Hi ...

Writing from Europe and using a not so good English.
I?ve written this message where I discuss a different approach to the paleolithic diet not as a criticism or an attack and neither pretending to possess the only truth on this topic.
I?ve researched a lot on the paleolithic diet and the contradictions of several dietary regimens called paleodiets.
Paleontologically and physiologically there are several discrepancies in suggested paleo diets.

Unable to find anything that summed up all those information and contradictions in a nutritional plan I tried to do it by myself and I would like to share my conclusions, discuss them with others and get further suggestions.

What I?ve often read about the paleolithic diet suggests a plan that can be summed up as a: lean meat and few lettuces leaves diet. (I know it's a generalization)

Even the paleodiet food pyramids I?ve seen suggest this approach.

But paleontologists like Richard Leakey and Jared Diamond in contraposition with Audette or Cordain say that humans in the paleolithic were not good hunters or big meat eaters.
The only "evidence" that humans were big meat eaters successfully hunting mammoths or whatnot and eating meat daily was the bones of animals found on paleo-band sites but they also, unlike plant matter that decays, are the only evidence we could have of their diet.
This plus some human ego and the Hollywood documentary history-textbook created the "myth" of man the hunter, hunting all the day and consuming huge amount of meat.

But new testing and DNA analysis methods (of fossil faeces) provide a different picture altogether where gathering of vegetables, fruits, seeds, nuts, sprouts and insects far from being a supplement to a meat diet was the staple playing the major role in the diet, and nutritionally a very important one. According to Diamond humans were more likely to be scavengers waiting for the leftover of larger and stronger predators.

Fish is another story. Skewering a fish with a stick is way easier than hunting, water is richer of non-aggressive fish compared to the land and its predator and fish is a rich source of nutrients. Several paleontologists theorize that humans settled their momentary sites near water and evolved along the rivers and the sea. This would explain our need for ALA, GLA, EPA, DHA which fish are the best source of. Fish intake was supposedly high in the Paleolithic, surely higher than meat which was according to Diamond around 15% of the dietary intake. Meat didn't play a major role in the diet.
The high bone density of paleolithic men suggests their calcium intake was more than twice the modern RDA. Without milk such amount of calcium could have been obtained only consuming an astonishingly amount of wild greens. New records suggest that humans in the paleolithic had seasonal access to more than 200 different kinds of fruit, vegetables and greens. While many of those types of plants are now extinct the oldest paleolithic site discovered in the Mediterranean regions is an area where fruits and vegetables of all kinds abound.

The average modern variety consumed is estimated to be 20 kinds of vegetables and fruits (of course, for many many people it is way less since 80% of vegetable and fruits consumption is estimated to be potatoes, especially fried, tomatoes and sugared jams and fruit juices)

Nuts are often overlooked and probably paleolithic humans ate more nuts than meat. What a Bushman considers the diet staple is not meat but nuts. Nuts and seeds of course.

And what about grains. While it's hard to deny that wheat is basically a non-food or a poison if you want, wild grains were not unknown to our paleolithic ancestors. It is in fact estimated by Leakey that sprouts had a role in the paleo-diet, wild grains and legumes were picked and stored till they sprouted. Sprouting would break down complex indigestible sugars and remove the toxins the plant creates to avoid being eaten before sprouting in order to defend its spreading and growing. Grains have been found on the fire ashes of early paleolithic groups sites. What we have left that could resemble wild grains and legumes are wild rice and lentils. If sprouted and cooked they could have a not so negligible role in a paleo-diet. Of course they are supposed to be side dish indeed like 30 grams of sprouted lentils supplementing a fish and veggies dish. Sprouted grains are a new different food than the grains they were with different nutritional content and characteristics and paleo compatible unlike wheat which is a non-food.

Eggs are another often neglected component of the paleo diet. Indirect tests suggests finding eggs on a nest was not that rare and that fresh eggs were often among the gathered food.

Fruits were an important staple far from being an after meal sneak fruit consumption was probably seasonally very high, indirect tests also suggest that when fruits is available the intake of fresh delicious fruits is high. Greens and fruits together in their fresh optimal nutrition condition covered the whole spectrum of needed vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and phytochemicals. While it's true that paleo-eaters consume probably more veggies than the SAD (standard American diet) counterpart, probably they don't meet the USDA recommended intake of 5 portions of vegetables and fruits and yet this recommended intake is a joke and nowhere near the level of fruits and wild green estimated paleolithic intake.

