[Solidsnape]

Maia Irraz, on 21 August 2012 - 01:46 PM, said:

Solidsnape, on 21 August 2012 - 01:30 PM, said:

Funny, but I've come to think of my Coeliacs disease as a kind of sign of what you just said.
I bet wheat, gluten, soya and lactose intolerance wasn't very common pre-civilisation.
Does that mean it will get more common and we're ultimately heading towards a future where all of us will be unable to consume these things like Gluten and lactose?
Are the main food groups of antiquity to become obsolete?

Bring on the Rice!!!!!

Not to sound snarky - because I also tend to think that food allergies are on the rise, though maybe not as prevalent as we'd think - but how do we know that people in pre-industrial times didn't have lactose / wheat / gluten allergies? Medical science wasn't exactly cutting-edge back then, what's to say that Mr. X's gastric troubles weren't actually caused by Coeliac's disease and not just a random illness? Coeliac's (which isn't a food allergy but an autoimmune disorder) was only properly identified at the end of the 19th century, after all, and humans have been consuming grains since the dawn of time, pretty much. I tend to think that allergies of this type have always been around, it's just that we hear about them more frequently these days so we think they're more common.

Anyway! Random aside over, I wanted to add that I checked out that site and I found it really sad. Fat shaming is nothing new but I fail to see how a site like that could motivate anyone to lose weight; to me it came off as hurtful and insulting more than anything else. Full disclosure - I've never been overweight but my parents are and my mother especially gets upset / angry when she feels like she's been targeted or made fun of. She doesn't have a thyroid condition and she doesn't overeat, her issue is that she's not active enough and she's getting older (late 60's) so losing weight is harder. She is consciously and actively trying to slim down, mostly for health reasons, and I'd be willing to bet that a site like that wouldn't help her one bit.

Yeah I know it's an auto immune disease and not an allergy, I also totally agree with what you said about science not being able to diagnose allergies at the time.
My question was, do you think that this is the case? Or not?
I don't know either way, I just found it interesting that the thread was going into evolution territory and that maybe there is some things changing in our bodies and maybe they are allergies and dietary diseases and the like.
I know that the few thousand or so years that we've been around wheat isn't an especially long time in evolutionary terms, but we've seen things evolve in a shorter time.
Maybe our digestive systems are still evolving to suit our new world/needs.
Of course, what do I know?

Anyone want some metal cut?

[gulex]

Maia Irraz, on 21 August 2012 - 01:46 PM, said:

Solidsnape, on 21 August 2012 - 01:30 PM, said:

Funny, but I've come to think of my Coeliacs disease as a kind of sign of what you just said.
I bet wheat, gluten, soya and lactose intolerance wasn't very common pre-civilisation.
Does that mean it will get more common and we're ultimately heading towards a future where all of us will be unable to consume these things like Gluten and lactose?
Are the main food groups of antiquity to become obsolete?

Bring on the Rice!!!!!

Not to sound snarky - because I also tend to think that food allergies are on the rise, though maybe not as prevalent as we'd think - but how do we know that people in pre-industrial times didn't have lactose / wheat / gluten allergies? Medical science wasn't exactly cutting-edge back then, what's to say that Mr. X's gastric troubles weren't actually caused by Coeliac's disease and not just a random illness? Coeliac's (which isn't a food allergy but an autoimmune disorder) was only properly identified at the end of the 19th century, after all, and humans have been consuming grains since the dawn of time, pretty much. I tend to think that allergies of this type have always been around, it's just that we hear about them more frequently these days so we think they're more common.

Anyway! Random aside over, I wanted to add that I checked out that site and I found it really sad. Fat shaming is nothing new but I fail to see how a site like that could motivate anyone to lose weight; to me it came off as hurtful and insulting more than anything else. Full disclosure - I've never been overweight but my parents are and my mother especially gets upset / angry when she feels like she's been targeted or made fun of. She doesn't have a thyroid condition and she doesn't overeat, her issue is that she's not active enough and she's getting older (late 60's) so losing weight is harder. She is consciously and actively trying to slim down, mostly for health reasons, and I'd be willing to bet that a site like that wouldn't help her one bit.

Not to be pedantic - but grains have 'only' been consumed for roughly the last 10.000 years a tiny fraction of human history and the main reason why we probably cannot handle it hormonally or biochemically. By the way i also know several people who are overweight and cannot seem to lose it even though they do everything they can by conventional standards. I dont mean to be intrusive - but has your mother tried a low carb diet? i am almost 100% sure this would fix her problem. Its not odd for some overweight people to experience an inability to lose weight. I think it is because your mother - like many other people - are overly sensitive to insulin. Any carbohydrate she eats will be converted into fat right away.
I know there are alot of diets and opinions on diets out there - and everyone claims to have a solution - but i really hope you'll consider low-carb (or your mother will in this case) it has worked for extraordinarily many people. Check out this side, if you want: http://www.dietdoctor.com/ its a pretty accessible introduction and i can almost guarantee you it'll work

Edit: Solidsnape - I recall reading somewhere that most anthropologists thought even the smallest genetic changes to take at least 60.000-100.000 years (i'll look it up) so it is highly unlikely that we have adapted. And the outrageous rates of diabetes, cancer an neurodegenerative diseases seems to me to be a testimony to this. A species eating the food it is genetically adapted to does not go blind, incapacitated (from diabetes) and mad (Alzheimer's)

This post has been edited by gulex: 21 August 2012 - 04:12 PM

[D'rek]

gulex, on 21 August 2012 - 03:50 PM, said:

Not to be pedantic - but grains have 'only' been consumed for roughly the last 10.000 years a tiny fraction of human history and the main reason why we probably cannot handle it hormonally or biochemically.

