PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Lots of great comments from Raja here. Bringing 15-20 years in the nutrition field to bear. Meanwhile, this thread seems to have at least temporarily committed apoptosis.

What about Price's research? Grain-eaters fared better than mostly-meat eaters.

That's one possible interpretation. However, Prices works suggests something else.

If Price's work is to be believed, there is a reason why grain and meat eaters fare better than high meat eaters. We may not understand this scientifically, but if it's true it means that there is something "essential" about carbohydrates.

As a physician, you may be interested in what's easiest for your patients. I'm more concerned with what's optimal.
Actually, I think it's easier to follow a mixed diet that a non-grain diet.

For more info on Dr. Price's work, go to www.westonaprice.org
(I have no financial interest in this organization . . . and I don't agree with everything they say . . . but they represent my views more than anyone else.)

[raja]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

As I have said before, I have not encountered any evidence at all there is a benefit to grains you can't get elsewhere. If you have something other than an observational study, I will look at it.

What about Price's research? Grain-eaters fared better than mostly-meat eaters.

You might also just as well say that Taubes' quote proves there is no harm to a high meat diet compared to a high rice diet. You were concerned about eating so much meat before, why not interpret it that way?

That's one possible interpretation.
However, Prices works suggests something else.

There are no essential carbohydrates.

If Price's work is to be believed, there is a reason why grain and meat eaters fare better than high meat eaters. We may not understand this scientifically, but if it's true it means that there is something "essential" about carbohydrates.

Keeping your insulin levels as low as possible is easiest in food -abundant environment on a diet without grains.

As a physician, you may be interested in what's easiest for your patients. I'm more concerned with what's optimal.
Actually, I think it's easier to follow a mixed diet that a non-grain diet.

For more info on Dr. Price's work, go to www.westonaprice.org
(I have no financial interest in this organization . . . and I don't agree with everything they say . . . but they represent my views more than anyone else.)

[raja]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

I checked out Loren Cordain's website, as you suggested. As usually happens in a situation such as this, it only served to reinforce my own positions. His reasoning on grains is flawed -- I won't go into the reasons here -- and he also referenced an excellent Nature article that gives evidence that non-cultivated grains were a major part of the diet of at least some pre-agricultural people as far back as 23,000 years ago.

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

So did they live mostly on meat Roger, as the original thesis you described seemed to suggest robustly, or were they 50% or more vegetable-fat eating guys, like the notional Paleo-Meditteraneans? I am still not sure which proportions of vegetable fat amenability we ascribe to these hungry and energetic 25 year old stalwarts upon whom the contemporary Paleo diet is modeled. Running after herding bison on foot is energy consuming work.

[rogermexico]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Roger,

According to your post, the big grain-eaters (Japanese and Hunza) were in the same good-health category as the high-meat eaters (the Inuit, plains Indians, etc.) If grains are so bad for you, why is that the case?


Your post:

The point is that when researchers look at traditional populations eating their traditional diets — whether in rural China, Japan, the Kitava study in the South Pacific, Africa, etc — and find relatively low levels of heart disease, obesity and diabetes compared to urban/westernized societies, they’re inevitably looking at populations that eat relatively little or no refined carbs and sugar compared to populations that eat a lot. Some of these traditional populations ate high-fat diets (the Inuit, plains Indians, pastoralists like the Masai, the Tokelauans); some ate relatively low-fat diets (agriculturalists like the Hunza, the Japanese, etc.), but the common denominator was the relative absence of sugar and/or refined carbs. So the simplest possible hypothesis to explain the health of these populations is that they don’t eat these particularly poor quality carbohydrates, not that they did or did not eat high fat diets."

He's saying that it's not that grains per se that are bad, but the refined grains and other refined carbohydrates that are the problem.

Regardless of the lectins and all the other supposedly harmful chemicals that you cite in your anti-grain posts, the Japanese are quite healthy in comparison with those who don't eat many grains. What's up with that?

This is Taubes' quote, btw, not mine, jsut to be clear to others on the thread.

I have quoted Taubes very carefully and tried not to ascribe my views to him.

Taubes definitely feels that sugars and refined grains are the biggest part of the problem as do both you and I.

