Polan on Paleo

[moda0306]

It really seems to me that the anti-grain people are now the MR folks of modern diet.  They seem to be just destroying others in arguments.

The way I am beginning to see it is this:

- There's nothing good about grains that can't be obtained far more efficiently/effectively by eating other healthy vegetables and other foods. 

- There are a ton of unique negative qualities of grains that not only eliminate a lot of what would appear to be benefits, but carry whole new problems into your gut that simply don't need to be there.

I have quit buying bread, pasta, and cereal.  It's tough.  I don't WANT this to be the case, but Gumby's (and others) verbal gymnastics around this stuff is hard to get around.  Moreso, even if they're wrong, I see very few qualities of grains that can't be found elsewhere in foods with far less debate around how healthy they are. 

More importantly than cutting this stuff out 100% is getting it out of the "foundation" of a healthy diet that we're being lead to believe that it is.  Grains should be grouped in with drinking too many beers at a bachelor party or too much sweets at a graduation party.  Not the foundation of a healthy diet.  My mom, God bless her soul, will make lasagna or spaghetti with garlic bread on the side.  It's delicious, but she thinks it's healthy enough.  I've tried to explain this stuff to my parents (especially my dad, who's trying to use every healthy means to reducing his cholesterol so he doesn't have to take the rat poison the doctors prescribe him).  I can tell it kind of hurts my moms feelings.  She, as I once did, doesn't want to believe that all these things we've been using for years not only as an ingredient, but as the foundation of our diet, is somewhere between unnecessary and just pure garbage... probably closer to the latter.

Once you decide to cut out grains, at least we can agree with the anti-meat crowd that almonds and non-grain vegetables and some amount of fruit can be healthy alternatives.  I love doing grilled vegetables to supplement a meaty meal.  A different debate can be had around the benefits/drawbacks of high-levels of red meat (obviously we want to be comparing to an "organic" cow/chicken, not the corn-fed, omega-6 laden crap we are surrounded by).  This is a very different debate, but one I'm very tempted to side with the paleo/PHD folks on as well.  Meat isn't the problem.  Omega 6 fats combined with grains and sugar, none of which containing the proper digestable micronutrients, is the problem.

But the low hanging fruit here, folks... at the very least, cut grains way down and replace with healthy, nutrient-rich vegetables.  If you're GOING to eat meat/dairy, try to get pastured or grass-fed and hormone-free stuff.  Those two moves alone can probably be agreed upon by almost everyone, even people somewhat skeptical about cutting out their "healthy oatmeal" every morning.  The thing is, when people eat like crap and try to make up for it by drinking diet soda (gotta get rid of that sugar), cutting out red meat and fat (cuz fat makes us fat, right?), and increasing grain intake (cuz it's cheap and easy and tastes pretty good and has fiber/nutrients) is just the wrong way to approach all this.

[doodle]

Coming at this from a different angle, is it possible and sustainable for a world of 7 - 10 billion to eat a paleo diet? If not, then either we need a smaller population or we need to re-engineer our genetics to allow us to eat grains. On the other hand, can't we just accept that we are part of an evolutionary chain and that while our diet might not be ideal for us today, it will lead to a human race that will be able to consume these types of foods, similar to the way which we evolved to be able to consume animal milk past our infancy.

[moda0306]

doodle,

I tend to think the Perfect Health Diet is a much better balance.  Paleo has some great ideas built into it, but I agree that it's expensive, unsustainable (from a macro perspective), and probably too extreme for a lot of people.  PHD is a kick-@ss balance IMO.

[Pointedstick]

My mom, God bless her soul, will make lasagna or spaghetti with garlic bread on the side.  It's delicious, but she thinks it's healthy enough.  I've tried to explain this stuff to my parents (especially my dad, who's trying to use every healthy means to reducing his cholesterol so he doesn't have to take the rat poison the doctors prescribe him).  I can tell it kind of hurts my moms feelings.  She, as I once did, doesn't want to believe that all these things we've been using for years not only as an ingredient, but as the foundation of our diet, is somewhere between unnecessary and just pure garbage... probably closer to the latter.

