From: Harvey Newstrom (mail@HarveyNewstrom.com)
Date: Sun Apr 20 2003 - 10:35:39 MDT
gts wrote,
> If you aren't already doing so, I suggest you drop
> your vegetarian-like diet and start eating other
> healthy paleolithic foods! <trying to the keep the
> discussion on-topic>
As good as your arguments are, I'm still not convinced. Fish is the only
thing that I think is healthy that is missing from my diet, and I replace
these with vegetarian fatty acids and supplements.
However, I still have a few problems with the Paleo diet theory.
1. Why are beans left out? I don't buy the part about not being able to
soak them. Why do we suppose our ancestors had simple tools for hunting
(spears, sticks, knives, axes, pits, etc.), but couldn't come up with bowls,
for example. I also don't buy the part about not being able to eat beans or
legumes raw. I love munching on raw peas out of the garden, and the
Japanese have a long history of eating soybeans cold and raw out of the pod.
These things are easy to eat and digest.
2. Why are grains left out? Same thing. Everyone seems to admit that
grains grew wild all over the place. The argument is again that ancient
tools couldn't handle them. We have ancient examples of stone bowls and
grinding instruments. Thrashing wheat stocks on the ground to shake out the
grain is not unusual. I myself ate wheat out of the field on the farm when
I grew up. Just rolling the wheat heads in your hands makes the grain fall
out. And other grains, such as corn, are really easy to get to. I see no
difficulty eating this stuff with my bare hands.
3. Speaking of not having bowls, this Paleo Diet seems to assume that
everything needs to be cooked using an open flame. Modern knowledge tells
us that this is the worst way to cook foods, especially meats. Charred food
or even fire-cooked foods are more carcinogenic. While this may not have
bothered our ancestors who died at an early age, it certainly bothers me
when I want to live well past 100.
4. I agree that humans are naturally omnivores, eating meat and vegetables.
But the meat-eating seems a bit exaggerated. It is not obvious or proven
that the ancient ancestors ate huge amounts of meat every day. They
probably had meat a few times per week, and foraged for nuts, berries, and
vegetables the rest of the time. Their diet was mostly vegetarian every
day, with boosts of meat occasionally. I don't see why this theory is so
down on vegetarianism, when it clearly supported humans most days.
5. Speaking of vegetarianism, most of the complaints against vegetarianism
have nothing to do with modern day. First of all, if someone isn't a total
vegan, meaning they also eat milk, dairy and eggs, then they are not missing
out on all the animal-only nutrients. Plus, we have supplements today. Any
modern person taking a well rounded supplement won't have any of the
deficiency problems. Plus, we can mass produce food in ways never available
before. Maybe the ancients couldn't mass produce tofu enough for their
diet, but the corner grocery store can. Most of the anti-vegetarianism
stuff I read here is aimed at theoretical diets that don't exist any more,
or aimed at pseudo-scientific claims that have nothing to do with a
life-extensionist diet that avoids meat.
6. I agree totally with the part about ancient lean meats being much
healthier than the fatty meats we produce today. That is part of the reason
I am vegetarian, and part of the reason I don't eat a lot of meat to
duplicate the Paleo diet. Modern meat is dangerous, fatty stuff. It bears
little resemblance to lean, low-fat, low-cholesterol meat available in
ancient times. It seems that a Paleo diet would avoid modern meat, and
maybe only eat fish, and lean fowl, but hardly ever touch the modern stuff
they sell as meat.
7. As for the idea that we are "adapted" to the Paleo diet, I think there
is a lot of confusion as to what "adaptation" is. It rarely involves
mutations or genetic changes of thousands of years as most people think.
Adaptation occurs in one or two generations when all those not adapted to
survive die off, and only the survivors have offspring into the next
generation. We have had dairy, tofu, grains, bread, and agriculture for
thousands of years. Anybody not well adapted to these diets died of
millennia ago. I am not sure why anybody would think that a modern person
today would be well adapted to a diet that disappeared so long ago. Only
people who could adapt, live, and even thrive on agriculture have survived
for the last few thousand years. The theory of adaptation and fitness
toward the modern diet seems to indicate that we should aim not at the Paleo
diet, but at more of an agricultural based diet more than 200 years ago, but
within the last few thousand years.
8. Even if the Paleo Diet were the perfect diet we are adapted towards,
there is a big question as to what that adaptation is set to maximize.
Evolutionary pressures do not push for longevity of individuals. It pushes
for maximum offspring. Look at nature, which often produces millions of
little tadpoles just so a few survive. This natural systems is not very
good for individual survival or longevity. I see no reason for the
assumption that this natural diet is the best for life-extension. At best,
I could consider it to be best for early reproduction. The longevity of the
parents after reproductions, or after the kids grew up, would have little to
do with genetics or evolution. It may even be evolutionarily more sound to
have the parents die off young so they stop competing with the next
generation. I don't trust evolution to make good choices for individual
longevity. This is the biggest flaw I see in the whole theory. The
underlying premise seems unlikely to me.
The Paleo Diet sounds good in theory, but there is a lot of interpretation
and selective application going on.
-- Harvey Newstrom, CISSP, IAM, GSEC <www.HarveyNewstrom.com>
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