To my knowledge he does not have an opinion on whether going the next step to elimnate all grains (which you might admit is actually simpler than just doing it with sugar becaue it does not require reading labels as much) is of additional benefit. I freely admit that the case against all grains is less established and the case against all refined sugars and grains (white flour etc) is more ironclad. If it were well-established we would not be discussing it.

I am basically taking it further than Taubes with other lines of evidence and reasoning.

Nevertheless, I have never seen Taubes say there is any reason at all to eat any grain and he definitely agrees with me that there is no requirement for carbohydrate in the diet at all.

As I have said before, I have not encountered any evidence at all there is a benefit to grains you can't get elsewhere. If you have something other than an observational study, I will look at it.

The lowest reported rates of cancer and heart disease are that I am aware of are actually in Inuit and other high animal-product eaters.

Rice has fewer lectins and gluten than wheat.

The Japanese have very high rates of stomach cancer and rates of stroke that partly balance their lower coronary risk. There is also a cultural taboo against heart attack and many coronary event are reported as strokes or otherwise. Again, well covered in Taubes' book.

Also, if the japanese are rice eaters, we have said nothing about whether they should eat the wheat corn or barley that worldwide are consumed in much larger amounts than rice, and could fairly wonder if north american natives living on buffalo meat would be healthier than japanese on wheat, one of the grains you advocate.

You might also just as well say that Taubes' quote proves there is no harm to a high meat diet compared to a high rice diet. You were concerned about eating so much meat before, why not interpret it that way?

In an earlier post in response to a question about grains, I gave a thumbnail nastiness gradient with Soy and wheat and corn far worse than white rice.

I even stipulated that I occasionally eat white rice. I don't need it, though.

Once again, though, why say we need it if its just starch and has to be fortified?

I really am relying on multiple lines of evidence here - I'm not sure if you are reading all of my posts (like 6s and 3s and the logic of grain avoidance) and I don't want to repeat myself that much.

As such, the observational data, even the better data that looks at nutritional transitions within countries, is very subject to interpretation. One couldrun whole website just debating that.

To me, who used to believe none of what I'm espousing until I started researching this 2 years ago, grains are a 10,00 year old habit that was necessary for the growth of civilization (Some hold this not such a good thing, perhaps?) but have never been necessary for human health on the individual level.

There are no essential carbohydrates.

Keeping your insulin levels as low as possible is easiest in food -abundant environment on a diet without grains.

[raja]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Roger,

According to your post, the big grain-eaters (Japanese and Hunza) were in the same good-health category as the high-meat eaters (the Inuit, plains Indians, etc.) If grains are so bad for you, why is that the case?


Your post:

The point is that when researchers look at traditional populations eating their traditional diets — whether in rural China, Japan, the Kitava study in the South Pacific, Africa, etc — and find relatively low levels of heart disease, obesity and diabetes compared to urban/westernized societies, they’re inevitably looking at populations that eat relatively little or no refined carbs and sugar compared to populations that eat a lot. Some of these traditional populations ate high-fat diets (the Inuit, plains Indians, pastoralists like the Masai, the Tokelauans); some ate relatively low-fat diets (agriculturalists like the Hunza, the Japanese, etc.), but the common denominator was the relative absence of sugar and/or refined carbs. So the simplest possible hypothesis to explain the health of these populations is that they don’t eat these particularly poor quality carbohydrates, not that they did or did not eat high fat diets."

He's saying that it's not that grains per se that are bad, but the refined grains and other refined carbohydrates that are the problem.

Regardless of the lectins and all the other supposedly harmful chemicals that you cite in your anti-grain posts, the Japanese are quite healthy in comparison with those who don't eat many grains. What's up with that?

[rogermexico]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Roger, I am not sure if this has been covered elsewhere on this thread as it is rather lengthy so sorry for any duplication

Francois Montignac (a French pharmacoligist) came-up with a similar therory in the 90's altough no link was made to the paleolithic ages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montignac_diet

It refers to glycemic index and controlling insulin peaks .
It also refers to the mediterranean diet -(something Lukester embraces)
His book is probably available in english by now.

Thanks I'll check it out

[rogermexico]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

I've read articles describing how native American Indians killed large quantities of buffalo by heading them off cliffs. So perhaps with enough savy, primitive man could hunt large animals successfully, even without guns or compound bows.

