About to embark on a 30-day trial of meat and water

[PyramidHead]

Of course, Vitamin C is the obvious one. I've read a few articles that claimed that the reason people like the Inuits could consume and almost all meat diet is because that only ate very fresh, often raw meat, which apparently has some Vit. C in it. They also ate wild berries in the summer. I know that those that who believe the all meat diet is healthy make other claims. I haven't had the opportunity to read about that yet, but as someone who worked in health care for 42 years, I have had my share of extreme diets, and theories concerning what is health and what isn't. Anyway, I'm giving you a link that discusses some cases of scurvy that people on ketogenic or zero carb diets experienced.

http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2010/11/danger-of-zero-carb-diets-iii-scurvy/

I am also convinced that fiber is an important part of good health for those of us who live in the modern world. For one thing, Inuits and other groups of people who lived in severe arctic areas were far more active than we are. That may have been part of why they were able to live without fiber in their diets. One more thing. The very early people that we evolved from never lived very long, so we don't know what type of health problems they might have developed if they lived into what we now consider old age. Many of the diseases that impact us today, don't usually develop until we are over 50, sometimes much older.

All good points, but I am keeping an open mind about the parts that have not been properly researched in the context of the variable in question (the presence vs. the complete absence of plant matter in one's diet). I think many of the nutrients in question are utilized more or less by the body depending greatly on what it is running on.

 

[PyramidHead]

I think that some of your logic is based on misinformation.

I cannot imagine a better way to spoil any piece of meat than to put it in a pressure cooker.

But all of that aside, the worst that I think will happen in your 30 day trial is a bad case of constipation.

Long term, you will be missing a lot of nutrients that your body actually needs.

But you are an adult so best of luck to you.

Can you name some of those nutrients, and specify why you believe the body needs them? I'm genuinely curious.

I think immediately of dietary fiber, a lack of which can contribute to intestinal cancers and more short term, constipation. Of course, there are vitamins. Here's this link:

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/10-nutrients-you-cant-get-from-animal-foods#section3

Beyond vitamin C, I haven't seen any evidence that any of those nutrients are essential to human health. The sample space of people who consume mixed diets, usually fairly rich in carbohydrates, skews the data in a way that suggests fiber is a benefit in itself, rather than a partially effective remedy against a larger problem. I'll be on the lookout for constipation, but it will probably be a while before that kicks in since right now I'm experiencing the opposite due to the increased motility of fat in the intestines, which is probably residual from what my body is not yet adapted to fully absorb. I feel as though there had to be centuries during which vegetation was so scarce due to glaciation (and not just where present-day Inuits live), drought, or forest fires spanning thousands of miles, that fiber intake among our ancestors would have been extremely low. If our default mode of processing food in this way led inexorably to constipation, I doubt we would have thrived as a species during these times.

- - - Updated - - -

I also think we should look at the diets of our nearest cousins, chimps. They eat meat and apparently savor it, but their diets are largely plants - and bugs.

And fittingly, theirs is the lineage that did NOT develop enormous brains capable of what human brains evolved to do.

- - - Updated - - -

Day 7.

My energy levels have evened out after a couple of days of up and down fluctuation. My body is still adapting, but the symptoms of this adaptation are lessening in frequency and severity. What I interpret from the process is my digestive tract getting more comfortable with digesting fat. At times, I felt as though my intestines (and probably the microbes that inhabit it) were entering panic mode: "What's all this stuff? Eggs? Steaks? Where's the bread? What happened to the leaves and stems we used to dine on like kings?" The result of this desperation would be that I absorbed only some of the fat I was ingesting, while the rest was discarded along with a number of dead carb-dependent bacteria. This has calmed down over the past couple of days, so I not only make fewer trips to the bathroom but I also feel like I'm on a fairly steady energy supply.

I wake up in the morning now without any of the fogginess, gut pain, and disorientation I accepted as just the normal thing people experience when they wake up. I've lost a significant amount of excess fat around my face, neck, and midsection (probably just from letting go of the water my cells were carrying around), and my teeth are thanking me every day. I'm no longer trafficking guns and ammunition to the tiny terrorists living along my gumline, and little by little they are packing up and leaving.

But, as one who doesn't care that much for meat but loves vegetables, fruits and nuts, I can't help but ask. Are you enjoying eating this way? Inquiring minds want to know?

The more I do it, the more I enjoy it. But there are a few dimensions to that, so let me explain.

