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We've known for decades that the western diet kills people (and increasingly so) and that traditional diets don't, yet nutrition science seems to be stuck in a

We've known for decades that the western diet kills people (and increasingly so) and that traditional diets don't, yet nutrition science seems to be stuck in a reductionist view of food, obsessed with finding the precise chemicals responsible for heart disease, diabetes, and all the other Western Diseases. Maybe this new study really has gotten to the bottom of heart disease, in which case we can all eat the newly re-formulated Low Glycemic Index Wonder Bread and carry on as usual. We'll be healthier, Food Industry will make another fortune, everyone's happy. Thought this would be a good opportunity to pimp the book: In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan. It's quite extraordinary if you are interested in your health (in the broadest sense of that word), food, and the history of Nutrition Science and the western diet.

grandalf 17y ago
Finally a rational comment! Nutrition is one of the areas where normally rational people (such as the typical HN reader) go totally off the deep end and rely on superstition, hearsay, herd mentality, group think, and whimsy. In general, most people (including people who are otherwise quite rational) do exactly what advertisers and corporate sponsors want when it comes to nutrition. There was a huge bombshell study a few years ago, documented in the book "The China Study" on the western diet (by a guy from Cornell). It should have made headlines. People should have thrown their meat and dairy into the garbage immediately... but nothing happened. Instead, ostensibly "health conscious" people convince themselves that there are "good fats" and ask themselves if they are getting enough protein. Most Americans are overweight and will end up with obesity, type II diabetes, heart disease, or colon cancer. Most vegetarians are overweight, pallid, and sick-looking (b/c they eat so much "good fat" -- more fat than McDonalds aficionados eat!). What it means for a human to eat optimally is well known and has been backed up by rigorous scientific research... why hasn't it made headlines? Because in this case it's too much work to think critically... it's not easy going against the grain of an entire society built upon destructive mythology with the nutrition establishment telling us to eat according to a harmful food pyramid, etc. So the whole "nutrition" industry is focused on convincing people that health is obtained by consuming or avoiding magic ingredients like "Omega 3s" or "turmeric" or "trans fats" or "mono unsaturated fats" or "whole grains" or "protein". All of this is at best minimally correlated or patently false. What's the difficult truth that nobody wants to hear? Animal protein causes disease. That means no meat, fish, milk, etc. The optimal human diet is plant based and should contain 80% carbs (as much of this unrefined as possible), 10% protein, and 10% fat). Fresh fruit has a few percent fat already, so very little extra fat is needed, even if it's so-called "good fat". If you're skeptical, read The China Study and then raid your fridge and cure your future cancer immediately :) notes: 1) humans can survive on lots of things including meats, cardboard, etc. b/c we evolved to survive in extreme conditions/habitats. That does not mean that all things we can digest are optimal for health. Also, it is trivial for any modern human to obtain sufficient calories only from optimal foods. 2) link to book (well worth the $10, read the reviews on Amazon): http://www.amazon.com/China-Study-Comprehensive-Nutrition-Implications/dp/1932100660/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1246067556&sr=8-1 http://www.amazon.com/China-Study-Comprehensive-Nutrition-Im...
- hachiya 17y ago
  I agree with your comment, and I want to clarify that Dr. T. Colin Campbell, author of "The China Study", is a Professor Emeritus at Cornell University, not MIT. He is likely the foremost nutritional researcher, not only of our time, but of history. The work he and his team did in the decades-long China Study research has not been paralleled. Some of the notable discoveries they made was that a particular protein found in dairy products, casein, enabled tumor growth. When removed from the diet, the tumors stopped. A similar tumor on/off mechanism was found with regards to the percentage of calories from protein in the diet. When the protein went over a certain threshold, tumor growth was enabled, but not at the lower levels.
  - grandalf 17y ago
    corrected the University name, thanks... :) Excellent summary of his work, btw. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be for him professionally to have exhibited all the courage he did in going against the status quo only to remain in relative obscurity. I guess great insights sometimes don't catch on right away.
    - hachiya 17y ago
      Yes, it seems he really went against the establishment thinking in those early years of his work, and even his own assumptions, as he grew up on a dairy farm. He and his team initially set out to "save the third world" by providing high quality animal protein. He was working in the Phillipines during this time, and as his work progressed, he started noticing that his initial assumptions about animal protein did not seem to be true. This was before the China Study research, and I do not know if it was covered in the book, but he talks about this in at least one talk that is available online. I think this is the talk here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1308977765978236346&ei=4ZRFSpWwPKHaqAKjlLiKBg&q=colin+campbell http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1308977765978236346... In addition to being sincere and extremely knowledgable about his subject matter, a characteristic of T. Colin Campbell is that, despite the respect and acclaim (more so in recent years) he has garnered, he comes across as quite humble.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
Retric 17y ago
Having read In Defense of food I would like to point out he does a vary poor job of defending his argument. The human body is one of the most complex systems on the planet suggesting we "Eat food, real food not to much mostly plants." is not particularly useful information. Nutritionist's have known for a long time that a pure corn diet is bad for you. What he is really attacking is the public perception of nutrition information which is far from the cutting edge of science. When NASA looks at nutrition they go far beyond the sound bite science and do a good job of supporting people in peek physical condition. The real problem is just eating one type of cheep food, with a long shelf life, that's easy to prepare, is bad for you in excess. But people already know that and it's not going to sell a book.
donaldc 17y ago
No doubt in 100 years or so nutrition science will finally get to the point of saying, in essence, prepare and eat foods that have a long tradition among groups of people who managed to stay in excellent health. I've gone ahead and started eating that way now. I'll be long dead before nutrition science actually comes up with dietary recommendations that they don't overhaul or reverse ten years later.

