> There is a lot of evidence beginning to emerge on the value of fasting. This was once encoded in culture as almost every culture had some concept of fasting.

> There is a lot of evidence beginning to emerge on the value of fasting. This was once encoded in culture as almost every culture had some concept of fasting. This is a cultural rift between Western Europe and everyone else. I grew up in Eastern Europe (now I live in the US), and fasting was not an extraordinary concept in that culture, by any means. But I keep noticing how controversial it is in the West. I could probably speculate on the influence of material wealth on culture, and so on, but there's probably not much of a point here. > I found fasting became much easier after I changed my diet to be ketogenic. You don't need to go that far. Fasting is easy when you don't do any kind of alimentary excess in general. I think the whole keto concept is just the pendulum swinging all the way to the other side. I guess it will settle in the middle at some point. Eat a bit of everything, nothing in excess, make sure to not miss the greens and the fruits, etc. Self-control and self-limiting are things that we all need to re-train ourselves for - and not just when it comes to food. --- Anyway, I'm far more interested in studies regarding the effects of fasting on the brain. Traditionally, it was used in a spiritual context, by people who, for lack of a better term, were consciousness hackers. Fasting seemed to enable that process, whatever the mechanism. I'm also very curious about the effects of fasting, if any, on neurodegenerative diseases.