I don't find this argument very convincing. Apples have only been in North America since the 17th century, an even tinier fraction of human history, but every north-american-aboriginal person I've met hasn't had any trouble eating them.

Furthermore, your notion of "low-carb diets always work", even if true, is vastly simplified. At best, it is true but there are differences of proportion for different people, ie: person A could lose weight if they reduced their daily carbohydrate intake to 100 [unit]s but person B would have to reduce it to 10 [unit]s to lose any weight.

This post has been edited by D'rek: 21 August 2012 - 05:22 PM

[gulex]

D, on 21 August 2012 - 05:21 PM, said:

gulex, on 21 August 2012 - 03:50 PM, said:

Not to be pedantic - but grains have 'only' been consumed for roughly the last 10.000 years a tiny fraction of human history and the main reason why we probably cannot handle it hormonally or biochemically.

I don't find this argument very convincing. Apples have only been in North America since the 17th century, an even tinier fraction of human history, but every north-american-aboriginal person I've met hasn't had any trouble eating them.

Furthermore, your notion of "low-carb diets always work", even if true, is vastly simplified. At best, it is true but there are differences of proportion for different people, ie: person A could lose weight if they reduced their daily carbohydrate intake to 100 [unit]s but person B would have to reduce it to 10 [unit]s to lose any weight.

I dont find your counter argument very convincing. Native americans first came to North America cross the Bering Strait some 12.000 years ago meaning they have been without apples for roughly 11,500 years. Not nearly enough for genetic changes to occur. Processed grains on the other hand, were unavailable for 98% of the history of our species.
Even if we assumed (which there is no reason to) that native americans had had the time to 'lose' their genetic adaptation to apples it still, likely, wouldn't have happened since they would have had other fruits available for consumption with similar nutrient/carb content. Grains on the other hand - have a singularily high carbohydrate content.
I hope you'll take 2 minutes of your time to watch this - somewhat comical - illustration of it: http://www.youtube.c...h?v=v8WA5wcaHp4

Regarding the neccesary customization of a low carbohydrate diet you are very correct. People tolerate carbohydrates differently to some degree - ie some persons will tend to store glucose as muscle glucogen whereas other people will tend to store it as fat. Likewise different degrees of metabolic damage will require different degrees of dietary intervention. Ie a person who is very metabolically damaged will probably have to stay in a ketotic range for the rest of his/her life (roughly 50 grams of carbohydrate a day or even less) Young people who haven't done the amount of damage to themselves that older generations did can probably also sustain themselves on larger amount of carbs without trouble. So yes, to some degree it will be different for everyone. But the variable to be tangled with remains the same: Carbohydrates.

This post has been edited by gulex: 21 August 2012 - 05:45 PM

[LadyMTL]

gulex, on 21 August 2012 - 03:50 PM, said:

Maia Irraz, on 21 August 2012 - 01:46 PM, said:

Solidsnape, on 21 August 2012 - 01:30 PM, said:

Funny, but I've come to think of my Coeliacs disease as a kind of sign of what you just said.
I bet wheat, gluten, soya and lactose intolerance wasn't very common pre-civilisation.
Does that mean it will get more common and we're ultimately heading towards a future where all of us will be unable to consume these things like Gluten and lactose?
Are the main food groups of antiquity to become obsolete?

Bring on the Rice!!!!!

Not to sound snarky - because I also tend to think that food allergies are on the rise, though maybe not as prevalent as we'd think - but how do we know that people in pre-industrial times didn't have lactose / wheat / gluten allergies? Medical science wasn't exactly cutting-edge back then, what's to say that Mr. X's gastric troubles weren't actually caused by Coeliac's disease and not just a random illness? Coeliac's (which isn't a food allergy but an autoimmune disorder) was only properly identified at the end of the 19th century, after all, and humans have been consuming grains since the dawn of time, pretty much. I tend to think that allergies of this type have always been around, it's just that we hear about them more frequently these days so we think they're more common.

Anyway! Random aside over, I wanted to add that I checked out that site and I found it really sad. Fat shaming is nothing new but I fail to see how a site like that could motivate anyone to lose weight; to me it came off as hurtful and insulting more than anything else. Full disclosure - I've never been overweight but my parents are and my mother especially gets upset / angry when she feels like she's been targeted or made fun of. She doesn't have a thyroid condition and she doesn't overeat, her issue is that she's not active enough and she's getting older (late 60's) so losing weight is harder. She is consciously and actively trying to slim down, mostly for health reasons, and I'd be willing to bet that a site like that wouldn't help her one bit.

Not to be pedantic - but grains have 'only' been consumed for roughly the last 10.000 years a tiny fraction of human history and the main reason why we probably cannot handle it hormonally or biochemically. By the way i also know several people who are overweight and cannot seem to lose it even though they do everything they can by conventional standards. I dont mean to be intrusive - but has your mother tried a low carb diet? i am almost 100% sure this would fix her problem. Its not odd for some overweight people to experience an inability to lose weight. I think it is because your mother - like many other people - are overly sensitive to insulin. Any carbohydrate she eats will be converted into fat right away.
I know there are alot of diets and opinions on diets out there - and everyone claims to have a solution - but i really hope you'll consider low-carb (or your mother will in this case) it has worked for extraordinarily many people. Check out this side, if you want: http://www.dietdoctor.com/ its a pretty accessible introduction and i can almost guarantee you it'll work

Actually, my mom is diabetic (type 2 so not on insulin) and she's tried most any diet you can think of. She's not obese but she could probably stand to lose about 20-25 pounds, I think. In general she doesn't eat a lot of carbs but I'll definitely forward the link. I myself have tried low carb but wasn't able to stick with it for very long...lack of willpower combined with a passion for warm, buttery croissants, lol. Thanks for the info!