On the SAD nobody meet the RDA for minerals and vitamins and even those RDAs are jokes, the minimum requirement to avoid deficiency while in normal and stress less condition.
We need way more.

The new picture emerging from DNA tests and indirect tests and the put to rest Hollywood caveman great hunter clich? puts vegetables and berries at the base of the pyramid and fish at the second. This is the opposite of a lean beef, poultry and pork pyramid base with few veggies as side dish.

I remember seeing a typical Paleodiet food pyramid:
- - - - -- - -- --- - - -- - - -- - -
Lean poultry, beef and pork at the base
Fruits and vegetables at the center
Nuts and berries were at the top
- - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - -- -- - - -
Simplistic and according to the new picture emerging from DNA tests: wrong.
Another problem which is created in this pyramid other than the overlooked importance of (wild) green consumption is a diet very high in protein and moderate in fat.

It is quite correct that wild animals meat was low in fat (5-3%) and this plus the idea that we hunted all the day and ate huge amount of meat would suggest a moderate-low fat diet and very high protein diet.

However Paleolithic diet was probably very high in fat, higher than SAD 30% of fat in the diet and quite moderate in protein. A Bushman consumes on average 2.200 calories and 90-100 grams of protein. While it is about twice the RDA for protein it can still be considered a moderate protein consumption. No doubt the RDA underestimates the importance of protein as we're usually suggested the amount which is necessary not to be in negative hydrogen balance which like the RDA for vitamins and minerals is the minimum to avoid deficiency not the ideal or desirable amount. If modern hunter-gatherers protein consumption range from 19% to 30% estimated protein consumption for the paleolithic is between 20-25%.
And according to Dec Twohig only 25% of the total protein intake would come from meat.

As for fat just because wild animals had flesh that was low in fat it doesn't mean the diet was low in fat. Hunter-gatherers usually have the habit of ignoring the lean meat and consuming the animal fat and the organs. Also, meat and hunting did not have a major role in the diet and unlike meat the animal product most consumed was fish especially fatty fish, shellfish and fish rich in EFA. Evidence suggests an intake of fat-fish way higher than the modern average. Consumption of fish in the paleolithic was estimated to be five times higher than nowadays and meat consumption, especially lean meat trimmed of the fat way lower not only of the modern average but of the average paleo-eater. Not to mention the fats from the high intake of nuts and seed. Not only the paleodiet was high in fat but it was probably high in saturated fat too.

continue to part two in the next post ----->

continued from previous post ----->


While this is just a personal interpretation I think we have an instinctive fat craving.
Remember for a moment the "old" grains, like a dish of cooked-steamed pearled barley.
Quite bland isn't it?
Let's add some spices, split peas, carrots, onions...
No. Still bland and hard to swallow
But let's cook the barley and veggies in half litre of milk; let's add some melted butter and cream. Suddenly it becomes wonderfully tasty spoon after spoon.

Joseph Piscatella claims that that desire for sweets like chocolate chips, pies, ice cream, desserts, cr?me br?l?e is actually a biological craving for fat (fat consumption triggers the release of cholecistokinin which controls the appetite and the "full stomach response")
Such natural craving can be explained with the importance of fat in the diet.
Not only in the minimum RDA for LA, ALA, DHA, EPA and GLA but also for their roles in calcium absorption, cellular turnover, hormone production and proper EFA retention.
Traditional diets just as the paleo-diet probably was are rich in fats. Fish, shellfish, meat-fat, nuts or tropical fruits like avocados and coconuts.

I believe high fat consumption is what gives to people the "youthful" fresh look, the soft, smooth and moisturized skin (or hair) (which can be occasionally observed in traditional non-starving and non-industrialized populations) and in my experience the Ornish diet low fat levels, the deficiency or inadequate intake of EFA (low intake of nuts and fish and high intake of margarine and cold pressed oils) results in dehydrated and cracked skin or hair, dull complexion and or emaciated faces.

Many indirect tests would suggest a paleo diet is 50% animal food and 50% plant food.
However, lack of milk and huge intake of calcium rich greens would suggest a seasonally higher intake of plant food.