It's hard for my mom too. She considers herself a health nut and guzzles whole grains like there's no tomorrow. I've tried to convince her of this stuff but have such difficulty getting through. The most common response is basically, "But… but… FIBER!" She has a body type that never seems to put on any weight so there haven't been any clear consequences to her but my father has suffered under the avalanche of grains IMHO.

On the other hand, I got them to switch back from margarine to butter, so that's good! The baby boomer generation really seems to have been hit pretty hard with a barrage of absolutely awful dietary advice.

[doodle]

My mom, God bless her soul, will make lasagna or spaghetti with garlic bread on the side.  It's delicious, but she thinks it's healthy enough.  I've tried to explain this stuff to my parents (especially my dad, who's trying to use every healthy means to reducing his cholesterol so he doesn't have to take the rat poison the doctors prescribe him).  I can tell it kind of hurts my moms feelings.  She, as I once did, doesn't want to believe that all these things we've been using for years not only as an ingredient, but as the foundation of our diet, is somewhere between unnecessary and just pure garbage... probably closer to the latter.

It's hard for my mom too. She considers herself a health nut and guzzles whole grains like there's no tomorrow. I've tried to convince her of this stuff but have such difficulty getting through. The most common response is basically, "But… but… FIBER!" She has a body type that never seems to put on any weight so there haven't been any clear consequences to her but my father has suffered under the avalanche of grains IMHO.

On the other hand, I got them to switch back from margarine to butter, so that's good! The baby boomer generation really seems to have been hit pretty hard with a barrage of absolutely awful dietary advice.

Maybe your mom's genetics have evolved to allow her to consume grains whereas your dad's haven't. Just because Asians can't drink milk, doesn't mean I shouldn't. Overall, I don't think we can remove grains from the food system and still feed 7 billion people. So eventually we will evolve to consume grains with fewer and fewer negative side effects.

[Gumby]

Insulin response for brown rice is significantly lower than for white rice, which is an important factor contributing to diabetes.

Please. Small amounts of white rice does not "cause" diabetes. If that were true, asian countries would have lots of diabetes.

In Asia they don't eat "small" amounts of white rice, they eat it at virtually every meal.  In some Asian cultures the words "eat" and "rice" are synonymous.  This is contributing to metabolic syndrome and a potential diabetes epidemic.

And yet... the more white rice populations eat, the less diabetes they get. Countries with the highest white rice consumption, such as Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Bangladesh, have very low rates of diabetes.

[align=center][/align]

For the past 5 years Harvard's School of Public Health has been promoting a switch from white to brown rice in China in order to prevent this health calamity:

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/brown-rice/

The preliminary results are promising:

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/featur ... -diabetes/

Really? you think think that the results were promising? The only preliminary "results" listed were:

Although no overall differences in metabolic factors were found between the two groups, the brown rice intervention showed some benefits in improving HDL cholesterol and blood pressure in diabetic patients
Source: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/featur ... -diabetes/

So, all they found is that by reducing glycemic load in diabetic patients, the patients were better off. You don't need a study to figure that out. The study hasn't made any progress whatsoever in healthy people.

It should be fairly obvious, looking at the data, that white rice does not cause diabetes. Countries that eat the most white rice often have the lowest incidence of diabetes.

[doodle]

Please. Small amounts of white rice does not "cause" diabetes. If that were true, asian countries would have lots of diabetes.

In Asia they don't eat "small" amounts of white rice, they eat it at virtually every meal.  In some Asian cultures the words "eat" and "rice" are synonymous.  This is contributing to metabolic syndrome and a potential diabetes epidemic.

And yet... the more white rice populations eat, the less diabetes they get. Countries with the highest white rice consumption, such as Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Bangladesh, have very low rates of diabetes.