First and foremost, I love meat and I never get tired of the taste of it when it's prepared to my liking. I can't cook a damn thing, but now I'm learning how to pan-sear a steak to perfection and making my way around a pressure cooker. That of course is just a personal anecdote, but I suspect everyone has a natural taste for meat that they can reactivate without much trouble. Children will eat meat without hesitation, but vegetables have to be dressed up in all sorts of ways. I think there's probably a biological and historical reason for this. Much of the vegetables we eat are not naturally occurring in the wild, so we wouldn't have developed a palate for them.

On top of that, the only way that plants are able to defend themselves from being eaten (rather than just their seeds) is to manufacture toxins and antinutrients that must be cooked out of them before consumption, or tolerated as "fiber" that your body doesn't get anything out of. You get these bitter flavors and burning sensations that can be harnessed with a little ingenuity to make other foods taste better, but are really your body's way of telling you that you shouldn't be eating this. But that's a side point that doesn't really address your question.

The second thing that I've come to terms with is that I don't look to food for enjoyment so much anymore. We have this idea that our meals should be entertaining, when really it doesn't have to be anything other than fuel; and if it's the kind of fuel our bodies are optimally geared to run on, chances are it will taste just fine. So, the concept of eating out of boredom or chasing variety for its own sake is starting to seem like a waste of time to me. I know that the taste of a rare ribeye steak with a nicely charred exterior will, always and forever, be something I immensely enjoy. If I had the budget for it, I'd eat it every day for every meal (as the Andersen family has for decades without any health problems). But burger patties are tasty too, as is bacon, chuck roast, salmon, and did I mention bacon?

Finally, I just love how simple everything surrounding eating has become. There's no more looking for recipes that torture a cauliflower into tasting vaguely like a potato, or looking for low-carb cheesecake recipes that leave me unsatisfied and wanting the real thing. Over time, not eating anything sweet makes me want it less and less, and I expect to eventually have no interest in sugar at all. Grocery shopping is fun. I think of all the money I'm saving from cereals, vegetables, and sweets (not to mention craft beer!) and channel that into the week's selection of meats. I do miss the occasional drink, but I intend to find a way to enjoy a non-fermented liquor once in a while after the month is up.

Where are you going to find a non-fermented liquor? As far as I am aware, all drinking alcohol is derived from fermentation. In fact, industrial ethanol is too - my understanding is that fermentation is simply too easy a way to make ethanol for any alternative methods to be needed (or economically viable).

Is there any liquor on the market that is not derived from fermentation?

I must have used the wrong word. I was referring to the so-called "dry" alcohols that do not contain any residual sugars from the process (which, as you say, must have been fermentation) such as whisky, gin, and vodka. So maybe "distilled" would have been a better word.

 

[PyramidHead]

southernhybrid, another thing that bugs me about that NatGeo article is the part where it concludes humans could not have subsisted on mostly meat because hunting is often difficult. Why, then, are there carnivores in the world at all? Among all species, humans are probably in the top 1% of apex predators simply due to our ability to fashion tools, set traps, plan ahead, and communicate complex strategies among ourselves (all behaviors, by the way, which separate us from our closest cousins and would not have evolved if we did not require much of our nutrition from animal flesh).

If it simply wasn't feasible for early humans to hunt all year round without going hungry, how did other species manage to do it? Lions don't hibernate, and they get what they need from the Savannah one way or another.

 

[Toni]

southernhybrid, another thing that bugs me about that NatGeo article is the part where it concludes humans could not have subsisted on mostly meat because hunting is often difficult. Why, then, are there carnivores in the world at all? Among all species, humans are probably in the top 1% of apex predators simply due to our ability to fashion tools, set traps, plan ahead, and communicate complex strategies among ourselves (all behaviors, by the way, which separate us from our closest cousins and would not have evolved if we did not require much of our nutrition from animal flesh).

If it simply wasn't feasible for early humans to hunt all year round without going hungry, how did other species manage to do it? Lions don't hibernate, and they get what they need from the Savannah one way or another.

Carnivores, especially large land carnivores tend to be either solitary or to live in small family groups and require significant terrotory to supply suitable prey. Humans so not tend toluve this way.

You might consider the shape of the human mouth, as well as the number, size, and type of teeth that a human has compared with the teeth of say, a lion. Humans specifically have more teeth designed to chew plant based meals vs the teeth of a lion which survives on meat.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

It honestly sounds like a crap diet and I don't say that because I'm a pescetarian (I still miss meat, though not as much), it is just that it lacks any sort of depth. I love serving stuff on a bed spinach for the contrast.

Only advice I can offer is drink plenty of clear fluids to help with the bowels.