Fat intake would range between 30% and 45%
Carbohydrate would range 25% to 40% (hardly a very low carb diet, for a Bushman 2200 calories diet it would equate to 150-200 grams of carbs)

Frying although paleo-compatible is never a good idea for the transformative processes occurring when fat is heated at high temperatures. Often overlooked in its toxic compounds forming danger in all diets cooking can be a potential hazard. Since wheat and potatoes are lacking in the paleo-diet acrylamide is not a problem but still frying, grilling, roasting, backing and dry-cooking should be avoided in favour of boiling, steaming, pressure-cooking and liquid-cooking. Probably the healthiest and less toxic method of cooking is "soup-cooking". If we cook vegetables, greens, meat and fish in soup with low heating, the nutrients are retained in the liquid, toxic elements formation we have in frying, roasting, baking and grilling is prevented and phytochemicals and antioxidants are absorbed more easily.

Another good idea to increase the consumption of greens credited to Dr. Gian Cursio is "blended salads". Greens and or wild greens blended with nuts and or fruits to make a creamy smoothy that can be drunk. It's worth repeating that three asparagus, a salad with a tomato and 50 grams of lettuce and an apple daily is nothing not only if compared to what the paleolithic intake of greens and fruit was (especially as a source of calcium) but also to what "we" know of the ideal intake of diseases preventing and body processes assisting phytochemicals and antioxidants.

So here's the food pyramid I think best represents the diet of the paleolithic, the natural diet for humans and the healthiest choices compatible with such diet
------------------------------------------------------------
(wild) greens and berries at the base
fish (shellfish) and fruits at the second place
nuts (seeds) and eggs third place
fatty meat fourth place
sprouts and roots at the top
-----------------------------------------
The paleo-diet is the healthiest diet possible imo with the potential of preventing and reversing diseases but the opposite imo can be true too if by paleodiet we mean the wrong mythological paradigm of the big hunter resulting in a diet were lean meat is over consumed, greens are under consumed, high intake of fats from nuts and fish is lacking, calcium intake is low, phytochemicals intake is low, fat soluble vitamins intake is inadequate and so is vitamins and minerals intake.

A good first step would be trying to consume at least 1 pound of raw vegetables and 1 pound of cooked vegetables (and this still would be lower than a green intake in the paleolithic) So instead of a recommended 5 portions of veggies and fruits it can be useful to think of 5 portions per meal. Greens should be eaten with all the meals, so not a salad a day ... but a salad with every meal. Blended salads also help and have a powerful effect on one's health.

It's hard nowadays to simply eat "instinctively" without making errors.
A good idea could be to keep the nutrient content of one's paleo diet under control with some nutrition analysis software of website like fitday.
But not macronutrients as is usually suggested, there's no need to pay attention to macronutrients, but micronutrients.
Minerals, fat soluble vitamins and water soluble vitamins.
Calcium, zinc, selenium, magnesium, potassium, iron, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamins A, vitamin E, B complex and so on trying to have an higher intake than the inadequate rda for those elements.

Relying on supplements is not a good idea either; supplements I believe may have a role but only to supplement an already adequate intake of elements and not to substitute them. Vitamins and minerals act synergistically and need the presence of other elements (usually provided by the whole plant or either animal food) to be utilized properly, many need phytochemicals that assists the processes of absorption and utilization and phytochemicals are not in the multis we buy. Trying to feed purified food to humans and add back synthetic vitamins and minerals through supplementation have been scientifically tried before and never worked.

In health
Davide

this is some good information and makes total sense. i've always thought that our intro to meat (and jerky) was by scavenging off other beasts kills. and seasonally the diet would absolutely change. i doubt if we did much hunting in fall when nuts are readily available. i have seen, even currently, tribes that put their entire beast over a fire....no boiling vessels. i guess it depends on whats available. i don't doubt that the carb intake must've changed with each season, though. i mean why bother to hunt if it is not necessary. from what i understand, humans were always pretty 'lazy' and would eat whats available. of course if you lived in more southern hemispheres there would be more vegetation. but did early humans live in climates where there was real winter? that must be the reason for fire, clothing, etc. and is the move northward what prompted the inclusion of grain/legume in the diet? i mean why bother with something that need even the preparation of sprouting when one can just eat what's available?

Davide's piece is very well-written, and I agree with most of the things he's saying. Actually I think that the term "paleo" is quite deceiving and misleading. Not only our foods are no longer the same as far as their constitution is concerned, but also our ways of producing, storing and distributing them are very different. Also, our lifestyle and temperament are different from those of "golden" times. So I'm quite reluctant to say I follow a paleo diet. I'd rather say I follow a paleoish diet, or low-carb, or simply a healthy diet, although this may sound a little pretentious.