[align=center][/align]

For the past 5 years Harvard's School of Public Health has been promoting a switch from white to brown rice in China in order to prevent this health calamity:

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/brown-rice/

The preliminary results are promising:

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/featur ... -diabetes/

Really? you think think that the results were promising? The only preliminary "results" listed were:

Although no overall differences in metabolic factors were found between the two groups, the brown rice intervention showed some benefits in improving HDL cholesterol and blood pressure in diabetic patients
Source: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/featur ... -diabetes/

So, all they found is that by reducing glycemic load in diabetic patients, the patients were better off. You don't need a study to figure that out. The study hasn't made any progress whatsoever in healthy people.

It should be fairly obvious, looking at the data, that rice does not cause diabetes. Countries that eat the most white rice often have the lowest incidence of diabetes.

**But only if you have evolved to eat it. Technically given enough time, humans could probably evolve to eat anything without negative side effects. Also, perhaps there is another element in the diet of these populations that neutralizes the diabetic effects of rice.

Since I have no idea what my geaneology is or what Im best suited to eat, I will just take the middle approach and eat a little of everything. The stress caused from worrying endlessly about what I put in my mouth will probably take more years off my life (not to mention the quality of it) than the minute details of what I put inside it. Moderation in all things...from investing, to eating, to life seems like the winning game plan.

[Benko]

Since I have no idea what my geaneology is or what Im best suited to eat, I will just take the middle approach and eat a little of everything. The stress caused from worrying endlessly about what I put in my mouth will probably take more years off my life (not to mention the quality of it) than the minute details of what I put inside it.

+5 bold mine
and I can guarantee (even if I can't spell the word) that this stress is worse on your gut than the worse paleo offender.

Perhaps more than a little veggies.

[Gumby]

**But only if you have evolved to eat it.

Well, rice is basically just starch and you already have the ability to digest it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amylase

Polan tried to convince people that Amylase is somehow new, but it's not. It's too prevalent to be new. You digest starch and it raises your glucose. Diabetes is diagnosed as a fasting glucose that exceeds a fixed threshold of 126 mg/dl.

So, let me rephrase. There is no good evidence to suggest that white rice causes diabetes. There is zero evidence that eating a small scoop of white rice as part of a meal causes diabetes. And the hard evidence suggests that white rice consumption may be protective of diabetes.

Eat a variety of foods and don't worry about.

[Gumby]

Overall, I don't think we can remove grains from the food system and still feed 7 billion people.

You're absolutely right, doodle. We can't. In fact, some scholars believe that the Neolithic period (i.e. agriculture) really began when cultures grew to the point that they were unable to find enough "Paleo" food to feed their tribes (lack of herds of animals and megafauna, such as Wooly Mammoth) — and perhaps migration to find new food became too difficult with these larger tribes. So, these cultures would find themselves needing an energy source that could be farmed and fed to growing populations. People soon figured out that plants could be planted and the plentiful seeds could be eaten. Grains are the food of the masses — societies would starve without them.

The beginning of that Neolithic period were actually marked with terrible health. Skeletons got shorter. Tendon attachments were smaller — showing muscles weakened. Cavities and osteoporosis were far more common. Periods of malnutrition were common. Signs of infection were more common.

This is widely observed in study after study of that time period:

http://pmid.us/19003886
http://pmid.us/10074386
http://pmid.us/20063662
http://pmid.us/19920233

In other words, the Paleolithic skeletons were far healthier than the Neolithic skeletons. But, what else could these Neolithic people do? They had to eat grains to survive in large populations.

If grains were so good for us, you would expect to see an improvement in health from the Paleolithic period to the Neolithic period. But, that's not what happened.

So eventually we will evolve to consume grains with fewer and fewer negative side effects.

It would take a very long time for that to happen. Your argument about evolving to eat rice doesn't really make sense because rice farming only began about 13,000 years ago and it would take at least 200,000 years for the necessary mutations to reach "fixation" (where everyone has them universally). White rice is easily digestible because it is a very simple starch and everyone has Amylase from the Paleolithic period.

And because the modern agricultural era is only about 10,000 years old, there hasn't even been enough time for the mutations to remove our adaptation to Paleolithic diets to spread anywhere close to fixation.