This post has been edited by Maia Irraz: 21 August 2012 - 06:45 PM

[Macros]

This is why I hate dietary advice, everyone and their dog has a different opinion on what is the way forward etc.

If we haven't evolved at all then surely people living on diets that are pushed as healthy (for example lets say whole grain cereals for breakfast, an average lunch and an eveening meal of meat, veg and a side of something like rice) should be dead?

Eta, how long have we been cooking our food?
Should everything be consume raw? The evolutionary arguement seems flawed imo, it makes sense, but I think people under estimate animals ability to adapt in relatively short timescales (several thousand years, hundreds of generations?)

This post has been edited by Macros: 21 August 2012 - 11:19 PM

[gulex]

Macros, on 21 August 2012 - 11:12 PM, said:

This is why I hate dietary advice, everyone and their dog has a different opinion on what is the way forward etc.

If we haven't evolved at all then surely people living on diets that are pushed as healthy (for example lets say whole grain cereals for breakfast, an average lunch and an eveening meal of meat, veg and a side of something like rice) should be dead?

Eta, how long have we been cooking our food?
Should everything be consume raw? The evolutionary arguement seems flawed imo, it makes sense, but I think people under estimate animals ability to adapt in relatively short timescales (several thousand years, hundreds of generations?)

As you say the current diets pushed as healthy should be dead - and they are dying, however slowly. We are living in a time in which hundreds of Ph.Ds have earned their money and their degrees by saying 'consume less saturated fat and more complex carbohydrate' they dont like being told/discovering that the foundation of their careers is a lie - hence current dietary advice dies slowly. Whatmore, the guys making the food pyramids aren't scientists but big business (read agriculture) who then hires scientists sympathetic to their point of view. This is how it was invented in the first place.
The raw food argument, while associated with evolutionary nutrition, is largely a closed subgroup because their 'science' that supposedly shows the huge detriment of cooked food is dubious at best.

I really understand why people are super-skeptic about any dietary trend - but there is solid evidence that low-carb is the end of the line.
Regarding genetic adaptation you are severely overestimating the rate at which evolution occurs. We are still 99.X% (i dont remember the exact decimal) the same as our paleolithic ancestors, genetically. Also if we had adapted to grains it wouldn't cause us severe inflammation, we would have larger stomachs and smaller brains (like other herbivores - cows, horses etc) and we wouldn't be developing metabolic syndrom disorders from eating it. I have tried to look up the rate at which minute genetic adaptations occur - but i have so far been unable to find it. I recall reading somewhere that it was 50-60.000 years, but that could be wrong ofcourse.

This post has been edited by gulex: 22 August 2012 - 09:52 AM

[Morgoth]

I'm not going to dive into this considering how little knowledge about dietry science I have. However, I noticed somewhere above the mention of lactose intollerance as a growing phenomenon? That is wrong.

Lactose tolerance on the other hand is a relatively new development.

[Macros]

Gulex, what I meant was, the people on these diets would be dead.

But still, I'm not arguing that we aren't extremely similar to our ancestors, what I'm suggesting is, they could have handled this stuff just fine as well.

My take on the "rampant increase" on the allergic reactions front and other problems:

Medical science's advancement over the last 100 years has been astonishing.

So someone with a peanut allergy who would likely be dead at the drop of a hat now can cope with it and survive, because of the knowledge of the condition that exists, and the likes of those injections some severe cases carry around with them.
the same for soaring cancer rates, and other (I think this is the correct terminology) degenerative diseases (which are, iirc, actually caused by entirely too much generation) people are living a lot longer, and its like any machine, the longer it runs, the more likely something will go wrong.

I'm not saying evolution isn't a factor in what we can and can not handle, I'm saying people place too much emphasis on it as we really have no accurate idea of how much dietary problems and other conditions related to this topic were problems hundreds of years ago. Because people simply didn't know what was causing their problems, what their problems were or didn't live long enough to feel the problems.

Why do we cook food? to make it easier to break down.
Cooking foods alters how our bodies deal with it, so the larger stomach/ smaller brain argument is slightly sidestepped as the cooking makes our smaller stomachs far more efficient.
I'd argue that having the intelligence not only to cook the food, but acknowledge the fact that eating less therefore spending less time hunting/ gathering and eating was the evolutionary step that nullifies a lot of the "we weren't built for this shit" argument.
If cows could cook, would they spend all day chomping on grass?

[Macros]

nsfw, but one of his funnier bits from back in the day.

Just jumped into my head when Morgoth mentioned the lactose intolerance

[gulex]

Macros, on 22 August 2012 - 11:10 AM, said:

Gulex, what I meant was, the people on these diets would be dead.

But still, I'm not arguing that we aren't extremely similar to our ancestors, what I'm suggesting is, they could have handled this stuff just fine as well.

My take on the "rampant increase" on the allergic reactions front and other problems:

Medical science's advancement over the last 100 years has been astonishing.

So someone with a peanut allergy who would likely be dead at the drop of a hat now can cope with it and survive, because of the knowledge of the condition that exists, and the likes of those injections some severe cases carry around with them.
the same for soaring cancer rates, and other (I think this is the correct terminology) degenerative diseases (which are, iirc, actually caused by entirely too much generation) people are living a lot longer, and its like any machine, the longer it runs, the more likely something will go wrong.

I'm not saying evolution isn't a factor in what we can and can not handle, I'm saying people place too much emphasis on it as we really have no accurate idea of how much dietary problems and other conditions related to this topic were problems hundreds of years ago. Because people simply didn't know what was causing their problems, what their problems were or didn't live long enough to feel the problems.

