3 ms·

What about all of the exceptions? The general approach to exceptions is that exceptions exist and yes, it is impossible to eat 100% foods that the paleolithic

by Evgeny 14y ago

What about all of the exceptions? The general approach to exceptions is that exceptions exist and yes, it is impossible to eat 100% foods that the paleolithic man ate. Obviously even modern cows or pigs did not exist 20K years ago. And one can argue that wild fish / game is also not the same cause they evolved somewhat. So, the approach is that while the ideal is 100%, the real goal is not to reach it, but to gradually come closer. I.e. eliminating sugars, white bread, sodas, vegetable oils is probably already ~70% of the way or more. Olives are treated to make them less bitter. Is curing or fermenting permissible, or does one eat only the olives which can be eaten without processing? Well, my personal approach is that fresh/cooked is OK, and then, the more processing is done, the farther we are away from ideal. So, along the lines of fruit > fresh fruit juice > reconstituted fruit juice > fruit drink > water with dissolved fructose. That's not "scientific" and I'm not aiming to prove it. By your logic, you've given up on coffee, chocolate, and alcohol, right? No paleolithic person ever tasted a drop of whiskey. That would be ideal, though I haven't reached that point yet. I'm not even sure I will seriously try to eliminate all those by 100% - but any reduction will be beneficial.

dalke 14y ago
It seems then that your scale is not what people of the paleo era could get (in an abstract sense, because until 500 years ago, no one on the planet could have had a slice of tomato with a leaf of basil on top), but rather that you want to minimize the number of processing steps involved in the food you eat. That latter goal is much easier for me to understand, and even support, though I wonder if corn, being the result of 5,000 years of directed evolution, is more processed than beer. Take for example alcohol. There's good genetic evidence that humans have evolved to better handle alcohol. Eg, "The studies on human ADH (alcohol dehydrogenase) gene have suggested Darwinian positive selection on the genetic variation of ADH1B His47 [52–54]. Alcohol consumption is a recent agriculture-related life style, and the adaptive selection has begun about 10 Kya" http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijeb/2011/484769/ http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijeb/2011/484769/ During the Babylonian era, "a daily ration of beer was provided for all citizens, the amount depending on one's social status" and "it was sometimes used to pay workers as part of their daily wages." During the Middle Ages it was safer to drink than water. And that's the point of the linked-to criticism - 20,000 years is long enough that our genetics are different than humans of the same era. We've evolved to better handle starch, to better handle drinking milk as an adult, and to drink alcohol. To choose a paleo diet on the belief that it better fits our genetics sounds like it denies the evidence that our genetics have changed since then.

by Evgeny 14y ago

dalke 14y ago

It seems then that your scale is not what people of the paleo era could get (in an abstract sense, because until 500 years ago, no one on the planet could have had a slice of tomato with a leaf of basil on top), but rather that you want to minimize the number of processing steps involved in the food you eat. That latter goal is much easier for me to understand, and even support, though I wonder if corn, being the result of 5,000 years of directed evolution, is more processed than beer. Take for example alcohol. There's good genetic evidence that humans have evolved to better handle alcohol. Eg, "The studies on human ADH (alcohol dehydrogenase) gene have suggested Darwinian positive selection on the genetic variation of ADH1B His47 [52–54]. Alcohol consumption is a recent agriculture-related life style, and the adaptive selection has begun about 10 Kya" http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijeb/2011/484769/ http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijeb/2011/484769/ During the Babylonian era, "a daily ration of beer was provided for all citizens, the amount depending on one's social status" and "it was sometimes used to pay workers as part of their daily wages." During the Middle Ages it was safer to drink than water. And that's the point of the linked-to criticism - 20,000 years is long enough that our genetics are different than humans of the same era. We've evolved to better handle starch, to better handle drinking milk as an adult, and to drink alcohol. To choose a paleo diet on the belief that it better fits our genetics sounds like it denies the evidence that our genetics have changed since then.