As far as dieting goes, even the Spurlock guy who did the Super Size diet had his body eventually accept the fats and sodium. So, just because you feel "good" doesn't mean you are doing your body good... or are.

 

[PyramidHead]

southernhybrid, another thing that bugs me about that NatGeo article is the part where it concludes humans could not have subsisted on mostly meat because hunting is often difficult. Why, then, are there carnivores in the world at all? Among all species, humans are probably in the top 1% of apex predators simply due to our ability to fashion tools, set traps, plan ahead, and communicate complex strategies among ourselves (all behaviors, by the way, which separate us from our closest cousins and would not have evolved if we did not require much of our nutrition from animal flesh).

If it simply wasn't feasible for early humans to hunt all year round without going hungry, how did other species manage to do it? Lions don't hibernate, and they get what they need from the Savannah one way or another.

Carnivores, especially large land carnivores tend to be either solitary or to live in small family groups and require significant terrotory to supply suitable prey. Humans so not tend toluve this way.

You might consider the shape of the human mouth, as well as the number, size, and type of teeth that a human has compared with the teeth of say, a lion. Humans specifically have more teeth designed to chew plant based meals vs the teeth of a lion which survives on meat.

Good point about territory habits. I hadn't thought of that. As for teeth, we clearly have adaptations that favor more than just meat, as you say. But I will also note that we don't have fully plant-adapted teeth and jaws either; ours don't rotate like a cow's, for example.

Here is an informal infographic that looks at several bodily features of humans, wolves, and sheep. It seems to suggest that, while plant eating is possible given our makeup, we are poorly equipped for it compared to animals that specialize in it, in contrast to our meat-eating equipment, which is just about the same as animals that specialize in that.

 

[PyramidHead]

It honestly sounds like a crap diet and I don't say that because I'm a pescetarian (I still miss meat, though not as much), it is just that it lacks any sort of depth. I love serving stuff on a bed spinach for the contrast.

Yeah, that's food as entertainment again. I kind of get it, but it also kind of seems silly. What I'm pretty sure of is that I will start introducing some herbs and spices after the month is up, as well as hard cheeses in moderation.

Only advice I can offer is drink plenty of clear fluids to help with the bowels.

Everybody keeps telling me this, but I've had nothing but loose, watery stools since I started this diet a week ago, so maybe I'm just different.

As far as dieting goes, even the Spurlock guy who did the Super Size diet had his body eventually accept the fats and sodium. So, just because you feel "good" doesn't mean you are doing your body good... or are.

True, but there are some takeaways that are worth considering from the signals your body is sending to your brain. For one thing, digestion shouldn't hurt, once you've gotten adapted to whatever diet you choose. Heartburn, gas, bloating, and other such symptoms are probably a sign that your body doesn't like what you're doing to it--for some reason that needs to be determined, of course. And of course, taste isn't the sole proprietor of what we ought to eat since sugar is so yummy, but BAD taste is probably a more reliable indicator of what we DON'T need to eat. Pour yourself a nice bowl of bran. Not the sweetened cereals, no milk, just pure bran. It seems to me that there's an excellent correspondence between the fact that my body has no use for this material and the fact that I have no receptors on my tongue that reward me for consuming it. But I get that tasting good and feeling good are separate things, which is why I'll be getting blood work at the end of this trial (should have gotten it done before I started, but I couldn't find the time).

 

[Toni]

southernhybrid, another thing that bugs me about that NatGeo article is the part where it concludes humans could not have subsisted on mostly meat because hunting is often difficult. Why, then, are there carnivores in the world at all? Among all species, humans are probably in the top 1% of apex predators simply due to our ability to fashion tools, set traps, plan ahead, and communicate complex strategies among ourselves (all behaviors, by the way, which separate us from our closest cousins and would not have evolved if we did not require much of our nutrition from animal flesh).

If it simply wasn't feasible for early humans to hunt all year round without going hungry, how did other species manage to do it? Lions don't hibernate, and they get what they need from the Savannah one way or another.

Carnivores, especially large land carnivores tend to be either solitary or to live in small family groups and require significant terrotory to supply suitable prey. Humans so not tend toluve this way.

You might consider the shape of the human mouth, as well as the number, size, and type of teeth that a human has compared with the teeth of say, a lion. Humans specifically have more teeth designed to chew plant based meals vs the teeth of a lion which survives on meat.

Good point about territory habits. I hadn't thought of that. As for teeth, we clearly have adaptations that favor more than just meat, as you say. But I will also note that we don't have fully plant-adapted teeth and jaws either; ours don't rotate like a cow's, for example.

