From: Damien Sullivan (phoenix@ugcs.caltech.edu)
Date: Sat Apr 12 2003 - 17:34:11 MDT
On Sat, Apr 12, 2003 at 05:27:33PM -0400, gts wrote:
> dairy for calcium, but if that is so then how do we explain the fact that
> prehistoric humans had no dairy products but were taller than us moderns,
True, plus the cows have to get their calcium from somewhere...
> green leafy vegetables like spinach, contain more than enough calcium. AND
I'd hardly tell anyone not to eat veggies, but eating enough seems like a
challenge, or expensive.
> Rickets was a major national health problem here in US in the early part of
> decided instead to mandate that flour be fortified with B vitamins.
Rickets seems to be caused by vitamin D shortage...
> In itself flour is little more than sugar. It is broken down into sugar
Looking at nutritional labels there's a fair bit of protein, fiber, and iron
there as well, especially for whole wheat flour. One test I do is to ask
"what would I be getting if I got all 2000 of my calories from this food?" and
good breads and pasta hold up decently. Not complete, but not pure sugar,
either. Some veggies hold up even better, but getting all your calories from
veggies is definitely a challenge...
> > A book on Australia I just read noted the aborigines trading
> > millstones to grind grass seeds in the dry areas. I'm not
> > sure excluding grains is completely paleolithic.
>
> I would say those aborigines are better described a Neolithic rather than
> Paleolithic.
I would say we can't be that sure of what exactly the Paleolithic diet was.
I've looked into it before myself, and opinions seem to range from "lots of
meat" to "lots of vegetables nuts and seeds". And the aborigines were still
pretty healthy. Diverse diet good, yes. I'm much less convinced of "grains
bad".
-xx- Damien X-)
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