Why do we cook food? to make it easier to break down.
Cooking foods alters how our bodies deal with it, so the larger stomach/ smaller brain argument is slightly sidestepped as the cooking makes our smaller stomachs far more efficient.
I'd argue that having the intelligence not only to cook the food, but acknowledge the fact that eating less therefore spending less time hunting/ gathering and eating was the evolutionary step that nullifies a lot of the "we weren't built for this shit" argument.
If cows could cook, would they spend all day chomping on grass?

Regarding diseases: here is what we do know: Maasai eating their traditional diets have virtually no cancer, diabetes, or neurodegenration. The Inuit eating their traditional diet hadn't either until we introduced processed carbohydrates (sugars, grains, beer) in fact, no culture eating its traditional (sugarless and often also grainless) diet had any of these diseases. This is a fundamental observation, how do we explain it? i'd say the evolutionary perspective on diet explains it.
My point here is that we know pre-industrial societies and especially pre-agricultural societies simply did not suffer from cancer, diabetes and neurodegeneration. They are diseases of civilization. Sure, we can hope that modern medicine will be able to nullify our intolerances to sugar and a high carb diet - but it is - and i dont like being this catagorical - a fact that we have said intolerances and it is close to fact that simple and complex carbohydrates are at the root of the diseases gripping modern man.

Regarding your cooking hypothesis you seem to imply that cooking somehow saved us time (or would save cows time lol) How should this be possible? . It is well established in anthropology that hunting/gathering was considerably less labour intensive than farming. It is therefore hypothesized that we were forced into the labour intensive and unhealthy practice of farming out of neccesity and not free will. In short, farming was time consuming not time saving.

I really hope you dont think that i'm trying to 'sell' anything here. I too used to be universally sceptic when it came to the question of diet. Looking into this, however, made me realise how it all fits together.
I'm probably not gonna be able to talk you into this: But i would urge you to watch Gary Taubes' lecture on youtube:
http://www.youtube.c...h?v=M6vpFV6Wkl4 he presents it much better than i do and then you'll have a better opportunity for judging by yourself. Its one and a half hours - but for something as critical as your life long health its surely a good investment. Even if you find that you do not believe him - then you'll at least feel certain that im wrong

This post has been edited by gulex: 22 August 2012 - 01:04 PM

[Morgoth]

I think you're making several assumptions here that you've not backed up by any evidence.

For instance, the Maasai and the Inuits, among a number of other tribal people, live lives so very different from ours diet can only be considered on of many factors that seperate their lives from ours. Do you have studies that show it is diet specifically that keep things like cancer low? If not I'm going to repeat the easily ignored phrase; "correlation does not equal causation".

As for hunting gathering being less labour intensive than farmiing, that's a very interesting claim and I wonder if you can back that up somehow. You might also want to consider the general access to food and how that differs between a farming society and a hunting/gathering one.

[Mrs Savagely Wishy Washy]

gulex, on 21 August 2012 - 12:35 PM, said:

The biochemical argument is almost as important: There are virtually no nutrition in grains and legumes per calorie compared to vegetables and fruits. They are high in carbs but low in vitamins and minerals compared to vegetables. Also grains and legumes (like cereals, beans, buckwheat etc) contains phytates - an antinutrient that homo sapiens have no enzyme to break down. These antinutrients binds themselves to magnesium, calcium, zinc and iron and prevents us from utilizing them - this is likely the cause of the widespread deficiencies these days.

Your biochemical argument is correct, but you are only telling one half of the story. Phytates are plant hormones involved among others in the regulation of germination, and beans are plant offspring, so to speak. As soon as the conditions for germination are appropriate, i.e. warmth, water, light, an enzyme will get activated called phytase.
This enzyme degrades the phytates/phytic acids, thus free resources for the seed to germinate, i.e. ions/minerals and phosphates for the seed to germinate and grow. That also applies to whole cereals, btw, however, taking the shell away from the corn gets rid of this problem with wheat, rye etc.
This particular fact reinforces my point that people should be educated about how to prepare and process food correctly. So in this case, all beans and lentils must be soaked in cold water for the phytase to become active and degrade phytates and make whatever is in the beans available to us as well. Hot or bioling water is bad because that kills of the phytase. Ideally, that's what should be done with cereals as well before they get processed into flour and then bread, or breakfast cereals etc. If it says something else on the packaging, they are idiots and don't trust anything they sell.

Certain amino acids also stimulate insulin secretion- so you won't get rid of insulin signalling completely by just eating fat and protein. Furthermore, insulin is also important in the development of tissues during embryogenesis and growth.

As for my non-existent point with movement: in my opinion, somebody who has to find wood for a fire, find food, carry water around, make a fire, prepare the food (butcher an animal, take the skin and prepare it to make leather, open nuts etc) moves definitely more than somebody who walks into Iceland, gets a frozen pizza, on the bus home munches on some chocolate bar or a bag of crisps, then puts the pizza in the oven, turns on the telly and 15 minutes later gets the pizza. Or doing laundry by hand. Or cleaning without a hover. Or taking care of lifestock.


The evolution of mankind and its diet is a hotly disputed topic. You'll find some theory or another that will appeal to your cause if you look long and hard enough. And whether Inuit, Massai or from any other civilisation and healthy or sick, we all got to die. One way or the other Hood will get us.


Edit, while I am at it:
http://www.princeton...e/S26/91/22K07/

Corn syrup, rats and weight gain.

And- does this guy to whose lecture you keep referring me to, have a vested interest in this topic?

