14 ms·

Cereal Grains: Humanity’s Double-Edged Sword (1999) [pdf]

43 points by primroot 11y ago

quelsolaar 11y ago
Everything is a double-edged sword. Even a single-edge sword is a double-edged sword.
- knodi123 11y ago
  ouch, my brain.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
- gyom 11y ago
  Nice ! It's not really a paradox, though, because "being a double-edged sword" is a comparison that's being made with regards to the decision of using that particular single-edge sword. And "being a single-edge sword" here is a technical description of the physical object. But that quote is something worth writing down somewhere.
  - coldtea 11y ago
    It's written down here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNtgdspXypo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNtgdspXypo (NSFW) It's from a Louis C.K. routine.
pierrec 11y ago
So in countries where nutritionally varied food is not widely available, people are so reliant on cereal sources that they become afflicted by deficits in many nutrients. Doesn't have any easy solution. But the paper also raises multiple times the point that vegetarian diets tend to be too reliant on cereals, such as here: "Because the bioavailability of zinc from meat is four times greater than that from cereals [113], it is clear that the displacement of animal-based foods by cereal-grain- and plant-based diets is not only responsible for impaired zinc metabolism in developing countries, but also in western populations adopting vegetarian diets [114, 115]." It's so much easier to have a vaguely balanced nutrition when you add a bit of meat. It's also perfectly possible to have it as a vegetarian, but it really requires that you know what you're doing and that you make sure you get necessary nutrients. This can be challenging if you only use "traditional" food, but it's made easier by products like Vega powder (which I've been having recently, pretty good!), which specifically try to compensate frequent shortcomings of a vegan diet, or I suppose HN favorites like Soylent and Mealsquares. I'm not sure the last two are really appropriate as vegetarian complements, though.
- rancur 11y ago
  I, personally, began experiencing this myself. If I'm eating healthy, I can add in cereal. If I'm not, I feel physically horrible eating cereal. So I just avoid it and try to eat healthy meals all the time. Keeps my productivity and mood high, and you would not believe how good my skin looks when I've been eating plenty of vegetables for the last week.
  - magic_beans 11y ago
    Note: cereal grains are not "cereal" (I'm assuming you mean breakfast cereal)?
    - rancur 11y ago
      oh. yes. I don't read articles sorry I just comment. I'm from slashdot
      - feld 11y ago
        upvote for honesty
- bane 11y ago
  At the moment, believe it or not, Soylent is vegan. One thing I've noticed in lots of diet advocacy literature is that you'll find statements like "this nutrient is available in that food" without ever specifying the amount or how much you have to eat to make up for the lack of meat/gluten/whatever the diet is trying to keep you from eating. Quite often people will then build up meals in that diet thinking that they'll have all of the various nutrients they need, but it turns out it doesn't have sufficient concentrations of certain important ones. And you would have to eat multiple kilograms of the replacement food to get enough of the nutrient to be useful. The amount of nutrition and food science somebody has to know to live healthily on an alternative diet can sometimes be staggering.
  - GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
PhantomGremlin 11y ago
I know that multivitamin pills have bad rap in various circles. But the bioavailability of many simple vitamins is very high when given in tablet form. So what I'd really like to know is what happens with cereal / vegetarian / vegan diet plus cheap, easily available multivitamin and mineral supplement pills Maybe that's most of what's needed? The article does mention supplements, but only piecemeal. Of course, people still need protein. You won't get that from a cheap vitamin pill, and it's tricky to do right with a vegan diet. Fortunately I live in the USA and beef is relatively cheap. "Beef. It's what's for dinner". BTW I have vague recall of Northern vs Southern diets in the US Civil War. The claim was that this played an important part in the health and strength of the soldiers. The Union soldiers had more beef and wheat in their diets. The Confederate soldiers had more pork and corn. The Union won.
- Spooky23 11y ago
  The civil war claim is pretty weak. There was no refrigeration in those days (at least in the field). The soldier's provided nutrition mostly came from hardtack and salted pork/bacon/beef. They also had stuff like dried peas and beans. At some point the union soldiers had some access to condensed milk. The soldiers bought stuff (or were preyed upon) by various camp followers selling more stuff. Generally speaking, the South had a weak supply chain, so they were more often to go without. I think that fact spoke more to the eventual Union victory.... industrial economies can absorb more punishment than a agrarian slave economy.
- a_c_s 11y ago
  Bioavailability is rather complicated: for any given nutrient it can be enhanced by the presence of certain other nutrients but diminished by others. Your comment also ignores phytonutrients* (which includes flavonoids and some anti-oxidants) and the effects of diet on gut flora, both of which topics we are just beginning to understand. This is why, until we really understand the nitty-gritty of all of the hundreds (thousands?) of chemicals contained in food and how they interact, the best recommendations involve eating a variety of foods, both fresh and cooked. * http://extension.psu.edu/health/news/2012/the-importance-of-non-vitamins http://extension.psu.edu/health/news/2012/the-importance-of-...
caligastia 11y ago
There is a set of tools here that allow for a hyper-efficient lifestyle based on a new kind of wheat bread superfood: http://breadflower.com/ http://breadflower.com/
- iand675 11y ago
  You're kidding, right?
ComteDeLaFere 11y ago
Except... The Importance of Dietary Carbohydrate in Human Evolution http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/682587 http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/682587
- primroot 11y ago
  I cannot access that link, but I think it's important to note that the subject of the publication is mainly cereal grains (seeds of gramineae). Other sources of carbohydrates (such as root vegetables) have very different nutritional profiles (e.g. many are a source vitamin C). Chris Masterjohn has written about the consumption of starch among hunter-gatherers.

