Toronto’s Poop-Themed Restaurant Defies Human Psychology

New York Magazine:

There are plenty of things in this world that I think are cute, but that doesn’t mean I want to eat them. Kittens — snuggly, sure. Tasty? I really don’t want to find out. Ditto for baby elephants. And, for that matter, baby humans. I even think that big-eyed poop emoji is kind of adorable, in a weird way; I also do not feel, nor have I ever felt, the urge to go make myself a crap sandwich.

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There are many reasons why the whole concept feels like a terrible idea, and one of them is this: When it comes to disgust, humans are not rational beings. In a 1986 study that seems tailor-made for this very situation, psychologist Paul Rozin offered volunteers a piece of chocolate fudge that had been molded to look like a piece of dog poop. Overwhelmingly, they passed, choosing instead to eat a piece that, as one Guardian column has described it, “less closely resembled what all food eventually becomes.”

Read the whole story: New York Magazine