Hunting of megafauna as a food source is very well documented.

As bowhunter, I hunt with a 53 lb longbow (primitive stick and string) with broadhead arrows no more effective than flint points. It will shoot completely through a whitetail.

Elk, moose and even bison can be easily killed with the this kind of tackle which is no more effective than what native americans used.

[rogermexico]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Roger,

It seems to me you have made two reversals concerning the paleo diet.
You now admit that: 1) Grains were used, at least to some degree, and 2) carbohydrate-rich diets were consumed by some cultures.

If it makes you feel better to see a reversal that is fine, but I think you are splitting hairs -humans ate everything edible - that is what omnivore means- but that is in no way inconsistent with saying we are incompletely adapted to predominant grain consumption . If I am on the road and all I can find to eat is a bran muffin, have I just trashed my whole thesis?

At the outset I explicltly said my paleo diet did not attempt to duplicate what paleo people ate, but what metabolic conditions they evolved under. Chief among these was (I believe) a fat burning metabolism with low insulin levels. I also stated pretty clearly that fasting, infrequent meals, and low carb consumption were all ways to achieve that.I specifically mentioned those because those conditions characterize the period before agriculture. I never stated that there were no societies with high carb consumption via tubers, so how is that a reversal? I stated that I endorsed low carbs as a percentage of calories as the most practical way to keep insulin levels low in regime of high caloric abundance.

I don't try to duplicate what paleo people ate, with the important exception of discouraging grain consumption. For all practical purposes, they did not eat grains. there is wealth of evidence they are not as healthy as vegetables. If so, why eat them? What benefit do they provide?

In a prior post, you said,
That is not entirely true, as you said in your last post. "Clearly, at some point in or around mesopotamia, there was a technological transition to cultivated grain." In other words, humans were grain-eaters prior to 10,000 years ago. This is not a minor point, since a long history of grain eating by humans has allowed them to adapt to this food.

You qualify your statement by claiming that grain eating was "at most an incidental or small part of the diet" and not "predominant". I know of no evidence to support that statement.

Plenty of evidence. Loren Cordain's work especially.

In fact, grain grows almost everywhere, and it can be gathered and stored for future use. Why would paleo people not exploit this food source, then exploit it further by the development of agriculture?

That is the point, they didn't exploit it until agriculture 10,000 years ago.

"Celiac disease is the most common genetic disease in Europe. In Italy about 1 in 250 people and in Ireland about 1 in 300 people have celiac disease. It is rarely diagnosed in African, Chinese, and Japanese people." Why do the Africans, Chinese and Japanese people rarely have celiac disease? Is it because their diets are more traditional resulting in better health? Or is it that rice is a better grain than wheat in some respects?

Celiac disease is just the tip of the iceberg. White rice is indeed less harmful than wheat flour, you don't make pie crusts with it (less gluten) That explains the ethnic difference. Why advocate wheat?

What you can't get from vegetables that you can get from grains is adequate carbohydrates. In order to duplicate the actual paleo diet, you probably need 50% carbohydrate in your diet (admitted speculation), and the only way to do that is with starchy tubers and/or grains.

I am duplicating paleo metabolism not the diet.

The human metabolic requirement for dietary carbohydrates is exactly zero.

None. You don't need them, period. Glucose can be produced as an internal fuel in the body in perfectly adequate amount for human health with zero oral carbohydrate intake.

There are essential fatty acids and amino acids, but absolutely no essential carbohydrates.

Roger, I don't doubt that removing refined sugar and carbohydrates from anyone's diet will result in improved health.

We actually agree on many things:

Eliminate refined sugars and grains
Use healthy fats (animal and mono-saturated)
Get daily sunlight
Eat grass-fed meat (I grow my own )
Adequate exercise

Where we disagree:

What is the true paleo diet
Are grains healthy or harmful

I would also add some things to your Dietary To Do list:

Avoid industrially grown and processed foods -- agricultural corporations don't care about your health, only their bottom line
Soak grains overnight before use to remove mineral-binding phytins
Eat the whole animal, not just the muscle meat -- consume organ meats and bone broths. (It's just a psychological aversion, get over it)
Eat food from one's climate zone
Eat food according to its season, using traditional techniques such as drying to preserve foods out of season
Eat whole foods
Use unrefined salt
Don't use vitamin and mineral supplements except as short-term medicines
Use high-vitamin cod liver oil if you can't get enough sun
Strive for disease prevention and treatment through lifestyle modification. Use convention or alternative medicine as a last resort (or the former if in need of trauma care). If you require a doctor, you've made a mistake in how you eat or live. Figure out what it is and correct it.