This post has been edited by Miss Savage: 22 August 2012 - 07:05 PM

[Solidsnape]

Morgoth, on 22 August 2012 - 10:51 AM, said:

I'm not going to dive into this considering how little knowledge about dietry science I have. However, I noticed somewhere above the mention of lactose intollerance as a growing phenomenon? That is wrong.

Lactose tolerance on the other hand is a relatively new development.

Haha. That would be me.

[gulex]

Morgoth: What other factors would there be? the side on which they sleep during the night? There are two main factors possible diet and excercise through my earlier post i have already related how our modern diseases are propelled by our diet. A wrong diet would therefore be the obvious problem for modern day man.
source: http://www.ajcn.org/...t/81/2/341.full

Hunter gatherers expend no more energy than modern westerners
source: http://www.scienceco...to_theory-95568 (this is a summary of the papers conclusion the link to the actual paper is found at the bottom)
This also means that Maasai aren't expending much more/less energy than the average modern western person meaning that the excercise factor is not the cause of their superior health. The only variable left is their diet - which i have already linked sufficiently to cancer and diabetes to make perfect sense. Another hint at nutrition being the important factor is the fact that man became shorter and began to develop cavities immediatly after the invention of agriculture
source: http://beyondveg.com...l-1984-1a.shtml
Just in case you also think i'm making the cancer/diabetes/neurodegeneration link up
Source: http://enzimologia.f...Proc%202004.pdf
"[...] Accumulating evidence suggests that this mismatch between our modern diet and lifestyle and our paleolithic genome is playing a substantial role in the ongoing epidemics of obesity, hypertension, diabetes and athersclerotic cardiovascular disease." <- quotation from link. Note that Cordain authored this before serious research into ketotic diets and saturated fat was reinitiated therefore it is still biased against saturated fat. Loren Cordain has since aknowledged that saturated fat is healthy when consumed in conjunction with relatively few carbohydrates.

Quote

As for hunting gathering being less labour intensive than farmiing, that's a very interesting claim and i wonder if you can back that up somehow. You might also want to consider the general access to food and how that difers between a farming society and a hunting/gathering one.

It is not an 'interesting claim' it is a commonly agreed upon fact within prehistorical archaeology and anthropology - its like asking me to provide academic proof that night is darker than day. but i have provided backing nontheless.
Concerning the difference in food availability you'll probably be suprised: A leading hypothesis within prehistoric archaeology is that starvation was 'invented' with agriculture - since hunting was relatively easy and non-intensive while the invention of agriculture lead to the dawn of social elites who could monopolize the food supply but perhaps most importantly bad harvests would eventually happen and this would lead to mass-starvation. Also due to their reliance on a very few kinds of crops.
sources: I have tried to re-find my sources for this - but since most academic journals require payment to view i have only been able to find 'highschool-style information' + a wikipedia entry basically saying what i just said. But i doubt you'll be satisfied with that. You're gonna have to trust me on this particular point - and if you dont, please say so and i'll continue looking.

Do you feel i have more assumptions i need to back up? Or any inconsistencies within the theory that you would like to be backed up academically?


Edit:
Miss Savage:
Concerning grains you are, ofcourse, completely right. Soaking grains will take care of the biochemical problem - but do you dispute the endocrinological part of my argument? You remind me alot of the Western a. Price Foundation. Are you familiar with them? (http://www.westonaprice.org/)
The lecturer i keep refering to is a science journalist. He used to do articles/books on high particle phyisics in the late 80's and wrote a book concerning the 'bad science' of Cold Fusion - an idea within physics that was later abandoned due to - well i dont know. But it was abandoned and Taubes claims it was built on faulty science. Later he got interested in nutrition because he was told that the science there was 'so bad it was fascinating'. In short he didn't start out with a vested interest. Now he is making his name (and book sales) proponing low-carbohydrate diets and saying that 'Atkins was essentially right' so he is likely not completely impartial anymore.
The reason i like him is because he does what EVERY scientist should do - even in his lectures. He presents the observation (rampant obesity etc etc) and then proceeds to illustrate the 'mainstream' explanation and asks: Does the theory explain the observation? he claims it doesn't and proceeds to argue why and what would explain it better. He doesn't require you to trust him - he rarely says a sentence without reffering to this or that study showing this and that - Meaning you can dig them up and go them through in case you doubt him. He is now very 'cheered' by the American Lipid Association, various other lipidologists and especially endocrinologists (Like Robert Lustig) - all people who've been making the same arguments but without the coherence or vocality of Taubes.
His book 'Good Calories, Bad Calories' contains more than 150 pages of references and he has read practically everything on nutrition written since the late 19th century (Yes, more than one hundred years of data).

But instead of asking me - why dont you watch it? i understand it is alot of time to spend - but you obviously have an interest in nutrition. Dont take my word for it - for all i say, he could still be a fraudulent son of a ***** only thing that makes sense is judging for yourself.

This post has been edited by gulex: 22 August 2012 - 07:56 PM

[Macros]

A quick post from work, I won't likely have time to watch a one and a half hour video in the forseeable future, I'll just assume he knows what he's tapkig about and you aren't making stuff up.

But 2 things which I think you are patently wrong on.

1 you seek hung up on this idea that modern man is as physically active as days gone by.
He simply is not. Joe public gettig up, driving to work, sitting at his desk and driving home again to sit on the internet and watch TV does not expend as much energy as the poor bastard slaving in the cotton mill or flax fields of 200 years ago. Modern society and work is all about Maki life easier, less human I volvement and therefore less physical exertion. This is an arguemet I can not see you winning, regardless of what you say. And I firmly believe hard physical labour helps keep people in better physical condition than no proper exertion. Id say there weren't too many of Marius' mules over weight.