Here is an informal infographic that looks at several bodily features of humans, wolves, and sheep. It seems to suggest that, while plant eating is possible given our makeup, we are poorly equipped for it compared to animals that specialize in it, in contrast to our meat-eating equipment, which is just about the same as animals that specialize in that.

View attachment 14271

Yes, we are designed to be omnivorous. Not just our jaws and teeth, but also our gut, our posture, our musculature, our brains, the way our eyes are set into our heads, our hearing, our opposable thumbs, etc.

Not to pick a fight but the chart does NOT show that we are poorly equipped to eat plants. We are poorly equipped to eat grass--in fact, we cannot do it because our stomachs do not produce the right isomer of the enzyme required to digest cellulose. There is much more to plant material than cellulose but not much more to grass stalks and leaves. Ruminates such as sheep and cows are hardly the only herbivorous animals.

We make many choices about our lifestyles, thanks to the relative luxury of our times. Also, the chart is inaccurate. Humans can and do live quite well on diets without any animal protein.

 

[ZiprHead]

Okay. This is a first for me. Viewing a post comparing the rectums of certain mammals.

 

[Toni]

Yeah, that's food as entertainment again. I kind of get it, but it also kind of seems silly. What I'm pretty sure of is that I will start introducing some herbs and spices after the month is up, as well as hard cheeses in moderation.



Everybody keeps telling me this, but I've had nothing but loose, watery stools since I started this diet a week ago, so maybe I'm just different.

As far as dieting goes, even the Spurlock guy who did the Super Size diet had his body eventually accept the fats and sodium. So, just because you feel "good" doesn't mean you are doing your body good... or are.

True, but there are some takeaways that are worth considering from the signals your body is sending to your brain. For one thing, digestion shouldn't hurt, once you've gotten adapted to whatever diet you choose. Heartburn, gas, bloating, and other such symptoms are probably a sign that your body doesn't like what you're doing to it--for some reason that needs to be determined, of course. And of course, taste isn't the sole proprietor of what we ought to eat since sugar is so yummy, but BAD taste is probably a more reliable indicator of what we DON'T need to eat. Pour yourself a nice bowl of bran. Not the sweetened cereals, no milk, just pure bran. It seems to me that there's an excellent correspondence between the fact that my body has no use for this material and the fact that I have no receptors on my tongue that reward me for consuming it. But I get that tasting good and feeling good are separate things, which is why I'll be getting blood work at the end of this trial (should have gotten it done before I started, but I couldn't find the time).

And yet, antifreeze is a poison hazard to children and animals precisely because it is sweet.

Too much sugar and too much salt are terrible for your body.

And of course your body has a use for bran.

 

[bilby]

I also think we should look at the diets of our nearest cousins, chimps. They eat meat and apparently savor it, but their diets are largely plants - and bugs.

Last time I visited my nearest cousins, they served meat and vegetables; But I didn't get offered any bugs. And while Uncle Kevin does have quite a bit of body hair, I am pretty sure he and his children are not actual chimps.

On a more serious note, what chimps do to survive and thrive is not really much of a guide to what is best for humans. Even within the Primates, there are a lot of significant differences in dietary behaviours, and it's not unreasonable to assume that a one-size-fits-all primate diet would not work.

- - - Updated - - -

I think immediately of dietary fiber, a lack of which can contribute to intestinal cancers and more short term, constipation. Of course, there are vitamins. Here's this link:

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/10-nutrients-you-cant-get-from-animal-foods#section3

Beyond vitamin C, I haven't seen any evidence that any of those nutrients are essential to human health. The sample space of people who consume mixed diets, usually fairly rich in carbohydrates, skews the data in a way that suggests fiber is a benefit in itself, rather than a partially effective remedy against a larger problem. I'll be on the lookout for constipation, but it will probably be a while before that kicks in since right now I'm experiencing the opposite due to the increased motility of fat in the intestines, which is probably residual from what my body is not yet adapted to fully absorb. I feel as though there had to be centuries during which vegetation was so scarce due to glaciation (and not just where present-day Inuits live), drought, or forest fires spanning thousands of miles, that fiber intake among our ancestors would have been extremely low. If our default mode of processing food in this way led inexorably to constipation, I doubt we would have thrived as a species during these times.

- - - Updated - - -

I also think we should look at the diets of our nearest cousins, chimps. They eat meat and apparently savor it, but their diets are largely plants - and bugs.

And fittingly, theirs is the lineage that did NOT develop enormous brains capable of what human brains evolved to do.

- - - Updated - - -

Day 7.