43 points by primroot 11y ago

quelsolaar 11y ago

Everything is a double-edged sword. Even a single-edge sword is a double-edged sword.

knodi123 11y ago
ouch, my brain.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
gyom 11y ago
Nice ! It's not really a paradox, though, because "being a double-edged sword" is a comparison that's being made with regards to the decision of using that particular single-edge sword. And "being a single-edge sword" here is a technical description of the physical object. But that quote is something worth writing down somewhere.
- coldtea 11y ago
  It's written down here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNtgdspXypo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNtgdspXypo (NSFW) It's from a Louis C.K. routine.

pierrec 11y ago

So in countries where nutritionally varied food is not widely available, people are so reliant on cereal sources that they become afflicted by deficits in many nutrients. Doesn't have any easy solution. But the paper also raises multiple times the point that vegetarian diets tend to be too reliant on cereals, such as here: "Because the bioavailability of zinc from meat is four times greater than that from cereals [113], it is clear that the displacement of animal-based foods by cereal-grain- and plant-based diets is not only responsible for impaired zinc metabolism in developing countries, but also in western populations adopting vegetarian diets [114, 115]." It's so much easier to have a vaguely balanced nutrition when you add a bit of meat. It's also perfectly possible to have it as a vegetarian, but it really requires that you know what you're doing and that you make sure you get necessary nutrients. This can be challenging if you only use "traditional" food, but it's made easier by products like Vega powder (which I've been having recently, pretty good!), which specifically try to compensate frequent shortcomings of a vegan diet, or I suppose HN favorites like Soylent and Mealsquares. I'm not sure the last two are really appropriate as vegetarian complements, though.

rancur 11y ago
I, personally, began experiencing this myself. If I'm eating healthy, I can add in cereal. If I'm not, I feel physically horrible eating cereal. So I just avoid it and try to eat healthy meals all the time. Keeps my productivity and mood high, and you would not believe how good my skin looks when I've been eating plenty of vegetables for the last week.
- magic_beans 11y ago
  Note: cereal grains are not "cereal" (I'm assuming you mean breakfast cereal)?
  - rancur 11y ago
    oh. yes. I don't read articles sorry I just comment. I'm from slashdot
    - feld 11y ago
      upvote for honesty
bane 11y ago
At the moment, believe it or not, Soylent is vegan. One thing I've noticed in lots of diet advocacy literature is that you'll find statements like "this nutrient is available in that food" without ever specifying the amount or how much you have to eat to make up for the lack of meat/gluten/whatever the diet is trying to keep you from eating. Quite often people will then build up meals in that diet thinking that they'll have all of the various nutrients they need, but it turns out it doesn't have sufficient concentrations of certain important ones. And you would have to eat multiple kilograms of the replacement food to get enough of the nutrient to be useful. The amount of nutrition and food science somebody has to know to live healthily on an alternative diet can sometimes be staggering.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago

PhantomGremlin 11y ago

I know that multivitamin pills have bad rap in various circles. But the bioavailability of many simple vitamins is very high when given in tablet form. So what I'd really like to know is what happens with cereal / vegetarian / vegan diet plus cheap, easily available multivitamin and mineral supplement pills Maybe that's most of what's needed? The article does mention supplements, but only piecemeal. Of course, people still need protein. You won't get that from a cheap vitamin pill, and it's tricky to do right with a vegan diet. Fortunately I live in the USA and beef is relatively cheap. "Beef. It's what's for dinner". BTW I have vague recall of Northern vs Southern diets in the US Civil War. The claim was that this played an important part in the health and strength of the soldiers. The Union soldiers had more beef and wheat in their diets. The Confederate soldiers had more pork and corn. The Union won.

Spooky23 11y ago
The civil war claim is pretty weak. There was no refrigeration in those days (at least in the field). The soldier's provided nutrition mostly came from hardtack and salted pork/bacon/beef. They also had stuff like dried peas and beans. At some point the union soldiers had some access to condensed milk. The soldiers bought stuff (or were preyed upon) by various camp followers selling more stuff. Generally speaking, the South had a weak supply chain, so they were more often to go without. I think that fact spoke more to the eventual Union victory.... industrial economies can absorb more punishment than a agrarian slave economy.
a_c_s 11y ago
Bioavailability is rather complicated: for any given nutrient it can be enhanced by the presence of certain other nutrients but diminished by others. Your comment also ignores phytonutrients* (which includes flavonoids and some anti-oxidants) and the effects of diet on gut flora, both of which topics we are just beginning to understand. This is why, until we really understand the nitty-gritty of all of the hundreds (thousands?) of chemicals contained in food and how they interact, the best recommendations involve eating a variety of foods, both fresh and cooked. * http://extension.psu.edu/health/news/2012/the-importance-of-non-vitamins http://extension.psu.edu/health/news/2012/the-importance-of-...

caligastia 11y ago

There is a set of tools here that allow for a hyper-efficient lifestyle based on a new kind of wheat bread superfood: http://breadflower.com/ http://breadflower.com/

iand675 11y ago
You're kidding, right?

ComteDeLaFere 11y ago

Except... The Importance of Dietary Carbohydrate in Human Evolution http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/682587 http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/682587

primroot 11y ago
I cannot access that link, but I think it's important to note that the subject of the publication is mainly cereal grains (seeds of gramineae). Other sources of carbohydrates (such as root vegetables) have very different nutritional profiles (e.g. many are a source vitamin C). Chris Masterjohn has written about the consumption of starch among hunter-gatherers.