Basically we need about 190,000 more years until everyone starts being able to adapt to our new way of eating. I'll stick with Paleo-style eating for now.

[Gumby]

By the way, you guys have to read this...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... -Eden.html

Archaeologists believe they may have found a temple inside the Garden of Eden. And the story it tells of why there was a turn to agriculture on that very spot will make your jaw drop.

The temple is exquisite. Way more advanced than anyone would have expected for its time period.

And get this...

The first is its staggering age. Carbon-dating shows that the complex is at least 12,000 years old, maybe even 13,000 years old.

That means it was built around 10,000BC. By comparison, Stonehenge was built in 3,000 BC and the pyramids of Giza in 2,500 BC.

Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... -Eden.html

Yes. This highly advanced temple is from the dawn of the Neolithic period — right when people turned to farming. It's also appears to be the site of a mass slaughter. Piecing the clues together tells a very, very interesting story. Perhaps the movement towards agriculture was not a smooth one.

The evidence suggests there may have been lots of bloodshed. And in a weird sort of way, it sort of matches up with the biblical story of humanity being kicked out of The Garden of Eden. (The location of where Eden was roughly believed to be located also matches up as well)

[Pointedstick]

I'm glad you're back, Gumby. This information is amazing stuff.

[rocketdog]

We don't need to have evolved to eat a certain food in order for it to be healthful to us.  We didn't evolve to eat most of the foods available in your grocer's produce section, nor most of those in the dairy case, or beneath the fish counter for that matter, but that doesn't mean they are therefore automatically unhealthy.  Our body doesn't "know" what we evolved to eat, it only knows whether or not it can utilize what we do eat.  And it does its best with what you provide it. 

If you want to eat refined, nutritionally inferior grains like white rice and white bread, be my guest.  I'll happily eat the whole, unrefined grains and enjoy the added health benefits because of it. 

[Benko]

So eventually we will evolve to consume grains with fewer and fewer negative side effects.

It would take a very long time for that to happen.

Perhaps.  but while researching the history of the gene for amylase, I did find out that societies that eat larger amounts of carbs express more copies of the amylase gene per person. 

[rocketdog]

By the way, you guys have to read this...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... -Eden.html

Archaeologists believe they may have found a temple inside the Garden of Eden. And the story it tells of why there was a turn to agriculture on that very spot will make your jaw drop.

Oh dear, you don't actually mean the Garden of Eden, do you?  You do realize that's a myth, right?  Y'know, like Noah's Ark?  I do hope you're not serious (although if you are, then I guess that would explain all this nonsense about the white rice ) 

[Pointedstick]

Please, don't be that jerk libertarian who goes around telling people their religions are primitive childhood myths. It turns out to be a really bad way to convert people to your mode of thinking. 

For the record, I am not religious myself, but I still find this stuff to be fascinating. If there's archaeological evidence to support a creation myth, that could go a long way to establishing why a group of people might have started a religion surrounding it, no?

[moda0306]

We don't need to have evolved to eat a certain food in order for it to be healthful to us.  We didn't evolve to eat most of the foods available in your grocer's produce section, nor most of those in the dairy case, or beneath the fish counter for that matter, but that doesn't mean they are therefore automatically unhealthy.  Our body doesn't "know" what we evolved to eat, it only knows whether or not it can utilize what we do eat.  And it does its best with what you provide it. 

If you want to eat refined, nutritionally inferior grains like white rice and white bread, be my guest.  I'll happily eat the whole, unrefined grains and enjoy the added health benefits because of it. 

rocketdog,

It seems like you're asserting a couple things here:

1) White rice is the rice-equivalent of white-bread. 

Is this true?  I'm almost positive from what I've read that refined flour is much, much worse than "refined" rice.


2) More importantly, it seems you're completely rejecting the premise that grains are bad for us due to Omega 6's, phytates, and the fact that phytates "lock up" nutrients.  Is this the case?  Gumby (and others) posts on this subject seem pretty mind-blowing.  I haven't read any solid rejection/retort to Gumby's assertions on grains... just my years of preconceptions.