Farming caused starvation.
No, it did not.
the fact that it enabled population booms and urbanification of human cultures which meant humanity was dependant on farming is undisputable.
But good old mother natures droughts, floods and storms cause the shortages in the short term, and if you honestly belive hunter/ gatherers weren't affected by drought then this conversation may as well stop right here. With urban centres and large populations shortages are felt more acutely and as such higher numbers will suffer, Whig makes the event more notable in history.
In fact without farming we would not be having this conversation because it is so much LESS labou intensive than hunter gathering.
One mans work can feed many, leaving the many free to build cities and specialise in other areas, giving us the basis for R&D and basically every other trade bar slaughtering one another (although agriculture made war as we understand it today possible) and having sex (and the advent of civilisation, and one of its fall outs, currency, being a prostitute became arguably feasable)

Back to the topic at hand, what you're saying regarding masaii and Inuit cultures is perfectly logical and fine.
But I'm always skeptical when people say we KNOW X happened inside peoples bodies 10,000 years ago.
I'm always impressed with what archeologists dig up and how they extrapolate information from their discoveries, but i always struggle to accept that studying Hera's bones can tell us her diet and what she died of, unless it was a spear through the brain.
Have we ever considered that smaller numbers with shorter lifespans automatically equals less chances of developing cancer.
Maybe these cultures are pure bloodlines from a genetic code that doesn't develop these conditons as readily, maybe Ghenis Khan family all were destined to die from cancer or develop alziemers but died before they got the chance. Enough people in the world are related to them . (not really that's the most absurd straw man i could think of)

You and miss savage clearly are interested in the subject and obviously have considerably more knowledge on it than me (me having none) But I always struggle with science showing me this or that because invariably there's other science suggesting the polar opposite. I'm not trying to troll you or anything, I just habitually don't belive stuff I read on the internet and like to poke holes at it until I'm satisfied with the answer

Moat of what has been put forward I agree with, junk food high in sugars and fast food full of crap are entirely too prevailant in todays world and they contribute massively to what people call tue obeisity crisis or epidemic or whatever.
However I also think lifestyles have changed a lot, I know people that eat a lot of garbage but work I very labour intensive trades, and play sports several times a week and their weight only increases if they get laid up with an i jury so IMHO physical activity hqs a massive part to play as well.
Lazyness on both fronts ifyou want to call it that, gettig a fastfood delivered to the house or poppig a tv meal in the microwave is the easier quicker option, it usually tastes good as well but its awful for you.
But its coupled with the increase of automated work, office jobs and video game recreation is the whole problem, you can't take them seperately.

The cancer stuff, about glucose, that's probably all correct I really haveno idea about the science end of that stuff,probably something I'd need to read up on.

So to get back on topic:
Its shit food and no exercise imo, not exclusively diet because we've been eating bread and drinking beer for hundreds, thousands of years



ETA - apologies on the spelling and typing, on my phone

This post has been edited by Macros: 22 August 2012 - 10:54 PM

[gulex]

Macros, on 22 August 2012 - 10:49 PM, said:

A quick post from work, I won't likely have time to watch a one and a half hour video in the forseeable future, I'll just assume he knows what he's tapkig about and you aren't making stuff up.

But 2 things which I think you are patently wrong on.

1 you seek hung up on this idea that modern man is as physically active as days gone by.
He simply is not. Joe public gettig up, driving to work, sitting at his desk and driving home again to sit on the internet and watch TV does not expend as much energy as the poor bastard slaving in the cotton mill or flax fields of 200 years ago. Modern society and work is all about Maki life easier, less human I volvement and therefore less physical exertion. This is an arguemet I can not see you winning, regardless of what you say. And I firmly believe hard physical labour helps keep people in better physical condition than no proper exertion. Id say there weren't too many of Marius' mules over weight.

Farming caused starvation.
No, it did not.
the fact that it enabled population booms and urbanification of human cultures which meant humanity was dependant on farming is undisputable.
But good old mother natures droughts, floods and storms cause the shortages in the short term, and if you honestly belive hunter/ gatherers weren't affected by drought then this conversation may as well stop right here. With urban centres and large populations shortages are felt more acutely and as such higher numbers will suffer, Whig makes the event more notable in history.
In fact without farming we would not be having this conversation because it is so much LESS labou intensive than hunter gathering.
One mans work can feed many, leaving the many free to build cities and specialise in other areas, giving us the basis for R&D and basically every other trade bar slaughtering one another (although agriculture made war as we understand it today possible) and having sex (and the advent of civilisation, and one of its fall outs, currency, being a prostitute became arguably feasable)

Back to the topic at hand, what you're saying regarding masaii and Inuit cultures is perfectly logical and fine.
But I'm always skeptical when people say we KNOW X happened inside peoples bodies 10,000 years ago.
I'm always impressed with what archeologists dig up and how they extrapolate information from their discoveries, but i always struggle to accept that studying Hera's bones can tell us her diet and what she died of, unless it was a spear through the brain.
Have we ever considered that smaller numbers with shorter lifespans automatically equals less chances of developing cancer.
Maybe these cultures are pure bloodlines from a genetic code that doesn't develop these conditons as readily, maybe Ghenis Khan family all were destined to die from cancer or develop alziemers but died before they got the chance. Enough people in the world are related to them . (not really that's the most absurd straw man i could think of)

You and miss savage clearly are interested in the subject and obviously have considerably more knowledge on it than me (me having none) But I always struggle with science showing me this or that because invariably there's other science suggesting the polar opposite. I'm not trying to troll you or anything, I just habitually don't belive stuff I read on the internet and like to poke holes at it until I'm satisfied with the answer

Moat of what has been put forward I agree with, junk food high in sugars and fast food full of crap are entirely too prevailant in todays world and they contribute massively to what people call tue obeisity crisis or epidemic or whatever.
However I also think lifestyles have changed a lot, I know people that eat a lot of garbage but work I very labour intensive trades, and play sports several times a week and their weight only increases if they get laid up with an i jury so IMHO physical activity hqs a massive part to play as well.
Lazyness on both fronts ifyou want to call it that, gettig a fastfood delivered to the house or poppig a tv meal in the microwave is the easier quicker option, it usually tastes good as well but its awful for you.
But its coupled with the increase of automated work, office jobs and video game recreation is the whole problem, you can't take them seperately.