Moreover, I think that we should perhaps reserve say 15% (no more) of our diet to modern foods, such as grains and by-products. I know that grains are much ill-spoken these days, and some people compare them to arsenic. Well, not too much and not too little. There are less harmful grains (rice) and ways of using them that will add variety and flexibility to your diet, if you want. By the way, a real paleo diet would necessarily include bugs and insects and probably also periods of starvation.

This may sound heretical to say here, but in the same way as you eat animal foods and use fire to cook your food as a direct or symbolic link to the rise of the human being from the primates, you should use a little (very little indeed) amount of the best grains out there as a reminder of the rise of civilization (please forget the Eskimoes for a while). Whether you love (modern) civilization or not, you can't deny you are a son or daughter of civilization. So, wouldn't you act accordingly?

Regards,

Jos? Carlos

Thanks for your replies!
There are a few other considerations that should be factored

I've been told that meat must have necessarily played a huge role in the diet of paleolithic humans because they could have not found enough time to gather food all day. We already work 45 hours weekly on average how much should have humans worked if they needed to gather enough fruits, veggies and nuts to feed everyone? Unfortunately for them they got it all wrong.

Jared Diamond studied modern hunter-gatherer societies. Year round the diet of the populations studied by Diamond consume 2400 calories per person, 120 grams of protein and by weight their diet was 80% fruits and vegetables. They worked 12 hours weekly to gather and fish enough food the rest was free time. In other words the ability to store, process, refine foods and to have lot of meat available at the market turned us into animals that require six time more work than before. And we're talking about one of the arid and poor zone of the earth (since that's where they were exiled when agriculture took the power), just imagine how much more food in way less time could they gather in a food rich zone.

Another important aspect that puts into perspective those findings according to which the gathered food had a much more important nutritional role than the scavenged meat is our need to maintain a neat alkaline balance. Acidosis has negative effects on the metabolism, on the bones, on digestion, on aging and promote cancers.
There are two direct problems: first an acid overload slowly destroys the body, inflame its tissues and impair its function but on second place the body will always try to buffer the acid overload by pulling calcium from the bones and the teeth.
The paleolithic humans had high bone density. If their diet were net acidic that could have not been possible. Their diet promoted a net alkaline balance which is possible only when two condition are met: there must be an high intake of dark leafy vegetables and fruits and fruits, nuts and vegetables must be more than twice the amount of meat.
We've been misled into believing that lack of calcium causes osteoporosis but those populations that consume less calcium have also less osteoporosis. This doesn't mean of course which is the calcium that causes osteoporosis but to get so much calcium one has to consume much dairy products which are also acidic, to get less calcium but still a relevant amount one has to get those calcium from veggies or broths which are alkaline and hence prevent osteoporosis.

Let's talk about Innuits(Eskimos): their diet is very high in meat and very high in calcium. The rate of osteoporosis is very high and not the rate of the modern innuits but the traditional innuits. Stefansoon itself reported this when he said that women who were 60 years old seemed as old as western women seemed at 80 and that an innuit life span was 10 years shorted than that of westerns. The acid overload caused by a massive consumption of meat and an inadequate consumption of vegetables, fruits and nuts eroded their bones and tissues and highly accelerated the aging process.
Researches have found out that those Inuits that consume 2000 mg of calcium daily and follow a traditional diet have an high rate of osteoporosis, in fact the highest worlwide (Am J Nutr 1974;27:1916)
The truth is that Inuits diet is not suited for human consumption and although they have adapted partly to it they never adapted completely to such diet. Inuits after lot of generations of consuming such a diet still suffer the negative effects of it. Traditional Inuits suffered and suffer from liver enlargement. And this is spite of evidences of a physiological and genetical adaptation to the environment and climate of the arctic that would provide Innuits with a different and optimal for cold climate body fat distribution, higher metabolism and circularoty system differences.

Their diet was/is too high in omega-3 fats (a very high intake of omega-3 fats is dangerous) which would cause a condition were even nose bleeding can't be stopped and can be fatal.

Not only there's a genetical long term adaptation but it appears to be also a momentary physiological adpation. People who have spent time in the Innuits regions reported how they not only didn't suffer the cold climate but were able to consume a diet loaded with animal fats and organs without suffering any adverse effect. When attempting to consume the same diet once back at home they would get dangerously sick after few days.Several nutrients would be lacking in a diet resembling the Innuit one but that the Innuits can obtain not only by consuming certain kind of arctic animals that have a different nutritional profile that the meat we know (caribou meat is richer in vitamin C than orange) but consuming it raw and organs included.