[Pointedstick]

2) More importantly, it seems you're completely rejecting the premise that grains are bad for us due to Omega 6's, phytates, and the fact that phytates "lock up" nutrients.  Is this the case?  Gumby (and others) posts on this subject seem pretty mind-blowing.  I haven't read any solid rejection/retort to Gumby's assertions on grains... just my years of preconceptions.

Yes, this is key.

Nobody here is asserting that brown rice and whole grains don't have more nutrients in them, which seems to be your main point, Rocketdog. Rather, we're saying that these nutrients are:
1) more prone to spoilage and oxidation which damage your health
2) less bioavailable due to phytates which prevent nutrient absorbtion; the plant's defense mechanism against being eaten!
3) accompanied by a lot of bad things like gluten and large amounts of omega-6 fatty acids

Rocketdog, so far I haven't seen you refute these points, besides reiterating your original argument that there are more nutrients which we agree with you on. You're going to have to do a bit better than that if you want to go toe-to-toe with Gumby. 

[Gumby]

By the way, you guys have to read this...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... -Eden.html

Archaeologists believe they may have found a temple inside the Garden of Eden. And the story it tells of why there was a turn to agriculture on that very spot will make your jaw drop.

Oh dear, you don't actually mean the Garden of Eden, do you?  You do realize that's a myth, right?  Y'know, like Noah's Ark?  I do hope you're not serious (although if you are, then I guess that would explain all this nonsense about the white rice )

I'm not religious at all.

I get the feeling you don't like to read much, rocketdog. If you had read the article, you would have seen that the archeologists are the ones who made the "Eden" claim. Additionally, I've provided plenty of scientific evidence to support my arguments. While you provided the equivalent of a press release from an organization whose studies are funded by multi-billion dollar corporations.

I provided a link to an article about how archaeologists believe they may have found a "temple in the Garden of Eden" (their words, not mine) and you belittle their discoveries with rude jokes that are offensive to devout individuals.

Again, I'm not religious at all. But, if you want to deny that archaeologists have unearthed a highly advanced temple located smack in the middle of where ancient historical texts describe as the location of the Garden of Eden — built right around the birth of the Neolithic period — that's your prerogative.

I guess you seem to prefer myths from corporate marketing ("eat whole grains every day!").

[Gumby]

I'm almost positive from what I've read that refined flour is much, much worse than "refined" rice.

Yes. Whole grain bread is certainly better than white bread, but modern preparation and hybridization of whole grains tends to nullify many of the marketed benefits (quick rise doughs, oxidation of oils, high phytates, high gluten, etc.). The perfect bread would be made with old-world techniques: ancestral (pre-hybrid) grains, stone ground flour, slow-rise doughs or fermented or sprouted and cooked at lower temperatures to reduce phytates and minimize oxidation. There are many artisanal bakers around the country that understand the old-world techniques. The Weston A. Price Foundation mails out an annual Shopping Guide for $3 that lists many of these bakers that sell on a national level. Some of these higher quality breads can be found in the frozen section at Whole Foods for those who are interested. These bakers do their best to minimize the time from the grinding to baking (since the oils in the ground flour tend to go rancid and oxidize as quickly as milk spoils at room temperature). So, many of these bakers will bake with flour they ground the day before with a stone (a slow grinding stone will grind at a lower temperature than a high-speed grinding machine, thus preserving the oils). Some people even purchase flours mills for their homes so they bake their own breads with fresh flour and old-world techniques.

As you can see, proper preparation takes a lot of effort and time. Modern corporations tend to avoid those techniques to improve their profit margin. They use marketing slogans to sell their products despite the problems with these claims.

More importantly, it seems you're completely rejecting the premise that grains are bad for us due to Omega 6's, phytates, and the fact that phytates "lock up" nutrients.  Is this the case?

He may be rejecting them, but the scientific literature says all those things exist in grains:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytic_acid
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antinutrient
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega-6_fatty_acid

Phytic acid has a strong binding affinity to minerals such as calcium, magnesium, iron, copper, and zinc. This results in precipitation, making the minerals unavailable for absorption in the intestines.[5][6] Phytic acids are common in the hulls of nuts, seeds and grains.