My energy levels have evened out after a couple of days of up and down fluctuation. My body is still adapting, but the symptoms of this adaptation are lessening in frequency and severity. What I interpret from the process is my digestive tract getting more comfortable with digesting fat. At times, I felt as though my intestines (and probably the microbes that inhabit it) were entering panic mode: "What's all this stuff? Eggs? Steaks? Where's the bread? What happened to the leaves and stems we used to dine on like kings?" The result of this desperation would be that I absorbed only some of the fat I was ingesting, while the rest was discarded along with a number of dead carb-dependent bacteria. This has calmed down over the past couple of days, so I not only make fewer trips to the bathroom but I also feel like I'm on a fairly steady energy supply.

I wake up in the morning now without any of the fogginess, gut pain, and disorientation I accepted as just the normal thing people experience when they wake up. I've lost a significant amount of excess fat around my face, neck, and midsection (probably just from letting go of the water my cells were carrying around), and my teeth are thanking me every day. I'm no longer trafficking guns and ammunition to the tiny terrorists living along my gumline, and little by little they are packing up and leaving.

But, as one who doesn't care that much for meat but loves vegetables, fruits and nuts, I can't help but ask. Are you enjoying eating this way? Inquiring minds want to know?

The more I do it, the more I enjoy it. But there are a few dimensions to that, so let me explain.

First and foremost, I love meat and I never get tired of the taste of it when it's prepared to my liking. I can't cook a damn thing, but now I'm learning how to pan-sear a steak to perfection and making my way around a pressure cooker. That of course is just a personal anecdote, but I suspect everyone has a natural taste for meat that they can reactivate without much trouble. Children will eat meat without hesitation, but vegetables have to be dressed up in all sorts of ways. I think there's probably a biological and historical reason for this. Much of the vegetables we eat are not naturally occurring in the wild, so we wouldn't have developed a palate for them.

On top of that, the only way that plants are able to defend themselves from being eaten (rather than just their seeds) is to manufacture toxins and antinutrients that must be cooked out of them before consumption, or tolerated as "fiber" that your body doesn't get anything out of. You get these bitter flavors and burning sensations that can be harnessed with a little ingenuity to make other foods taste better, but are really your body's way of telling you that you shouldn't be eating this. But that's a side point that doesn't really address your question.

The second thing that I've come to terms with is that I don't look to food for enjoyment so much anymore. We have this idea that our meals should be entertaining, when really it doesn't have to be anything other than fuel; and if it's the kind of fuel our bodies are optimally geared to run on, chances are it will taste just fine. So, the concept of eating out of boredom or chasing variety for its own sake is starting to seem like a waste of time to me. I know that the taste of a rare ribeye steak with a nicely charred exterior will, always and forever, be something I immensely enjoy. If I had the budget for it, I'd eat it every day for every meal (as the Andersen family has for decades without any health problems). But burger patties are tasty too, as is bacon, chuck roast, salmon, and did I mention bacon?

Finally, I just love how simple everything surrounding eating has become. There's no more looking for recipes that torture a cauliflower into tasting vaguely like a potato, or looking for low-carb cheesecake recipes that leave me unsatisfied and wanting the real thing. Over time, not eating anything sweet makes me want it less and less, and I expect to eventually have no interest in sugar at all. Grocery shopping is fun. I think of all the money I'm saving from cereals, vegetables, and sweets (not to mention craft beer!) and channel that into the week's selection of meats. I do miss the occasional drink, but I intend to find a way to enjoy a non-fermented liquor once in a while after the month is up.

Where are you going to find a non-fermented liquor? As far as I am aware, all drinking alcohol is derived from fermentation. In fact, industrial ethanol is too - my understanding is that fermentation is simply too easy a way to make ethanol for any alternative methods to be needed (or economically viable).

Is there any liquor on the market that is not derived from fermentation?

I must have used the wrong word. I was referring to the so-called "dry" alcohols that do not contain any residual sugars from the process (which, as you say, must have been fermentation) such as whisky, gin, and vodka. So maybe "distilled" would have been a better word.

Fair enough.

 

[bilby]

southernhybrid, another thing that bugs me about that NatGeo article is the part where it concludes humans could not have subsisted on mostly meat because hunting is often difficult. Why, then, are there carnivores in the world at all? Among all species, humans are probably in the top 1% of apex predators simply due to our ability to fashion tools, set traps, plan ahead, and communicate complex strategies among ourselves (all behaviors, by the way, which separate us from our closest cousins and would not have evolved if we did not require much of our nutrition from animal flesh).

If it simply wasn't feasible for early humans to hunt all year round without going hungry, how did other species manage to do it? Lions don't hibernate, and they get what they need from the Savannah one way or another.