Innuit would consume daily the stomach content of the hunted Caribous high in pre-digested or fermented plant matter (carbs therefore) or algae.
There's still controversy whether Innuits could have a source of wild cold climate fruits

Bottom line: not only their diet is not even as only meat as we have been told but they're negatively affected even by a diet which is not 100% meat in spite of an a short term climate and long term physiological adapation that the rest of the world doesn't have.


I have heard people trying to emulate the Innuit diet by consuming just grilled steak. That would kill them in less than two weeks.
Bottom line: want to try to eat like a triditional Innuit? Goes and live in the arctic, let your body physiology adapt (partially) to the environment and the climate, hunt your Caribous and eat them whole and raw and wait for the pros and cons of such a diet.

Clearly a diet that naturally takes into account our sweet tooth, the abundance of plants foods, our anatomical skills (climbing, grasping, picking up, breaking, peeling) would be enough net alkaline producing to naturally leave room for the right amount of animal products and animal fats. Hence even eating pure saturated animal fat wouldn't be something to calculate grams by grams with a scales. Have a net alkaline producing diet and everything sorts out by itself. But what about the saturated fat phobia?

If you agree with what I've written from the beginning of this thread (not just this post) then we can clearly see the cons of the standard paleolithic diet. It replaces a natural alkaline producing, rich in EFA, vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals, naturally rich in vitamin C we can't produce and need so much, calcium and water, providing enough glucose without relying on gluconeogenesis (whose byproduct inflame and toxify the body tissues) and devoid of toxic byproducts of hard cooking being mostly raw and gently cooked for meat, meat and more meat (hard cooked) a lettuce leaf and an apple as snack which would would dissolve calcium from bone and teeth, cause an acid overload ,dehydration, calcium and vitamin C deficiency which would be deficient of several minerals, vitamins and phytochemical which would provide unadequate amount of EFA and which would force the body to get glucose from burning proteins stressing this emergency mechanism and overloading the metabolism with the byproduct of such incomplete burning and which would provide the toxic byproduct of hard cooking fats and meats. But such a diet also diverges from the natural paleo in another important way: the meat consumed is mostly lean or trimmed.

But saturated fat is not the poison we may believe. Our body in fact turn most of the fat we consume into saturated fat even if we consume monounsaturated and polynsaturated fat. The body does this because it needs that saturated fat and it will get it one way or another either by converting sugars to fat, either by converting other fats to saturated fat.
The human body is 45% saturated fat and it contains in other words more saturated fat than lard!
Although convertion convertion of carbohydrates into fats may occur the convertion of protein into fats is not as effective and the byproducts of such convertion are higly toxic. Imagine a diet comprised mostly of lean meat. The rest is a little 10% of lettuce and a plum. We would have not enough carbohydrates to get fat from them, not enough fat in itself and would rely on protein while we're also relying on them for the creation of glucose, this not only empair both would functions one of which is already ineffective by itself but would also toxify the body with the byproducts of both gluconeogenesis and liponeogenesis paths.

Don Matesz uses an effective analogy. Since our body is 45% saturated fat when we're fasting at night or between meals our body essentially run on saturated fat, on human lard which is more saturated than animal lard.
The resting muscles, heart and liver prefer saturated fat as fule.
Hence: it's impossible to keep your blood vessels clear of saturated fatty acids. Since all animals store saturated fats for when no food is available, including while sleeping or between meals, it's extremely unlikely that saturated fats are intrinsically toxic.

But of course is simpler than that.
When an alkaline producing diet is consumed meat will always be more than half the amount of nuts, vegetables and fruits. When such amount of meat or animal food is sorted by itself the amount of protein and fats and saturated fats is also sorted by itself.

Davide

hmmm. we've been lead to believe that the innuit are hardy, healthy, long lived, etc. low carbers use them as example. i agree that a paleo diet should include a wide range of foods that we can hunt/gather. and i don't believe that we 'should' eat grain in order to honor our advancement. we could end up using that for everything and there we'd be, right where we are now....eating processed foods and fighting this wide array of disease that came along with it. anyway, is it possible that the innuit did not have enough sun and therefore not enough vitamin D for strong bones? or was that considered? i guess one of the problems i have here is that you speak of hunter/gatherers post agriculture and i always think of pre.....so instead of gathering food all at once, we'd be grazers, going from tree to tree and munching at our leasure. except in the case of hunting or fishing. but then did we catch and eat what we needed, eat then nap like other wild beasts. when did we figure out that we should have food storage? must've been when we moved northward...otherwise why bother. about fats. this make total sense. at that time we didn't squeeze fat from nuts and olives so had to rely on animal and nuts. i don't at all think we ate balanced diets, meaning if we ate what was available then we'd be eating lots of nuts at times and probably more vegetation at others. or do you think when we still had insticts our body's told us to add something else? what do you think of people who follow meat and egg diets without the inclusion of any vegetation? will they end up with bone density issues in the long run?