grandalf 17y ago

Finally a rational comment! Nutrition is one of the areas where normally rational people (such as the typical HN reader) go totally off the deep end and rely on superstition, hearsay, herd mentality, group think, and whimsy. In general, most people (including people who are otherwise quite rational) do exactly what advertisers and corporate sponsors want when it comes to nutrition. There was a huge bombshell study a few years ago, documented in the book "The China Study" on the western diet (by a guy from Cornell). It should have made headlines. People should have thrown their meat and dairy into the garbage immediately... but nothing happened. Instead, ostensibly "health conscious" people convince themselves that there are "good fats" and ask themselves if they are getting enough protein. Most Americans are overweight and will end up with obesity, type II diabetes, heart disease, or colon cancer. Most vegetarians are overweight, pallid, and sick-looking (b/c they eat so much "good fat" -- more fat than McDonalds aficionados eat!). What it means for a human to eat optimally is well known and has been backed up by rigorous scientific research... why hasn't it made headlines? Because in this case it's too much work to think critically... it's not easy going against the grain of an entire society built upon destructive mythology with the nutrition establishment telling us to eat according to a harmful food pyramid, etc. So the whole "nutrition" industry is focused on convincing people that health is obtained by consuming or avoiding magic ingredients like "Omega 3s" or "turmeric" or "trans fats" or "mono unsaturated fats" or "whole grains" or "protein". All of this is at best minimally correlated or patently false. What's the difficult truth that nobody wants to hear? Animal protein causes disease. That means no meat, fish, milk, etc. The optimal human diet is plant based and should contain 80% carbs (as much of this unrefined as possible), 10% protein, and 10% fat). Fresh fruit has a few percent fat already, so very little extra fat is needed, even if it's so-called "good fat". If you're skeptical, read The China Study and then raid your fridge and cure your future cancer immediately :) notes: 1) humans can survive on lots of things including meats, cardboard, etc. b/c we evolved to survive in extreme conditions/habitats. That does not mean that all things we can digest are optimal for health. Also, it is trivial for any modern human to obtain sufficient calories only from optimal foods. 2) link to book (well worth the $10, read the reviews on Amazon): http://www.amazon.com/China-Study-Comprehensive-Nutrition-Implications/dp/1932100660/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1246067556&sr=8-1 http://www.amazon.com/China-Study-Comprehensive-Nutrition-Im...

hachiya 17y ago
I agree with your comment, and I want to clarify that Dr. T. Colin Campbell, author of "The China Study", is a Professor Emeritus at Cornell University, not MIT. He is likely the foremost nutritional researcher, not only of our time, but of history. The work he and his team did in the decades-long China Study research has not been paralleled. Some of the notable discoveries they made was that a particular protein found in dairy products, casein, enabled tumor growth. When removed from the diet, the tumors stopped. A similar tumor on/off mechanism was found with regards to the percentage of calories from protein in the diet. When the protein went over a certain threshold, tumor growth was enabled, but not at the lower levels.
- grandalf 17y ago
  corrected the University name, thanks... :) Excellent summary of his work, btw. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be for him professionally to have exhibited all the courage he did in going against the status quo only to remain in relative obscurity. I guess great insights sometimes don't catch on right away.
  - hachiya 17y ago
    Yes, it seems he really went against the establishment thinking in those early years of his work, and even his own assumptions, as he grew up on a dairy farm. He and his team initially set out to "save the third world" by providing high quality animal protein. He was working in the Phillipines during this time, and as his work progressed, he started noticing that his initial assumptions about animal protein did not seem to be true. This was before the China Study research, and I do not know if it was covered in the book, but he talks about this in at least one talk that is available online. I think this is the talk here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1308977765978236346&ei=4ZRFSpWwPKHaqAKjlLiKBg&q=colin+campbell http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1308977765978236346... In addition to being sincere and extremely knowledgable about his subject matter, a characteristic of T. Colin Campbell is that, despite the respect and acclaim (more so in recent years) he has garnered, he comes across as quite humble.

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

Retric 17y ago

Having read In Defense of food I would like to point out he does a vary poor job of defending his argument. The human body is one of the most complex systems on the planet suggesting we "Eat food, real food not to much mostly plants." is not particularly useful information. Nutritionist's have known for a long time that a pure corn diet is bad for you. What he is really attacking is the public perception of nutrition information which is far from the cutting edge of science. When NASA looks at nutrition they go far beyond the sound bite science and do a good job of supporting people in peek physical condition. The real problem is just eating one type of cheep food, with a long shelf life, that's easy to prepare, is bad for you in excess. But people already know that and it's not going to sell a book.

donaldc 17y ago

No doubt in 100 years or so nutrition science will finally get to the point of saying, in essence, prepare and eat foods that have a long tradition among groups of people who managed to stay in excellent health. I've gone ahead and started eating that way now. I'll be long dead before nutrition science actually comes up with dietary recommendations that they don't overhaul or reverse ten years later.