Carnivores, especially large land carnivores tend to be either solitary or to live in small family groups and require significant terrotory to supply suitable prey. Humans so not tend toluve this way.

You might consider the shape of the human mouth, as well as the number, size, and type of teeth that a human has compared with the teeth of say, a lion. Humans specifically have more teeth designed to chew plant based meals vs the teeth of a lion which survives on meat.

Good point about territory habits. I hadn't thought of that. As for teeth, we clearly have adaptations that favor more than just meat, as you say. But I will also note that we don't have fully plant-adapted teeth and jaws either; ours don't rotate like a cow's, for example.

Here is an informal infographic that looks at several bodily features of humans, wolves, and sheep. It seems to suggest that, while plant eating is possible given our makeup, we are poorly equipped for it compared to animals that specialize in it, in contrast to our meat-eating equipment, which is just about the same as animals that specialize in that.

View attachment 14271

In fairness, it should be noted that Wolves are not 100% carnivorous, and will eat plants in some circumstances. They are omnivores, like us, but lean slightly farther in the direction of preferring animals to plants.

Cats would have made a fairer example of an obligate carnivore, and that comparison would show that humans are quite a long way from being carnivores, as well as being quite a long way from being herbivores.

Comparing two ominvores to a single (very specialized) herbivore is not a particularly fair comparison IMO. Grass eating is a distinctly niche behaviour (albeit one that human agriculture has promoted significantly).

 

[southernhybrid]

I'm afraid that I have to strongly disagree with you PH, when it comes to the benefits of dietary fiber. There are countless academic studies that support the benefit of dietary fiber. I also read a new study that may demonstrate that there are things about the benefits of dietary fiber that we don't even understand yet.

https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/article/67/4/188/1901012

Dietary fiber intake provides many health benefits. However, average fiber intakes for US children and adults are less than half of the recommended levels. Individuals with high intakes of dietary fiber appear to be at significantly lower risk for developing coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and certain gastrointestinal diseases. Increasing fiber intake lowers blood pressure and serum cholesterol levels. Increased intake of soluble fiber improves glycemia and insulin sensitivity in non-diabetic and diabetic individuals. Fiber supplementation in obese individuals significantly enhances weight loss. Increased fiber intake benefits a number of gastrointestinal disorders including the following: gastroesophageal reflux disease, duodenal ulcer, diverticulitis, constipation, and hemorrhoids. Prebiotic fibers appear to enhance immune function. Dietary fiber intake provides similar benefits for children as for adults. The recommended dietary fiber intakes for children and adults are 14 g/1000 kcal. More effective communication and consumer education is required to enhance fiber consumption from foods or supplements.

The report is very long, so I only skimmed it, but I've read quite a bit on this topic and I'm convinced that fiber is a very important part of a good diet for modern humans.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

I'm afraid that I have to strongly disagree with you PH, when it comes to the benefits of dietary fiber. There are countless academic studies that support the benefit of dietary fiber. I also read a new study that may demonstrate that there are things about the benefits of dietary fiber that we don't even understand yet.

https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/article/67/4/188/1901012

Dietary fiber intake provides many health benefits. However, average fiber intakes for US children and adults are less than half of the recommended levels. Individuals with high intakes of dietary fiber appear to be at significantly lower risk for developing coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and certain gastrointestinal diseases. Increasing fiber intake lowers blood pressure and serum cholesterol levels. Increased intake of soluble fiber improves glycemia and insulin sensitivity in non-diabetic and diabetic individuals. Fiber supplementation in obese individuals significantly enhances weight loss. Increased fiber intake benefits a number of gastrointestinal disorders including the following: gastroesophageal reflux disease, duodenal ulcer, diverticulitis, constipation, and hemorrhoids. Prebiotic fibers appear to enhance immune function. Dietary fiber intake provides similar benefits for children as for adults. The recommended dietary fiber intakes for children and adults are 14 g/1000 kcal. More effective communication and consumer education is required to enhance fiber consumption from foods or supplements.

The report is very long, so I only skimmed it, but I've read quite a bit on this topic and I'm convinced that fiber is a very important part of a good diet for modern humans.

I think we all know folks who supplement their diets with fiber. I've always thought that odd and kind of trendy. What is the point of eating a crap diet with refined and processed foods and then consuming fiber on the side? Am I the only one who finds that irrational?

The fiber is already in the food. Eat the food and you'll get the fiber. If you're eating twinkies and then grabbing for the metamucil I think that borders on insanity.