[5] Ekholm, Päivi; Päivi Ekholm, Liisa Virkki, Maija Ylinen, Liisa Johansson (Feb 2003). "The effect of phytic acid and some natural chelating agents on the solubility of mineral elements in oat bran". Food Chemistry 80 (2): 165–70. doi:10.1016/S0308-8146(02)00249-2.

[6] Cheryan, Munir; Rackis, Joseph (1980). "Phytic acid interactions in food systems". Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr 13 (4): 297–335. doi:10.1080/10408398009527293. PMID 7002470.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antinutrient

Again, "traditional" preparation of grains can make the nutrients available to the gut. But when it comes to rice, fermentation or milling was, and is, used to remove the antinutrients. The gut can certainly handle small amounts of antinutirents, but not when it's your staple food. And these days brown rice tends to be high in toxins such as arsenic many brands of brown rice showed arsenic levels that exceed the safe limit by 50% and some by double — so that's another good reason to avoid brown rice.

Personally, I was most impressed with the evidence of the skeletal remains of shorter, weaker and sicker humans once grain-based agriculture was established.

[moda0306]

Gumby,

Nutrition/Economics Professor.

Do it.

Keep in mind you'd probably get along with NOBODY on staff in either of those fields... though I tend to think you'd like that...

[Gumby]

Keep in mind you'd probably get along with NOBODY on staff in either of those fields... though I tend to think you'd like that...

[MachineGhost]

It really seems to me that the anti-grain people are now the MR folks of modern diet.  They I can tell it kind of hurts my moms feelings.  She, as I once did, doesn't want to believe that all these things we've been using for years not only as an ingredient, but as the foundation of our diet, is somewhere between unnecessary and just pure garbage... probably closer to the latter.

Food, culture, rituals and emotions are so intertwined, especially in women who were raised to be homemaker/caretakers, that its virtually impossible for them not to be offended.  I think you have to recognize that its going to be offensive no matter what, but have a way ahead of time to soften the blow afterwards.  Everyone feels depressed when their belief system is attacked or crumbles.  I just advocate you do not try this on radical muslims.  They will react violently because they're all immature little shits.

[MachineGhost]

Meat isn't the problem.  Omega 6 fats combined with grains and sugar, none of which containing the proper digestable micronutrients, is the problem.

The evidence on "red meat" and "processed meat" seems to be pointing to that it is specifically pork that is the problem (above and beyond the iron content and some questionable "toxin" which name escapes me at the moment), not the typical red meat we think of.  I no longer eat pork except for nitrate-free salami on my pizza which I'll phase out eventually.  In theory you could render pork safe to eat with proper marinating a minimum of 24 hours and using an acid, but I like to just pull out a frozen piece of meat from the freezer and have it cooked in 20 minutes.

BTW, raw almonds were my #1 allergic reaction in terms of causing chronic nasal congestion, etc..  I had no idea and I been eating them for literally almost a decade, 6 days a week.  Good riddance!

[doodle]

It really seems to me that the anti-grain people are now the MR folks of modern diet.  They I can tell it kind of hurts my moms feelings.  She, as I once did, doesn't want to believe that all these things we've been using for years not only as an ingredient, but as the foundation of our diet, is somewhere between unnecessary and just pure garbage... probably closer to the latter.

Food, culture, rituals and emotions are so intertwined, especially in women who were raised to be homemaker/caretakers, that its virtually impossible for them not to be offended.  I think you have to recognize that its going to be offensive no matter what, but have a way ahead of time to soften the blow afterwards.  Everyone feels depressed when their belief system is attacked or crumbles.  I just advocate you do not try this on radical muslims.  They will react violently because they're all immature little shits.

Advertising plays a huge role in shaping our food desires as well. Of course, there is nothing wrong with the freedom of big corporations to peddle their fatty and sugary snacks to little children though 

http://www.upworthy.com/watch-the-video ... see?c=tkp1