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Honey throws a huge wrench in the paleo argument: it's essentially a 100% processed/refined sugar of which the Hadza in particular consume huge amounts with no

Honey throws a huge wrench in the paleo argument: it's essentially a 100% processed/refined sugar of which the Hadza in particular consume huge amounts with no ill effect. Matter of fact seems to be that if you can use the calories, there is nothing wrong with getting them separate from nutrients. A highly active person might need twice as many calories as his sedentary twin but only 20-30% more nutrients to sustain himself, and the difference can pretty much come from anywhere. You can see the same phenomenon in elite athletes: Andre Agassi for instance ran almost exclusively on candy and McDonalds for most of his career. How relevant is this for most of us? Very little. We'll do better eating more "primitive" foods and less processed ones etc etc.

whiddershins 4y ago
Honey and table sugar are not the same. In honey the fructose and glucose are side by side but not chemically joined (monosaccharides) in sucrose they are joined together (disaccharide) these require different gut bacteria to break down and can plausibly have different biological effects when consumed.
- jdhn 4y ago
  I take it that having the fructose and glucose side by side is OK, but with sucrose being joined together that's bad?
  - whiddershins 4y ago
    For some people. In theory.
- crazygringo 4y ago
  But honey and HFCS (high-fructose corn syrup) ARE the same, for all practical purposes nutritionally. Honey is basically concentrated Coca-Cola. And HFCS is popularly demonized even more than sugar is... so I'm not sure what your point is.
  - mementomorti 4y ago
    What about other stuff in honey, such as microbiome content?
    - SamoyedFurFluff 4y ago
      Genuinely confused here: honey has antimicrobial properties. What micro biome content??
vixen99 4y ago
As you concede we shouldn't take away too many lessons from the Hadza unless we too hunt for our food with hand-made bows and arrows and forage for edible plants. Takes lots of calories to do that, calories which don't lie around waiting to be turned into fat. A point you make about other very active people. No ill effect due to diet? Not sure about that given their life span though of course causes of death may be entirely unrelated to diet especially with their tough life style. We should also remember our very varied genetic inheritance as illustrated in stories of the 'my grandfather smoked like a chimney and died at 93' genre. True in my case but it's a risky bet to assume you've got the same genes. https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/hadza https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/hadza
e44858 4y ago
They ate honeycomb, which is very different from the refined honey you’d find in a grocery store. Comb has large amounts of protein from pollen and bee larvae.
- SamoyedFurFluff 4y ago
  You actually don’t eat bee larvae when you’re eating honeycomb. bees separate out their hives so certain sections have honey, certain sections have larvae, etc. Gathering and eating honeycomb mostly consists of selecting the primarily honey sections of comb. The comb itself has very little to no nutritional value, not even fiber.
samliebert 4y ago
Actually the Hadza DID suffer an ill-effect for all that honey they ate. I'll quote below what I wrote in a different thread that talked about this article: Something that the article fails to mention is that unlike the indigenous people who didn't consume as much honey (like Inuit before they were introduced to refined carbs) the Hadza had high incidence of dental caries among those who commonly ate honey: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5351833/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5351833/ "The unexpected discovery of high caries incidences for men in the bush is likely explained by heavy reliance on honey, and perhaps differential access to tobacco and marijuana." The Alaskan Inuits who didn't eat nearly as much carbs, had far fewer incidences of dental caries until the introduction of refined carbohydrates: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12/21/the-evolution-of-cavities/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12... "In 1965, the dietary intake was conducted by the ‘interview method’ plus personal observations when visiting all of the families during meal times. Bang and Kristoffersen ‘…contacted all of the Eskimos involved in the study questioning each individual in detail about what food and roughly how much of each food item he consumed in the course of the year’.1 The authors noted a dramatic increase in carbohydrate intake of ‘nearly 50%’ and a decrease in the intake of protein ‘by about 50%’ from 1955 to 1957 to 1965.1 This rise in the intake of carbohydrate was paralleled by an ‘almost 90% increase’ in the sum of decayed, missing and filled permanent teeth for primary teeth (from 3.0 to 5.6) and a fourfold increase in those >6 years old, ‘the percentage of caries-free persons had decreased from 74.5% to zero in 8 years…While 50% of the children in 1955–1957 had caries-free primary teeth all the children had decayed teeth in 1965…The most dramatic change was observed in individuals 30 years of age or older. In this previously caries-free group, all subjects had developed caries in 1965’.1 Thus, the Alaskan Inland Inuit that had subsided on a diet virtually devoid of carbohydrate for most of their life who did not have any dental caries between 1955 and 1957 had all developed dental caries by 1965; in the interim, the intake of carbohydrate had increased by 50%." Here's also an interesting sidenote regarding the evolution of cavities: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12/21/the-evolution-of-cavities/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12... "Stanhope and his colleagues were also able to pinpoint some of the genes that were important for Streptococcus mutans’s adaptation to civilization. Fourteen genes, for example, show signs of having experienced strong natural selection. Some of those evolved genes are essential for breaking down sugar. Others help the bacteria survive in the acidic conditions that arise in the mouth when we eat starches. Perhaps most intriguing of all the genes in Streptococcus mutans are the 148 that Stanhope and his colleagues found in every human strain, but in none of the related bacteria in the mouths of other animals. The best explanation for this is that Streptococcus mutans picked these 148 genes up from other species in our bodies. Once Streptococcus mutans grabbed these genes, it didn’t let them go. The function of the genes hints at their value. Some provide additional help at breaking down sugar. Others create more defenses against low pH. Others produce toxins that can kill off other species of bacteria that are competing with Streptococcus mutans for the spoils of civilization. These adaptations have made Streptococcus mutans spectacularly successful, and they’ve also provided us with a lot of misery. The cavities would be bad enough. Archaeological evidence indicates that cavities went from rare to common with the advent of agriculture. Making matters, worse, however, is the fact that when Streptococcus mutans gets into the bloodstream through the gums, it can make its way to the heart and cause problems there, too."

