the more trust I gain in myself.

Fashion is a real passion in my family. I never even realised it was something glamorous until much later. For me, it was my family's job.

I saw a photo of a Christian Lacroix couture dress when I was in my teens and decided right then that that's how I wanted to look on my wedding day. In my mind, that's what angels looked like.

I loved everything about my wedding look, but, in retrospect, I would have changed the position of where we attached the veil on my head. Make sure you test a few different placements and styles before the big day to make a clear vision and plan with your hairstylist.

It's always fun to visit multiple locations on one trip, but I think it also really depends on the ages of those on holiday. As a child, I loved spending time in one vacation spot, getting attached to the location, becoming comfortable, and feeling as though I were at home. This is something I would like for my children to experience.

The disgraces I suffer should be attributed to me, but the praises that I get go to my family and teachers. It is they who decided what I would become.

The creation of God itself, I deduced, came from our primal fear.

Happiness is perhaps painlessness, a state one rarely appreciates. Happiness, then, is very much like a great talent. It rarely gets appreciated and is taken for granted.

I cannot live on myths; somehow, science convinces me more easily. I am prone to lean towards science, ethics, and philosophy rather than myth, religion, and rituals.

Tell me, when do you become a respectable person in society? When you start respecting yourself. That is when you take care of yourself, that is when you comb your hair, groom yourself, and cleanse your body. You do all this because you respect yourself.

I write the occasional poem. I think my dabbling in poetry makes me better at screenplays. Poetry teaches the value of condensing, the importance of talking in a few words.

A political party is about an ideology. And I don't think my goals in politics can match the ideology of any political party.

You must have anger, as rightful wrath is what makes you create your own ethical standards.