 

[bilby]

I'm afraid that I have to strongly disagree with you PH, when it comes to the benefits of dietary fiber. There are countless academic studies that support the benefit of dietary fiber. I also read a new study that may demonstrate that there are things about the benefits of dietary fiber that we don't even understand yet.

https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/article/67/4/188/1901012

Dietary fiber intake provides many health benefits. However, average fiber intakes for US children and adults are less than half of the recommended levels. Individuals with high intakes of dietary fiber appear to be at significantly lower risk for developing coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and certain gastrointestinal diseases. Increasing fiber intake lowers blood pressure and serum cholesterol levels. Increased intake of soluble fiber improves glycemia and insulin sensitivity in non-diabetic and diabetic individuals. Fiber supplementation in obese individuals significantly enhances weight loss. Increased fiber intake benefits a number of gastrointestinal disorders including the following: gastroesophageal reflux disease, duodenal ulcer, diverticulitis, constipation, and hemorrhoids. Prebiotic fibers appear to enhance immune function. Dietary fiber intake provides similar benefits for children as for adults. The recommended dietary fiber intakes for children and adults are 14 g/1000 kcal. More effective communication and consumer education is required to enhance fiber consumption from foods or supplements.

The report is very long, so I only skimmed it, but I've read quite a bit on this topic and I'm convinced that fiber is a very important part of a good diet for modern humans.

I think we all know folks who supplement their diets with fiber. I've always thought that odd and kind of trendy. What is the point of eating a crap diet with refined and processed foods and then consuming fiber on the side?

Because people prefer what you describe as 'a crap diet'?

Why would someone eat foods they don't like, when they can eat foods they like, and remain healthy through supplements?

Am I the only one who finds that irrational?

The fiber is already in the food. Eat the food and you'll get the fiber. If you're eating twinkies and then grabbing for the metamucil I think that borders on insanity.

If you expect me to eat broccoli just because you like it, then that borders on insanity.

People are entitled to their own preferences. And if they can indulge those preferences, and mitigate any harm that indulgence might cause by taking supplements, why should they instead let you dictate to them how they should behave?

 

[PyramidHead]

I'm afraid that I have to strongly disagree with you PH, when it comes to the benefits of dietary fiber. There are countless academic studies that support the benefit of dietary fiber. I also read a new study that may demonstrate that there are things about the benefits of dietary fiber that we don't even understand yet.

https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/article/67/4/188/1901012

Dietary fiber intake provides many health benefits. However, average fiber intakes for US children and adults are less than half of the recommended levels. Individuals with high intakes of dietary fiber appear to be at significantly lower risk for developing coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and certain gastrointestinal diseases. Increasing fiber intake lowers blood pressure and serum cholesterol levels. Increased intake of soluble fiber improves glycemia and insulin sensitivity in non-diabetic and diabetic individuals. Fiber supplementation in obese individuals significantly enhances weight loss. Increased fiber intake benefits a number of gastrointestinal disorders including the following: gastroesophageal reflux disease, duodenal ulcer, diverticulitis, constipation, and hemorrhoids. Prebiotic fibers appear to enhance immune function. Dietary fiber intake provides similar benefits for children as for adults. The recommended dietary fiber intakes for children and adults are 14 g/1000 kcal. More effective communication and consumer education is required to enhance fiber consumption from foods or supplements.

Were all of the study participants eating a typical Western diet that includes high-gycemic and refined carbohydrates? Or were the people who were likely to fret about fiber the health-conscious types who also counted calories and stayed away from junk food? There are too many variables in epidemiology to make anything out of a correlation like that.

The report is very long, so I only skimmed it, but I've read quite a bit on this topic and I'm convinced that fiber is a very important part of a good diet for modern humans.

The problem is that 'modern humans' have been around for much longer than sources of dietary fiber have been readily available. Where would they have gotten 14 g/1000 kcal of fiber in the African savanna? And more importantly, why would they have done this, without medical science to tell them they should? Fiber does not taste good and does not provide any energy. Why would they waste their time with it, when the same amount of effort could yield something more energy-dense and palatable? Our human ancestors were omnivores, but only ate plants reluctantly, opportunistically (unless they were very sweet and thus contained some energy). Why would something necessary for human health be tasteless and indigestible?

 

[PyramidHead]

The other salient piece of information we have about human dietary needs is that agriculture had to be invented.

