Glycation Causes – Carbs, PUFAs, Oxidative Stress, Inadequate CO2, Dicarbonyls, Depleted Glutathione, or Some Combination?

Here are some differing views on glycation causes from people advocating low-carb, high-carb, and moderate-carb diets (summary of identified causes in parentheses):

Ron Rosedale, MD: (glucose, starch and other carbohydrates)

"In everyone, when one eats starches it quickly turns to sugar, glucose, fructose, galactose, etc. that will circulate and glycate the collagen that lines the arteries causing inflammation and cardiovascular disease and all of the other adverse effects of glycation."

From: http://drrosedale.com/blog/2012/08/18/a-conclusion-to-the-safe-starch-debate-by-answering-four-questions

“glucose will cause some damage when above 0 mg/dl …. At any level of glucose compatible with life some more meaningful degree of glycation, hormonal response and genetic expression will take place.”

From: November 20, 2011, http://drrosedale.com/blog/2011/11/22/is-the-term-safe-starches-an-oxymoron/

Jimmy Moore: (glucose)

“a process known as glycation–where the glucose (sugar) in your blood finds proteins to stick to to form what is know as advanced glycation end products, aka AGEs. As the acronym implies, these ages will age you. The more sugar you eat, the more ages that get produced.”

From: Low-Carb Diet Prevents Sagging Skin, Prostate Tumor Growth, And Hypercholesterolemia

November 26th, 2007

http://livinlavidalowcarb.com/blog/low-carb-diet-prevents-sagging-skin-prostate-tumor-growth-and-hypercholesterolemia/2137

Nora Gedgaudas: (nonfibrous carbohydrates)

"All nonfibrous carbohydrates stimulate the secretion of insulin, which is the fat storage hormone, or damage the body and brain via a process known as [i]glycation[/i] (in which sugars in the bloodstream react with proteins and fats and cause them to deteriorate). ...

Glycation and its damage is ultimately a cumulative process, so every bit of sugar or starch we eat eventually counts. Every piece of candy, cookie, bread, or potato, every spoonful of honey, and every drop of soda effectively shortens your life—something to think about."

From: Primal Body, Primal Mind, c. 2011, pp. -127

Ray Peat, PhD: (oxidized PUFA’s, repeated cellular stress, inadequate carbon dioxide)

"Glycation is something that is identified with diabetes and alzheimer's disease and so on. It means the attachment of sugar-like fragments to proteins and especially to receptors, or sensitive points in the cell (regulatory points). ... [T]hey call it glycation as if it's caused by glucose, but actually, the oxidized products of PUFA's are many times more active in causing glycation, and the glycation happens mainly on lysine amino groups of proteins, but you can glycate any molecule that has an amino group, and that pretty well inactivates it, but the normal function of a good concentration of carbon dioxide is to bind to glycine groups [and thus prevent glycation]."

From: (2005-10) Ray Peat - Nervous System Protect & Restore, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdLHWFJI2y0, starting at 1:00:54

“The free fatty acids released by the stress hormones serve as supplemental fuel, and increase the consumption of oxygen and the production of heat. (This increased oxygen demand is a problem for the heart when it is forced to oxidize fatty acids. [A. Grynberg, 2001]) But if the stored fats happen to be polyunsaturated, they damage the blood vessels and the mitochondria, suppress thyroid function, and cause “glycation” of proteins. They also damage the pancreas, and impair insulin secretion.

A repeated small stress, or overstimulation of insulin secretion, gradually tends to become amplified by the effects of tryptophan and the polyunsaturated fatty acids, with these fats increasing the formation of serotonin, and serotonin increasing the liberation of the fats.

The name, “glycation,” indicates the addition of sugar groups to proteins, such as occurs in diabetes and old age, but when tested in a controlled experiment, lipid peroxidation of polyunsaturated fatty acids produces the protein damage about 23 times faster than the simple sugars do (Fu, et al., 1996). And the oxidation of fats rather than glucose means that the proteins won't have as much protective carbon dioxide combined with their reactive nitrogen atoms, so the real difference in the organism is likely to be greater than that seen by Fu, et al.

These products of lipid peroxidation, HNE, MDA, acrolein, glyoxal, and other highly reactive aldehydes, damage the mitochondria, reducing the ability to oxidize sugar, and to produce energy and protective carbon dioxide.”

From: Glycemia, starch, and sugar in context, c. 2009

http://raypeat.com/articles/articles/glycemia.shtml

"Glycation imitates mutated forms of proteins, for example normal transthyretin behaves like the prion protein, forming amyloid. Transthyretin, the protein that carries thyroid hormone and vitamin A, is normally taken up along with cholesterol under the influence of thyroid hormone. Abnormal cholesterol metabolism is one of the traits associated with Alzheimer's disease. In the absence of thyroid-supported respiration, carbon dioxide and other respiration-associated molecules (e.g., acetate) are replaced by lactate and unused sugar, causing abnormal modifications of proteins such as tau, which regulates microtubule assembly. Glycation of collagen in the extracellular matrix alters the properties of the matrix. The glycated matrix would become a preferred site for glycated prion-like proteins.