For all our disagreement, which is probably borne more of passion and interest than anything else, let me state that if my patients were to follow your list the way you have stated it, they would still be much healthier than otherwise.

Thank you for your interest and your responses.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Secondly the assumption that humans without guns could easily hunt large mammals - I don't agree with that at all.

While an atlatl/spear is fine for whitetail deer or the equivalent, taking down mammoths or rhinos or similar animals with such equipment is really close to suicide. Even a decent sized elk or moose is damned hard to kill outside of modern compound bows.

I've read articles describing how native American Indians killed large quantities of buffalo by heading them off cliffs. So perhaps with enough savy, primitive man could hunt large animals successfully, even without guns or compound bows.

[Nicolasd]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Roger, I am not sure if this has been covered elsewhere on this thread as it is rather lengthy so sorry for any duplication

Francois Montignac (a French pharmacoligist) came-up with a similar therory in the 90's altough no link was made to the paleolithic ages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montignac_diet

It refers to glycemic index and controlling insulin peaks .
It also refers to the mediterranean diet -(something Lukester embraces)
His book is probably available in english by now.

[c1ue]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Roger,

Interesting points.

I do think that while chimpanzees and humans are not the same - nonetheless comparing modern human structure with chimpanzee structure is a little problematic.

For example - what is the Neanderthal vs. modern man gut ratio? What about blue whales? I suspect size matters.

Secondly the assumption that humans without guns could easily hunt large mammals - I don't agree with that at all.

While an atlatl/spear is fine for whitetail deer or the equivalent, taking down mammoths or rhinos or similar animals with such equipment is really close to suicide. Even a decent sized elk or moose is damned hard to kill outside of modern compound bows.

For that matter, in the era of large mammals roaming the land there were also large predators. I'd not envy anyone trying to hold off large predatory cats with a spear.

As for Japan - from my having lived there, the Japanese just don't eat much. In general they practice a societal caloric restriction.

When my ex-boss came to SF and we went out to dinner, his meal consisted of 4 pieces of sushi and a lot of sake. This is a little extreme, but at home the Japanese simply don't eat much.

I don't think they are in the starvation category of the 10% malnutrition crowd, but I do think that simply not eating too much helps.

Another data point is age.

I've noticed with seniors in my new business that they simply don't have the appetite of younger people. In fact, many seniors if they don't have food available right away will simply lose appetite and skip a meal.

Certainly those who make it to 75 and up aren't the obese ones, but I wonder how this fits with your refined sugar thesis.

As for gout and sugar, it is possible. I do know that refined sugar in the Middle Ages occupied the niche that cocaine does today. It may well have been that conspicuous consumption by the nobility/wealthy in that period consisted of not just meat and wine, but also refined sugar in the form of sweets hence the prevalence of gout.

[rogermexico]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Thanks for posting this.

I have long believed that sugar and refined carbohydrates were the causes of heart disease -- not cholesterol. It's nice to see some epidemiological confirmation.

Also interesting is that the big grain-eaters were in the same good-health category as the no-grain eaters. Roger, here's more evidence that your accusations against grains are incorrect.

You put people on your high-meat diet and they feel better . . . but you're also taking them off sugar and refined carbs. In my opinion, your version of the paleo diet is a "medicine" for sick people . . . not a diet for life.

You really should read Taubes book - this is the carbohydrate hypothesis itself - that carbs are responsible via insulin for heart disease, not fats or cholesterol. I think you would like it.

Of course they feel better off refined sugars. Where have I said that the effect is due to increased meat? Raja, I live in wisconsin where the lowest quartile of meat consumption would probably horrify you. They already eat a lot of meat, in the sense of "large animal flesh". I am trying to get them to have an egg and cup of coffee with cream in it instead of orange juice, toast and bagel and cereal with skim milk.

Here is where we are hung up, I think.