In other words, there was not enough energy-rich vegetation and sweet fruit in the natural environment of humans to satisfy their desire for it. This same environment was what would have exerted selection pressures on our ancestors, so it seems unlikely that plant matter would have been absolutely crucial to human life before we had the means to reliably grow it. I keep returning to this point, but the planet has changed a lot more than humans have in the past few hundred thousand years. Dependence on a food source that varied seasonally, was unavailable during ice ages, and was low in energy content would have put early humans at a severe disadvantage compared to those who could subsist on just meat--available anywhere animals live, in any climate, and full of energy. Thus, if we had some kind of nutritional requirement for something that could only come from plants, I don't see how that requirement would have survived natural selection before the invention of agriculture.

 

[bilby]

The other salient piece of information we have about human dietary needs is that agriculture had to be invented.

In other words, there was not enough energy-rich vegetation and sweet fruit in the natural environment of humans to satisfy their desire for it. This same environment was what would have exerted selection pressures on our ancestors, so it seems unlikely that plant matter would have been absolutely crucial to human life before we had the means to reliably grow it. I keep returning to this point, but the planet has changed a lot more than humans have in the past few hundred thousand years. Dependence on a food source that varied seasonally, was unavailable during ice ages, and was low in energy content would have put early humans at a severe disadvantage compared to those who could subsist on just meat--available anywhere animals live, in any climate, and full of energy. Thus, if we had some kind of nutritional requirement for something that could only come from plants, I don't see how that requirement would have survived natural selection before the invention of agriculture.

Therefore herbivores don't exist.

Or wasn't that the conclusion you were working towards there?

 

[rousseau]

The other salient piece of information we have about human dietary needs is that agriculture had to be invented.

In other words, there was not enough energy-rich vegetation and sweet fruit in the natural environment of humans to satisfy their desire for it. This same environment was what would have exerted selection pressures on our ancestors, so it seems unlikely that plant matter would have been absolutely crucial to human life before we had the means to reliably grow it. I keep returning to this point, but the planet has changed a lot more than humans have in the past few hundred thousand years. Dependence on a food source that varied seasonally, was unavailable during ice ages, and was low in energy content would have put early humans at a severe disadvantage compared to those who could subsist on just meat--available anywhere animals live, in any climate, and full of energy. Thus, if we had some kind of nutritional requirement for something that could only come from plants, I don't see how that requirement would have survived natural selection before the invention of agriculture.

This presumption is incorrect. Agriculture wasn't a random invention, it came to be in places of the world where hunting and gathering could no longer sustain population pressures. In other words it just meant people needed more produce and agriculture was the result of that pressure.

I don't think anybody would argue that the human diet isn't flexible, but throughout history when people were in a constant fight against starvation they tended to eat things that were edible. If it provided nourishment, people would eat it. The take home there, I think, isn't that our diet is inflexible, but rather if we can digest something that nourishes us, why not include any and all foodstuffs that are healthy for us?

 

[Playball40]

I'm afraid that I have to strongly disagree with you PH, when it comes to the benefits of dietary fiber. There are countless academic studies that support the benefit of dietary fiber. I also read a new study that may demonstrate that there are things about the benefits of dietary fiber that we don't even understand yet.

https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/article/67/4/188/1901012

Dietary fiber intake provides many health benefits. However, average fiber intakes for US children and adults are less than half of the recommended levels. Individuals with high intakes of dietary fiber appear to be at significantly lower risk for developing coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and certain gastrointestinal diseases. Increasing fiber intake lowers blood pressure and serum cholesterol levels. Increased intake of soluble fiber improves glycemia and insulin sensitivity in non-diabetic and diabetic individuals. Fiber supplementation in obese individuals significantly enhances weight loss. Increased fiber intake benefits a number of gastrointestinal disorders including the following: gastroesophageal reflux disease, duodenal ulcer, diverticulitis, constipation, and hemorrhoids. Prebiotic fibers appear to enhance immune function. Dietary fiber intake provides similar benefits for children as for adults. The recommended dietary fiber intakes for children and adults are 14 g/1000 kcal. More effective communication and consumer education is required to enhance fiber consumption from foods or supplements.

The report is very long, so I only skimmed it, but I've read quite a bit on this topic and I'm convinced that fiber is a very important part of a good diet for modern humans.

I think we all know folks who supplement their diets with fiber. I've always thought that odd and kind of trendy. What is the point of eating a crap diet with refined and processed foods and then consuming fiber on the side? Am I the only one who finds that irrational?

The fiber is already in the food. Eat the food and you'll get the fiber. If you're eating twinkies and then grabbing for the metamucil I think that borders on insanity.

Again, there is no such thing as "crap" food. Food serves a purpose - to fuel the body. Some foods have different ingredients, but no food is 'crap' or 'bad' anymore than any food is 'good'.