This is a fascinating thread and Davide, thank you for sharing your article. I don't have anything of real relevance to add other than that I have always wondered how it is that the huge agri-food processing industrial complex has became so powerful that people in countries all over the world are now consuming vast amounts of chemicals and frankenfoods and openly ignoring the simple real whole foods that our bodies were biologically designed to process...

Sometimes it depresses me so much...

__________________
Hugs, Rachel



Quien canta, sus males espanta... ("She who sings frightens away her ills") Miguel de Cervantes

i have spent numerous hours studying acid/alkaline. i used to teach macrobiotic cooking so have a basic knowledge but you may know that the macro idea is way different than what the body knows. pretty crazy. but i am also well aware of how the body functions since i work in the medical field. so, i completely see the problem with living on fat and meat. and also (surprise, surprise) it's nothing new and researchers have been aware of the correlation between osteoporosis and acid diet for a long time. it is amazing how many ways eating an acid forming diet will effect the entire body. it's funny, that i heard a lowcarber talk about her episode of cardiac arrythmia after eating only animal for a while. i certainly see the reason now. i appreciate you doing all this research, davide, and giving me food for thought. i still wonder whatever possessed humans to move that far northward.

No, hunter gatherers socities means anti-agriculture societies.
For example the Bushmen did opposed to agriculture that's why they're hunter-gathere, for a choice as they consider their life compared to post-agriculture life more healthy, real, human and meaningful
That's way the diet of these population are considered indirect test because they're 100% hunter-gatherer.
So there can't be any post-agriculture hunter-gatherer society.
All the modern hunter gatherer societies still fish and hunt their animals and gather their fruits, nuts and leaves
I used the example of Bushmen to show how they have a point that the western economy did ruined our life actually, we imagine that a life of gathering and fishing is just hard work and no fun and that only we in the modern western world can have free time and time to play and watch movies.
But actually the Bushmen work 12 hours weekly to gather and hunt and fish all the food they need consuming a rich and high in protein diet yet living in one of the less fruitful zone of the planet. There's no one in our economy that has more free time than they have to live their life and develop meaningful relationships.
The Bushmen though who consume more plant foods than others hunter-gatherers work less than Inuits or Masai which suggests to me that we're by nature suited to a mixed diet. We have both the ability to hunt small animals, fish lot of fish and gather lot of plant food (what about our long legs, arms, our thumb) and when we rely on just 50% of our omnivorous potential out life becomes harder and we end up working more and living less.

The little amount of time Bushmen require to find fruits, nuts, young leaves in the poor environment they live in is to me an evidence that we're designed to gather without it being a life of sacrifices pain and misery

There's a good point about grazing. All primates graze and all omnivorous animals graze.
Tons of studies have showed the healthy impact of grazing on metabolism.
Consuming 7 to 9 small meals "refuelling" instead of a breakfast, a lunch and a dinner improve glucose tolerance, postprandial lipemia, postprandial glycemia, triglycerides levels.
In other words the stomach is not so full to cause spaciness by blood pooling in the abdomen, the glycemic load is not so high to create an insulin spike and to leave the body without fuel later
Am J Clin Nutr 1970;23:1059-68/ N Engl J Med 1989;321:929-34/
Am J Clin Nutr 1993;57:446-51/
Am J Clin Nutr 1992;55:664-9/ Int J Obesity 1998;22:105-12/

This mirrors our instinctive gathering and there's no meal concept in many hunter/gatherer cultures.
Nap is found on cultures who eat few big meals daily of high glycemic processed foods.
Carnivorous animals would have never spread all over the world as we did because we're more adpatable and we function with the best of both worlds. The carnivorous hunting rush and nap is consistent with a body fueled by a non-glucose pathway.
Also, we often think of felines when we say predators and felines are known to have peculiar metabolism and physiology that requires more sleep than primate do.

