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Nice sarcasm, but... >he had alarming levels of arsenic in his system (probably due to working with metal ores and copper extraction) Also, the argument here

by jere 13y ago

Nice sarcasm, but... >he had alarming levels of arsenic in his system (probably due to working with metal ores and copper extraction) Also, the argument here that "since he wasn't eating a modern diet and still had health problems, we can't blame health problems on our modern diet" is somewhat silly. Diets like paleo are clearly against grains, which Otzi definitely ate (for all we know, that was most of his diet [1]... this guy was alive long after the advent of agriculture). Paleo (and similar diet) proponents would tell you that the cause of his gallstones and bad teeth were a high grain diet. To be clear, I'm not arguing that those claims are accurate, only that the logic in the OP doesn't directly counter such claims. Furthermore, the short life expectancy argument already being trotted out in this thread is pure bull. Life expectancy, which was mainly low due to infant mortality, dropped when agriculture was introduced and didn't recover until last century: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy#Life_expectancy_variation_over_time http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy#Life_expectancy... [1] http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2012/04/lessons-from-otzi-tyrolean-ice-man-part_17.html http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2012/04/lessons-from-o...

bane 13y ago
The figures provided in WP are for a 1961 Encyclopaedia Britannica (EB). Modern studies of contemporary primitive people groups shows markedly different life expectancy figures and reasoning. For example the neolithic life expectancy drop is now not considered to have been as severe attributed to communicable diseases introduced by domesticating livestock not grain introduction -- I'd add that our sample size of Neolithic dead people is also pitifully small. Another easy to research example, we know from historic records that life expectancy in 19th century Ireland was near the top of the table you provided in WP, but was considered quite low for the time period in Western Europe. Other data shows that by 1900 U.S. life expectancy was already ~50 which is almost double the figure provided by EB. Another way to think about it is, unless humans rapidly developed an ability to handle grains in the last couple hundred years, life expectancy should still be at or around historic numbers, not at around double. People should still be dropping dead from diets of grains, but they don't. So an external causal agent other than grains (livestock domestication, introduction of alcohol, large scale warfare, highly virulent diseases) must be the logical conclusion. The figures are off for Classical Rome as well. Depending on your social class life expectancy was around 40 for the lower classes and around 60 for the upper classes. Other studies show that if a child made it through their first 5 years, they could be expected to live to around 50 regardless of social class. It wasn't considered unusual to see people in their 60s and even early 70s even if the percentage of population in those ages was much smaller than today. But of course documentation isn't very good either leading to those conflicting figures. Another case, Australia spent about 30 years trying to get the life expectancy of Aboriginals up to any kind of reasonable number. I believe the gap when they started studying it was about 20 years. Grains were not causing non-Aboriginals to drop dead before their Aboriginal hunter gatherer neighbors. I'm generally suspicious of any expectancy tables for any population that don't start at around 35-40 for any time period. Numbers lower than that are almost always the cause of a catastrophic external factor like the Black Death. There are pitifully few well documented populations where life expectancy isn't at least in the 40s. This goes for hunter gatherer tribes to the most war-torn inhospitable genocide suffering places on the planet with access to virtually no healthcare and unbelievable infant mortality rates but plenty of grains. The introduction of a staple bearing diet had little effect on life expectancy numbers directly, but enabled other advances which did.
- Nimi 13y ago
  You're clearly very well informed on the subject, but could I question your last line: How do we know grains had little effect on life expectancy directly? Maybe it had a noticeable effect, that was cancelled by those other advances?
- jere 13y ago
  Excellent comment. I agree with pretty much everything and wasn't trying to say grains lowered life expectancy, rather just fighting against the notion that life expectancy has constantly increased since we were hunter gatherers. Again, I wasn't trying to argue for this, but I wouldn't discount diet as a factor completely. I've heard it suggested that some of the first agricultural societies were extremely malnourished because they depended too heavily on grains. Obviously, they didn't have fortified foods or supermarkets like we do today. I don't see why an extreme malnutrition (in vitamins/minerals, not calories) couldn't be a factor.
  - bane 13y ago
    I agree with malnutrition. In fact, many modern societies are malnourished due to lack of vitamins/minerals in the local staple. It's one of the reasons flour and cereals are usually "fortified". And in Asia, significant R&D efforts are not unusual to get rice to be more nutritious based on deficiencies in the local population. [1] The problem I have is that grains are pointed to be alternative diet folks as some kind great evil by itself based on dubious claims around unsubstantiated reasoning. Like I said, some external factor is more likely the issue. http://www.grandchallenges.org/ImproveNutrition/Challenges/NutrientRichPlants/Pages/Rice.aspx http://www.grandchallenges.org/ImproveNutrition/Challenges/N...