You have to eat something. If you were eating 160 lbs per year of sugar, you must now eat something else. I am not telling them to eat less sugar so they can eat more meat. I am saying they can eat more of anything as long as its not refined sugar, and if they want to go a step further, grains.

They can increase their butter, cream, fish, asparagus, whatever they want. I am not trying to coerce meat consumption, I just allow it.

I understand that you would prefer they eliminate sugar, and I guess eat lots of whole wheat and other cereal grains instead. But why grains? Why not tubers and vegetables.

Metabolically there is no need whatever for any carbohydrates in the diet. If that is the case, why would I recommend grains if they offer nothing I can't get more of from vegetables and animal products.

Raja, if you have religious or philosophical objections to meat I think that is reasonable and defensible. I can't argue with those. However, there is absolutely no good evidence that animal products in general are bad for your health. As you point out , much of the slander is due to unfounded fear of cholesterol, the rest due to unfounded fear of saturated fat, and the rest due to poorly controlled observational studies looking at "meat" (often included processed meat) consumption that is confounded by sugar consumption, ad sometimes even things like smoking.

No prospective intervention (nurses health, etc) has shown any negative effects to meat, protein, "red meat" or saturated fat.

My 12 steps or points do not say eat more meat as steaks and don't say eat more anything except what i regard as healthy fats. If high meat diet means any diet allowing animal flesh, then it is "high meat", otherwise, it is no higher than before. It is certainly not vegan.

It encourages animal products, and allows red meat if grass fed

It eliminates sugars, HFCS and highly refined flour

It encourages you to eliminate grains and the risks of their gluten and antinutrients. (gluten is not inactivated by cooking as I am sure you know, and I''ll talk about lectins and such in a future post) One third of the population has antibodies to gliadin. Overt celiac disease is just the tip of the iceberg. Wheat is just a 10,00 year old tradition.

I will ask once again, what can I or my patients get from wheat that we can't get better from fish (if you prefer) and non-cereal vegetables? Another way to put it, what deficiency can ensue based on my recommendations? What are my patients missing without wheat?

It's mainly about low insulin levels, but secondarily about avoiding grains, because they provide nothing special, are dangerous and we don't need them.

The "not diet for life" thing is hard to understand. Is there something you are not telling me? Are you a vegan? Fine if you are. Just curious. I don't mean to offend you but you seem to be seeing "meat promotion" everywhere.

[raja]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

The point is that when researchers look at traditional populations eating their traditional diets — whether in rural China, Japan, the Kitava study in the South Pacific, Africa, etc — and find relatively low levels of heart disease, obesity and diabetes compared to urban/westernized societies, they’re inevitably looking at populations that eat relatively little or no refined carbs and sugar compared to populations that eat a lot. Some of these traditional populations ate high-fat diets (the Inuit, plains Indians, pastoralists like the Masai, the Tokelauans); some ate relatively low-fat diets (agriculturalists like the Hunza, the Japanese, etc.), but the common denominator was the relative absence of sugar and/or refined carbs. So the simplest possible hypothesis to explain the health of these populations is that they don’t eat these particularly poor quality carbohydrates, not that they did or did not eat high fat diets."

Thanks for posting this.

I have long believed that sugar and refined carbohydrates were the causes of heart disease -- not cholesterol. It's nice to see some epidemiological confirmation.

Also interesting is that the big grain-eaters were in the same good-health category as the no-grain eaters. Roger, here's more evidence that your accusations against grains are incorrect.

You put people on your high-meat diet and they feel better . . . but you're also taking them off sugar and refined carbs. In my opinion, your version of the paleo diet is a "medicine" for sick people . . . not a diet for life.

[rogermexico]

Re: PaNu - The paleolithic nutrition argument clinic

Dr. Mercola has some interesting new advice on sunlight, at Shocking Update -- Sunshine Can Actually Decrease Your Vitamin D Levels.

• Showers (with soap) interfere with Vitamin D production, because it takes a while for the oil soluble Vitamin D produced on the skin to be absorbed, and showers can wash it off first.
• Sunlight through glass windows (which has more UVA than UVB) actually lowers ones Vitamin D levels.
• Statins and other cholesterol lowering drugs lower ones Vitamin D levels, because cholesterol is a precursor for Vitamin D.

Yep it has to be UV B - Skip the suncreen