Storage is instictive in most animals including small primates and rodents, indeed nut sheels remains have been found on paleolithic sites

I think that if we live in an environment ideal for omnivorism we knew better than avoiding using all the tools designed to gather we're equipped with. The only reason why we see colors is to be attracted to fruits and have a ready prepacked source of simple carbs, this tells me something.
As for people who follow no carb diet all I think is that those are kind of diets that are more dependent on a different environment.
Inuits are not a good example because all we know about them are few claims by Stephensson and few studies, so we don't even know they're healthy or they were healthy but there are evidences that some form of adaptation occured, Inuits have a different and peculiar metabolism and body fat distribution compared to us.
The Masai are not even on ketosis and consume enough simple carbs to avoid it.

Then of course surviving doesn't mean thriving.
There are sources that suggest that Inuits were not particularly healthy
Among the problems they seemed to suffer: liver enlargement, small bone density, precocious aging and weak blood aggregation.
We all have a personal image of what health is.
Many people who tried to sustain a physical strenuous workout routine on a meat and egg diet improved their strength and resistance exponentially as they increased their carb intake.
You won't find many natural body builder that will tell you can get good results while restrincting carbs to zero.
Carbs are protein sparing and are the fastest source of fuel during workout even if adpatation to lyposis and ketosis occurs and all the other metabolic pathway are not as effective asafter workout glycogen replenishment.
I've known people who are foggy zombies even after two years of zero carb intake and their memory, mood, sharpness quickly improve as they increase their carb intake.
As the amount of very low carb eater increase we also observe an increase in failure to thrive. It's not uncommon for people on a meat and egg diet from a prolunged period to experience depression and irritability even if they have never been depressed in all their life.
The correlation between sugar-fat metabolism and depression is one of the best documented, serotonin balance is highly dependent on carb intake and timing.
There are also metabolic differences among individuals like a lower or higher concentration of fat cells, whit lean tissue, glucose receptors on the cell membrana surface, there are people more or less sensitive to lyposis and glucose.
I think the bottom line is that there's a big difference between surviving and thriving. Most healthy hunter/gatherer societies are in the middle of the omnivorous spectrum then there are the extremes where also environment adpatation also occured: the almost vegan societies (oh yes, they do exist unlike some claim for example a population of Papua Guines who obtained most of their calories from tubers and roots and nuts) and the almost carnivorous societies.
Because we're equipped to have an easiest life and healthier body when we eat on the middle of the spectrum I believe that the people on the extremes of the spectrum are surviving but not thriving.
Let's not forget that Masai do suffer from atheriosclerosis.

I believe that not including any sort of vegetation may be a problem for calcium balance on the long run and first of all because there's not enough calcium on meat and egg to prevent a negative calcium balance as the food eaten would cause more calcium loss than calcium intake.

continue ---->

Davide

continue ---->

It's not wise to underestimate the importance of calcium balance.
Calcium is involved in more than just maintaining healthy strong bones and teeth. Calcium is involved in dozens of physiological vital functions.
An interesting theory is found of Dr Beddoe's book "Biological Theory of Ionization as applied to Human Nutritition"
Acconrding to Beddoe studies the source of all diseases is calcium imbalance or electrolite deficiency. You will remember that Pasteur admitted later in his life that germs are not the cause the terrain is all.
Beddoe claims that the Pasteur terrain are the tissue of a calcium unbalanced body

Often the theory of acid/alkaline is thought to be a sort of mumbo-jumbo esoteric fad. But let's not be fooled by the acid/alkaline tabs.
From another perspective the acid/alkaline balance is a seriously discussed and studied topid, this perspective is the "calcium balance"
This post wouldn't be enough to list all the studies on this subject and the correlation they found between health impairment and calcium inbalance

We have a positive calcium balance when natural calcium lossess don't exceed calcium intake.
Calcium is lost thorugh urine, sweat and intestine secretions.
When we're on a negative calcium balance calcium absorption from the gut is hard, calcium absorption from bone is easy. In other words the body pull calcium from teeth and bones to balance the unbalance
Meat and egg diet gurus have claimed that the acid/alkaline balance in the body is a myth because if our blood became acidic we would die very soon and so the P.H of the blood is always maintained by the body
Indeed, and that's the problem, the problem destroys itself to maintain this balance. It's like starvation the body attempts to survive by consuming the less vital tissues but eventually even the heart is catabolized.

