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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: March 21st, 2025

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  • I was surprised by so many brands now being owned by US giant Simplot.

    Birds Eye – Frozen vegetables, frozen fish, frozen meals, hot chips

    Edgell – Canned vegetables, frozen vegetables, beans, corn, hot chips

    Leggo’s – Pasta sauces, tomato paste, pasta, cooking sauces (featured in the doco)

    John West – Canned tuna, salmon, canned seafood, frozen seafood

    Chiko – Chiko Rolls and frozen snack foods

    Harvest – Shelf-stable meals, canned meals, cooking ingredients

    I&J – Frozen seafood

    Captain’s Catch – Frozen seafood

    Chicken Tonight – Cooking sauces

    Raguletto – Pasta sauces and pasta products

    Five Brothers – Pasta sauces

    Seakist – Canned tuna and seafood

    Ally – Canned seafood

    Providore d’Italia – Italian-style sauces

    Top Sail – Seafood products

    And then this guff on the Simplot website: “ Our products have to be Australian sourced. Customers want to see that we are supporting the Australian business.” hmmm
















  • I read an interesting book called “How Emotions are Made” by Lisa Barrett which talks about how emotions are created by the brain - they’re not things you have; they’re things you make and they’re influenced by culture, your past experiences, and what your body is experiencing right now.

    There was a few key takeaways (this is generated by GPT bc it does a better job at summarising).

    Core Argument: Barrett argues that emotions are not hardwired, universal reactions to the world. Instead, they are constructed by our brains, much like perceptions or thoughts.

    Key Concepts:

    1. The Classical View vs. The Theory of Constructed Emotion
    • Classical View: Emotions like anger, fear, sadness, etc., are innate, universal, and triggered automatically by specific stimuli.
    • Barrett’s Theory: Emotions are not universal biological responses, but rather concepts constructed by the brain using past experiences, cultural knowledge, and context.
    1. The Brain Predicts, Not Reacts
    • The brain is a prediction machine, constantly guessing what will happen next based on past experiences.
    • Emotions are predictions your brain makes to make sense of bodily sensations in context.
    1. Concepts and Language Shape Emotion
    • We learn emotional concepts from our environment, especially through language.
    • Your culture gives you the emotional categories that your brain uses to construct experiences (e.g., some cultures have words for emotions we don’t name in English).
    • What people feel and how they express emotions is shaped more by gender norms and socialization than by biological sex. For example: Women are often encouraged to express vulnerability or sadness. Men are often encouraged to express anger but discouraged from showing fear or sadness.
    • These differences are learned, not biologically programmed.
    1. Emotions are not hardwired or universal
    • There is no specific brain region for each emotion.
    • Physiological responses (like heart rate) vary widely even within the same emotion category.
    1. Interoception: The Basis of Emotion
    • Emotions begin with interoception—your brain’s perception of internal bodily states (like hunger, fatigue, or arousal).
    • Your brain interprets these signals based on context and past experience and labels them as an emotion.

    Practical Takeaways:

    • You can reshape your emotional experiences by:
    • Learning new emotion concepts.
    • Becoming more aware of your bodily sensations (interoception).
    • Expanding your emotional vocabulary (“emotional granularity”).
    • Emotional intelligence involves managing predictions, not just reactions.

    Barrett’s theory reframes emotion as a highly individual and cultural phenomenon, shaped by your brain’s predictions, concepts, and social context—not a universal biological blueprint.

    —

    I went down a whole rabbit whole of “your brain is a prediction machine” after this and it was super cool.