by jere 13y ago

bane 13y ago

The figures provided in WP are for a 1961 Encyclopaedia Britannica (EB). Modern studies of contemporary primitive people groups shows markedly different life expectancy figures and reasoning. For example the neolithic life expectancy drop is now not considered to have been as severe attributed to communicable diseases introduced by domesticating livestock not grain introduction -- I'd add that our sample size of Neolithic dead people is also pitifully small. Another easy to research example, we know from historic records that life expectancy in 19th century Ireland was near the top of the table you provided in WP, but was considered quite low for the time period in Western Europe. Other data shows that by 1900 U.S. life expectancy was already ~50 which is almost double the figure provided by EB. Another way to think about it is, unless humans rapidly developed an ability to handle grains in the last couple hundred years, life expectancy should still be at or around historic numbers, not at around double. People should still be dropping dead from diets of grains, but they don't. So an external causal agent other than grains (livestock domestication, introduction of alcohol, large scale warfare, highly virulent diseases) must be the logical conclusion. The figures are off for Classical Rome as well. Depending on your social class life expectancy was around 40 for the lower classes and around 60 for the upper classes. Other studies show that if a child made it through their first 5 years, they could be expected to live to around 50 regardless of social class. It wasn't considered unusual to see people in their 60s and even early 70s even if the percentage of population in those ages was much smaller than today. But of course documentation isn't very good either leading to those conflicting figures. Another case, Australia spent about 30 years trying to get the life expectancy of Aboriginals up to any kind of reasonable number. I believe the gap when they started studying it was about 20 years. Grains were not causing non-Aboriginals to drop dead before their Aboriginal hunter gatherer neighbors. I'm generally suspicious of any expectancy tables for any population that don't start at around 35-40 for any time period. Numbers lower than that are almost always the cause of a catastrophic external factor like the Black Death. There are pitifully few well documented populations where life expectancy isn't at least in the 40s. This goes for hunter gatherer tribes to the most war-torn inhospitable genocide suffering places on the planet with access to virtually no healthcare and unbelievable infant mortality rates but plenty of grains. The introduction of a staple bearing diet had little effect on life expectancy numbers directly, but enabled other advances which did.

Nimi 13y ago
You're clearly very well informed on the subject, but could I question your last line: How do we know grains had little effect on life expectancy directly? Maybe it had a noticeable effect, that was cancelled by those other advances?
jere 13y ago
Excellent comment. I agree with pretty much everything and wasn't trying to say grains lowered life expectancy, rather just fighting against the notion that life expectancy has constantly increased since we were hunter gatherers. Again, I wasn't trying to argue for this, but I wouldn't discount diet as a factor completely. I've heard it suggested that some of the first agricultural societies were extremely malnourished because they depended too heavily on grains. Obviously, they didn't have fortified foods or supermarkets like we do today. I don't see why an extreme malnutrition (in vitamins/minerals, not calories) couldn't be a factor.
- bane 13y ago
  I agree with malnutrition. In fact, many modern societies are malnourished due to lack of vitamins/minerals in the local staple. It's one of the reasons flour and cereals are usually "fortified". And in Asia, significant R&D efforts are not unusual to get rice to be more nutritious based on deficiencies in the local population. [1] The problem I have is that grains are pointed to be alternative diet folks as some kind great evil by itself based on dubious claims around unsubstantiated reasoning. Like I said, some external factor is more likely the issue. http://www.grandchallenges.org/ImproveNutrition/Challenges/NutrientRichPlants/Pages/Rice.aspx http://www.grandchallenges.org/ImproveNutrition/Challenges/N...