There are evidences that being in a negative calcium balance balanced by the body by pulling calcium from bones and teeth is not only detrimental to bone health but to all physiological functions of the body.

Proteins do increase calcium losses, no doubt about this.
For every gram of protein calcium losses are increased by 1 milligrams.
The problem is in the essential amino acids methionine and cysteine that contain sulphur which whem metabolized produces sulphuric acid which the body must buffer somewhat to prevent unbalances on blood p.h.
It's a mechanical and quick survival mechanism

The solution of course is not decreasing protein consumption since proteins are needed to maintain calcium balance and to build stronger bones, so consuming less protein woudl be like throwing the baby with the bath water. But since we need to consumed an adequate amount of protein to prevent lean body mass catabolization and be healthy and have healthy bones we need to focus more on decreasng calcium losses, increasing calcium absorption and increasing our calcium intake.

We're therefore looking for a food rich in calcium that decrease calcium losses and increase calcium balance
From a paleolithic point of view all these criteria are met by plant foods.

High protein and low potassium and bicarbonate foods increase calcium losses and should be counteracted by foods that promote calcium balance

Foods that increase calcium losses while not providing any relevant amount of calcium are the worse from a calcium balance point of view, worst of all would be living on those foods alone.

Neither increased calcium intake or higher calcium absorption may counteract the losses caused by an high sulphur forming diet. The reason is that the higher the calcium intake the less the calcium absorption and althoght gut absorption is increased when there's a low intake of calicum (just like iron when the body decrease the absorption of iron when the intake is high and increase by even 80% the absorptionm of iron when the intake is low and sources are plant foods) it's not enough to create a positive calcium balance when the losses are big.

If we do realize that we're not meant to survive only through the consumption of another specie's milk and that we didn't have any milk in the paleolithic we must have got our calcium from somewhere else or adapted generation after generation to an harsh environment that doesn't provide calcium. Since there are not evidences that we could get calcium from biting bones with our small teeth as dogs (and canine is just a misnomer since dogs and felines canine have a different phosphorous ratio than our small and fragile canines) our last sources was dark green wild young vegetation, nuts and fruits.

These are the foods that promote the retention of calcium in the bones and teeth while also providing the calcium we need and providing the potassium and bicarbonate we need to increase absorption of calcium from the gut
Am J Clin Nutr 1994;50:1345-61
Nutr Reviews 1995; 53: 71-80
Am J Clin Nutr 1993 Sep;58(3):398-406
Curr Op in Nephrology 2000; 9: 369-379
Clinical Nephrology 1998; 50: 94-100
Am J Epidemiol 1996 Mar 1;143(5):472-9
Am J Clin Nutr 1999 April 1;69(4):727-736
Am J Clin Nutr 2000 Jan 1;71(1):142-151
Eur J Nutr 2001;40(5):238-244
JAMA 2002; 287: 47-54
J. Nutr 1998;128:1051-3


So I don't know whether the people who chose to consume just animal food will have bone issue and calcium balance issue in the long run
What I do know is:

1) I can't see how wise can be to emulate the extremes of the omnivorous spectrum when we lack info about them and those few info we have are controversial and inconsistent and when we know that those in the middle of the spectrum have an easiest life and their health is best documented and is known to be remarkable

2) Claims that because a small amount of people live on either side of the spectrum we are designed to follow that diet and all the other foods are just poison are just absolutist unsubstantiated broad statements that doesn't do justice to low carb diets, paleolithic diets and the tons of info we have about healthy hunter-gatherer societies living on both plant foods and animals foods

Davide

I find your posts really interesting! Thank you for taking the time to post this information.

However, I think there may be one flaw in the theory about our paleo ancestors' bone calcium levels - I think we must keep in mind that these people were lucky to live past their 20's, which means that they would have been dying during the probable prime of their bone density. Not to mention that weight-bearing exercise strengthens bones as well, and since they were constantly on the move hunting/gathering that means as well that they constantly stressed their skeletal structures, creating more strength.

Now that's MY theory anyway and I'm certainly not a big student of paleo times! Just makes sense to me though....

Char

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Veni, vidi, velcro. I came, I saw, I stuck around.

Save the Earth - it's the only planet with CHOCOLATE!

hey davide, long time. i was just reading 'the paleo diet' newsletter (the courier?), the mid quarter one, and he reviewed 2 studies which were for net base purposes relating to bone mass, etc. he discussed the pros and cons of both, which are current studies. you may've seen them already. they are worth a read. bye for now.