The cancer stuff, about glucose, that's probably all correct I really haveno idea about the science end of that stuff,probably something I'd need to read up on.

So to get back on topic:
Its shit food and no exercise imo, not exclusively diet because we've been eating bread and drinking beer for hundreds, thousands of years



ETA - apologies on the spelling and typing, on my phone

I appreciate your scepticism and you were right to demand sources for my claims. Regarding excercise however, you have just demanded a source regarding my claim that we are no less physically active than our paleo ancestors, i gave you one, and now you refute it without any backing other than the knowledge on the subject which you yourself say you dont have? im puzzled lol did you not see the journal to which i linked?

Concerning the ease of paleolithic life compared to farming. Again - if you had read anything on this matter i could refer you to Pandora's Seed, a book by renowned geneticist Spencer Wells who documents the biological and physiological degredation which happened to us when we adopted agriculture, how we were likely forced into it due to a lack of animals to hunt, including a comparison of the easy paleolithic life and the hardships of farming. Or perhaps Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. But then - you haven't read it and i just provided you with a bunch of academic material that you've simply ignored in order to reiterate opinions to which i have already responded and provided material that suggests you're wrong. I'm actually somewhat angry - why should i bother sourcing anything when you just initialize a strategy of ignore-and-reiterate while completely neglecting the provision of any 'evidence' yourself?

edit: But then in case you're at work and intend to provide an in-depth reply when you get back, the implied annoyance and inherent sourness of my post is, ofcourse, premature

This post has been edited by gulex: 22 August 2012 - 11:39 PM

[Macros]

I think we're at odds here on the wrong fronts. I'll say to you now though, I won't have time to do any reading or research for at least a month.
My posting style has always been somewhat broken and... Illogical/ poorly constructed, I generally type things as they pop into my head and then I lose my train of thought and forget where I was going.

So, we understand that complex carbs and other sugar rich food contribute to weight gain, I don't think I've disputed that, and I'll stay out of the degenerative conditions arguements for now because its way over my head.
So weight gain.
Unless I am misreading everything in this thread our bodies haven't had time to evolve and adapt to grains and farmed stuffs because its a relatively recent revolation. I'm not saying evolutionary theory and science isn't right, I agree with most of it, I'm saying don't place too much emphasis on it ae a factor. The point I was trying to get across (I think my problem is likely the same as my spoken word, it all makes sense in my head, I just present it very poorly) is the weight 'problem' is a VERY recent thing. I'm not saying people weren't fat back I the day, it was just far less common place, I have no idea of stastics of how much of the western world is considered overweight or obese, and don't have the facilities on hand to check, nor likely the time she I get home.
Anyway, lets pitch it at the last 50 years onwards, there has been a growing trend of an increasing number of people being overweight.
My argument is that farmed grains and other foodstuffs (I *think* I'm right in saying potatoes are very high in carbs and basically turn to sugar as soon as we eat them, that will be relevant in anecdotal later) Alcan not be pointed at as a sudden burst in weight gain. We have been eating this stuff for thousands of years, cancer arguements aside, our bodies clearly can deal with it so I'm not saying the evolutionary part is BS, I think, in the case of dietary weightloss, its being given too much weight. If we were totally incompatible with the stuff, we would still be chasing around after buffalo and eating apples by the bucket load. So why, if we can eat carb rich food without dying are we suddenly exploding? Now this is where our wires seem to be crossed.
I'm basing my argument on this front on comparisons with recent human history, rather than to our palio ancestors, where our diets, lifestyles, everything was so vastly different comparisons are effectively pointless. Farmed foods have been the staple of the human diet for thousands of years, cities could not exist without farmig and agriculture. So if we've been scoffing bread, potatoes and beer for so long, why is it suddenly a problem?
Modern food addatives, portion sizes and deep fat frying the shit out of everything are factors, but modern man (and by modern man I mean mid 20th century on) does far FAR less physical activity than a worker from the thousands of year preceding him. I really can not see how you can dispute that physical activity has dropped, call me obtuse or stupid if you want, but the advent of the steam engine and more recently the prevalence or automated machinery and heavy and light plant changed the game. You don't have to bust yur halls everyday at the steel mill, you press a button and the computer makes it all happen.
This is all I have been trying to say, I've been readig your arguments as saying "hogwash, people move about plenty these days, its all diet". Which iritates the fuck out of me, people are becoming lazy, not intentionally, things are being made easier for them, why would they make the effort when it is not required? Children sit and play video games where 50 years ago they were playing games or (in worse.times) already at work, overall there has been a massive decrease in physical activity, especially in first world countries, in the last 100 years. And I'll say it again, if you disagree with that you're mad



a quick scan back up reveals mu misinterpretation of your statement, you said a leading hypothosis suggested farming caused starvation, you didn't suggest it yourself. Farming was a by product of population growth and over hunting (I watched 10,000 BC, I know how it started) over dependance and limitation of crop rotation and choice are the fault oftue planners, bit I can see what it suggests as it is essentially a food eggs in one basket situation. But Id counter the startment with starvation caused farming. People had a few tough times when the hunt was bad, maybe a fruit fly destroyed local food supplies, butit was likely hunger/starvation that drove man to consider the idea of a constant dependable food source, not the other way about.
And aside, bar fire farming is the greatest undertaking of mankind with regards to our development and the creation of civilisation, you call it labour intensive and hardship, I view it differently, once it got worked out farming freed up many to undertake other works. Going off topic again

I think the crux of our disagreement is the exercise, you are viewing humanitys history as a whole, I'm picking the more recent parts as a)I know nothing of before and b ) I feel its more relevant since the discussion was revolving around carbs and grains. I'm saying, in a nutshell, people are eating bread now and they were eatig bread 1000 years ago, our lifestyles have changed dramatically in that time.