whiddershins 4y ago

Honey and table sugar are not the same. In honey the fructose and glucose are side by side but not chemically joined (monosaccharides) in sucrose they are joined together (disaccharide) these require different gut bacteria to break down and can plausibly have different biological effects when consumed.

jdhn 4y ago
I take it that having the fructose and glucose side by side is OK, but with sucrose being joined together that's bad?
- whiddershins 4y ago
  For some people. In theory.
crazygringo 4y ago
But honey and HFCS (high-fructose corn syrup) ARE the same, for all practical purposes nutritionally. Honey is basically concentrated Coca-Cola. And HFCS is popularly demonized even more than sugar is... so I'm not sure what your point is.
- mementomorti 4y ago
  What about other stuff in honey, such as microbiome content?
  - SamoyedFurFluff 4y ago
    Genuinely confused here: honey has antimicrobial properties. What micro biome content??

vixen99 4y ago

As you concede we shouldn't take away too many lessons from the Hadza unless we too hunt for our food with hand-made bows and arrows and forage for edible plants. Takes lots of calories to do that, calories which don't lie around waiting to be turned into fat. A point you make about other very active people. No ill effect due to diet? Not sure about that given their life span though of course causes of death may be entirely unrelated to diet especially with their tough life style. We should also remember our very varied genetic inheritance as illustrated in stories of the 'my grandfather smoked like a chimney and died at 93' genre. True in my case but it's a risky bet to assume you've got the same genes. https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/hadza https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/hadza

e44858 4y ago

They ate honeycomb, which is very different from the refined honey you’d find in a grocery store. Comb has large amounts of protein from pollen and bee larvae.

SamoyedFurFluff 4y ago
You actually don’t eat bee larvae when you’re eating honeycomb. bees separate out their hives so certain sections have honey, certain sections have larvae, etc. Gathering and eating honeycomb mostly consists of selecting the primarily honey sections of comb. The comb itself has very little to no nutritional value, not even fiber.

samliebert 4y ago

Actually the Hadza DID suffer an ill-effect for all that honey they ate. I'll quote below what I wrote in a different thread that talked about this article: Something that the article fails to mention is that unlike the indigenous people who didn't consume as much honey (like Inuit before they were introduced to refined carbs) the Hadza had high incidence of dental caries among those who commonly ate honey: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5351833/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5351833/ "The unexpected discovery of high caries incidences for men in the bush is likely explained by heavy reliance on honey, and perhaps differential access to tobacco and marijuana." The Alaskan Inuits who didn't eat nearly as much carbs, had far fewer incidences of dental caries until the introduction of refined carbohydrates: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12/21/the-evolution-of-cavities/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12... "In 1965, the dietary intake was conducted by the ‘interview method’ plus personal observations when visiting all of the families during meal times. Bang and Kristoffersen ‘…contacted all of the Eskimos involved in the study questioning each individual in detail about what food and roughly how much of each food item he consumed in the course of the year’.1 The authors noted a dramatic increase in carbohydrate intake of ‘nearly 50%’ and a decrease in the intake of protein ‘by about 50%’ from 1955 to 1957 to 1965.1 This rise in the intake of carbohydrate was paralleled by an ‘almost 90% increase’ in the sum of decayed, missing and filled permanent teeth for primary teeth (from 3.0 to 5.6) and a fourfold increase in those >6 years old, ‘the percentage of caries-free persons had decreased from 74.5% to zero in 8 years…While 50% of the children in 1955–1957 had caries-free primary teeth all the children had decayed teeth in 1965…The most dramatic change was observed in individuals 30 years of age or older. In this previously caries-free group, all subjects had developed caries in 1965’.1 Thus, the Alaskan Inland Inuit that had subsided on a diet virtually devoid of carbohydrate for most of their life who did not have any dental caries between 1955 and 1957 had all developed dental caries by 1965; in the interim, the intake of carbohydrate had increased by 50%." Here's also an interesting sidenote regarding the evolution of cavities: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12/21/the-evolution-of-cavities/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2012/12... "Stanhope and his colleagues were also able to pinpoint some of the genes that were important for Streptococcus mutans’s adaptation to civilization. Fourteen genes, for example, show signs of having experienced strong natural selection. Some of those evolved genes are essential for breaking down sugar. Others help the bacteria survive in the acidic conditions that arise in the mouth when we eat starches. Perhaps most intriguing of all the genes in Streptococcus mutans are the 148 that Stanhope and his colleagues found in every human strain, but in none of the related bacteria in the mouths of other animals. The best explanation for this is that Streptococcus mutans picked these 148 genes up from other species in our bodies. Once Streptococcus mutans grabbed these genes, it didn’t let them go. The function of the genes hints at their value. Some provide additional help at breaking down sugar. Others create more defenses against low pH. Others produce toxins that can kill off other species of bacteria that are competing with Streptococcus mutans for the spoils of civilization. These adaptations have made Streptococcus mutans spectacularly successful, and they’ve also provided us with a lot of misery. The cavities would be bad enough. Archaeological evidence indicates that cavities went from rare to common with the advent of agriculture. Making matters, worse, however, is the fact that when Streptococcus mutans gets into the bloodstream through the gums, it can make its way to the heart and cause problems there, too."