[JLV]

I've red Guns, Germs, and Steel. I haven't read the entire argument because it hurts me to digest, but I can tell you that book does not back up your idea that the current average man is as active as that of the past.

Just walking for 10 miles a day at a decent clip is a thousand calories burned. A THOUSAND. I'm actually on your side about the low carb diets, I've found that limiting my carbohydrate intake has drastically increased my productivity and overall health, but you take it too far when you say exercise has nothing to do with it. Think about how much people walked before the invention of cars, roads, etc. 10 miles is not a lot of walking, really. A farmer plowing his field by hand or even horse/oxen burns much more than a thousand calories in a day.

Exercise matters. Diet matters. Not sure how it could be said as anything but such.

This post has been edited by JLV: 23 August 2012 - 12:39 AM

[Morgoth]

There's no need to be snide in your comments, gulex. I don't think I was unreasonable to request sources for the claims you made.

Now, I'm going to skip the whole quote, it fills up a little too much space I feel.

Quote

What other factors would there be? the side on which they sleep during the night? There are two main factors possible diet and excercise through my earlier post i have already related how our modern diseases are propelled by our diet. A wrong diet would therefore be the obvious problem for modern day man.
source: http://www.ajcn.org/...t/81/2/341.full

I think you're simply too focused on diet to see other factors. Polution, hygiene, lenght of life, medicine, I can list things that we have in our everyday lives that Maasai hardly ever see. Any one of these could have a detrimental effect on our health. Even your own source concludes that though diet is a likely and important factor, it is not the only one.

"However, the ultimate factor underlying diseases of civilization is the collision of our ancient genome with the new conditions of life in affluent nations, including the nutritional qualities of recently introduced foods. "

Quote

Another hint at nutrition being the important factor is the fact that man became shorter and began to develop cavities immediatly after the invention of agriculture
source: http://beyondveg.com...l-1984-1a.shtml

To quote your source:
Disease effects were minor in the Upper [Late] Paleolithic except for trauma. In postglacially hot areas, porotic hyperostosis [indicative of anemia] increased in Mesolithic and reached high frequencies in Neolithic to Middle Bronze times. [Reminder note: The end of the last Ice Age and the consequent melting of glaciers which occurred at the cusp of the Paleolithic/Neolithic transition caused a rise in sea level, with a consequent increase in malaria in affected inland areas which became marshy as a result.] Apparently this resulted mainly from thalassemias, since children show it in long bones as well as their skulls. But porotic hyperostosis in adults had other causes too, probably from iron deficiency from hookworm, amebiasis, or phytate, effect of any of the malarias. The thalassemias necessarily imply falciparum malaria. This disease may be one direct cause of short stature.

The other pressure limiting stature and probably also fertility in early and developing farming times was deficiency of protein and of iron and zinc from ingestion of too much phytic acid [e.g., from grains] in the diet. In addition, new diseases including epidemics emerged as population increased, indicated by an increase of enamel arrest lines in Middle Bronze Age samples....

We can conclude that farmers were less healthy than hunters, at least until Classical to Roman times. [Due to the difficulty in disentangling all relevant factors, as Angel explains a bit earlier] [w]e cannot state exactly how much less healthy they were, however, or exactly how or why.


Seems to me that once more nutrion is brough up as one of several, and in this case not the most important factor. If anything the source is written as a criticism on the notion that diet is the only, or even major reason for the decline in stature and health.

As for your final source, this source seems to line up more closely with your views. However, to quote one of the later parts:

HUNTER-GATHERER FITNESS
Our Paleolithic ancestors exerted themselves daily to secure their food, water, and protection.72,73 Although modern technology has made physical exertion optional, it is still important to exercise as though our survival depended on it, and in a different way it still does. We are genetically adapted to live an extremely physically active lifestyle. A sedentary existence predisposes us to obesity, hypertension, the metabolic syndrome, diabetes, and most types of cardiovascular disease, whereas regular exercise decreases the risks of developing all these diseases. Even in times of caloric excess, hunter-gatherers avoided weight gain in part
because they were extremely physically active. Studies of obesity consistently show that the best way to maintain weight loss (regardless of the type of diet used) is by daily physical exercise.

Our remote ancestors participated in various physical activities daily. They walked and ran 5 to 10 miles daily as they foraged and hunted for their food sources. They also lifted, carried, climbed, stretched, leaped, and did whatever else was necessary to secure their sustenance and protection. Days of heavy exertion were followed by recovery days. In modern terms, these people cross-trained with aerobic, resistance, and flexibility exercises. According to recent data on physical activity, fitness programs that
use various exercises are the most effective in preventing cardiovascular diseases.

I certainly wouldn't argue that diet is not a factor in the changes we see, but to argue that it is the only one of importance -like you've been doing- strikes me as improbable to say the least. Not even your own sources support such a claim. Additionally, cancer link is not argued anywhere amongst them as far as I can tell.

When that is said, I find the study about energy consumption in hunter gathering societies interesting and more than a little surprising. I wonder if other studies have been made to verify the claim.