It is possible that the altered transthyretin makes vitamin A less available to cells. Vitamin A deficiency creates major disruption of the framework proteins. Fragments of starch molecules inhibit the enzymes that remove inappropriately bound sugar molecules from proteins, and the inability to metabolize sugar into carbon dioxide increases that binding. Starches and unsaturated fats cooperate in this process of inappropriate sugar binding, while thyroid hormone, and the carbon dioxide it produces, tend to prevent the binding.

Considering the universal importance of carbon dioxide to life, the ways it interacts with all of the important substances that make up organisms, that it is involved closely with ATP synthesis and other "energy-related" processes, that it participates intimately in the regulation of water and ions, that it is therapeutic in a range of conditions including angina pectoris, hypoxia, epilepsy, inflammation, shock, lipid peroxidation, pneumonia, and asthma, I think we can at least conclude that it is a largely overlooked mediator between chemical energy and life processes. In many cases, its movements and reactions constitute the actual motive force that so many fantasy theories have failed to explain. In other situations, it fills out the context for understanding the energy-mediating actions of ATP, calcium, and hormones."

From: Energy, structure, and carbon dioxide: A realistic view of the organism, http://members.westnet.com.au/pkolb/peat2.htm

Chris Masterjohn, PhD: (oxidative stress, PUFAs, dicarbonyls, depleted glutathione)

... There are a lot of misconceptions about AGEs, and one of them is that they are mostly formed from glucose directly glomming on to proteins.  The term "glycation," which is clearly derived from "glucose," certainly contributes to this misconception, but the situation is actually much more complex than this.  Glucose does indeed have the hots for proteins, but the high school glycation prom has a sexy chaperone named fructosamine 3-kinase who's kicking carbonyls and taking names, and if the two dance too close, F3-K steps in the way. 

It is instead the sneaky dicarbonyls (pronounced like "DIE-carb-o-NEELS") that escape the attention of our otherwise striking chaperone.  They are on average 20,000 times more reactive than glucose, and they emerge from the broken pieces of glucose, protein, and fat — and not just PUFAs.  Nevertheless, they do no harm unless they slip past our good friend glutathione, who polices the streets at night and renders the balance of these creepy would-be criminals as impotent as the mythical sorcerer lurking in the shadows of Maasai-land.  ...

most AGEs in plasma are derived from methylglyoxal and 3-deoxyglucosone (13), and that it is methylglyoxal-derived AGEs that increase the most in diabetes...

peroxidation of PUFAs is very unlikely to be a major source of AGEs.

Are PUFAs off the hook?  Not at all.  We will see below that oxidative stress is a central factor in AGE formation, and guzzling corn oil gets that oxidative stress a-goin'.

... Treatments that deplete cells (27) or live animals (28) of their glutathione cause large increases in methylglyoxal concentrations, suggesting that the glyoxalase system is ordinarily efficiently detoxifying much or most of the methylglyoxal that crosses its path. Little is known about the molecular mechanisms by which our cells regulate their production of the two glyoxalase enzymes themselves, but we know so far that zinc and insulin increase the production of glyoxalase-1 (29).  This suggests that zinc, insulin, and glutathione are critical components of our defense against dicarbonyls and the AGEs they produce.

... oxidative stress depletes glutathione

... AGEs and their dicarbonyl precursors may emerge as key signaling molecules, but ... in many situations they do indeed cause harm.

From: Where Do Most AGEs Come From? O Glycation, How Thy Name Hast Deceived Me!

Friday, October 7, 2011

http://blog.cholesterol-and-health.com/2011/10/where-do-most-ages-come-from-o.html 

Is a Divide Developing Within the LCHF Camp over the importance of using ketones for energy?

Dr. Michael Eades has argued that the Inuit used ketones as a key energy source on their traditional diet, that the only reason they weren't measured as producing many ketones is that they were "ketoadapted," and that using ketones was a good thing for them, and also a good thing for others to emulate:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/ketones-and-ketosis/beware-confirmation-bias
"according to most of what I’ve read, the Inuit ate a diet made of about 50 percent caribou, 30 percent fish, 10 percent seal and 10 percent rabbit, polar bear, birds and eggs. These are the figures Stefansson quotes, but they are confirmed by others. Both Stefansson and Murdoch, who wrote the ethnology report for the government in the late 1800s (predating Stefansson) reported that the Inuit ate about the same amount of food, in terms of calories, as a standard American and ate the same amount of fat. I’m not sure I agree, but that’s what they reported. I would think they would have eaten more fat.

... I can tell you from many years of experience treating patients on low-carb diets that you don’t have to eat a 70-80% fat diet to go into ketosis. You can eat steak, chicken, lamb chops, virtually any kind of meat along with a salad and a green vegetable and get nicely into ketosis. And stay there for a good while. Ultimately, if you stick with such a diet, you end up ketoadapted and your level of measurable ketones fall.

He even argued against eating too much protein, so as to avoid slowing down the ketogenic process;

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/saturated-fat/tips-tricks-for-starting-or-restarting-low-carb-pt-ii/
"keep an eye on the protein intake. Too much protein will prevent the shift into ketoses [sic] because the liver will convert some of the protein into glucose – this glucose will then be used first and slow down the ketogenic process.  Which, if course, prompts the question, how much protein is too much?  As long as you’re getting your protein from meat, especially fatty cuts of meat, you’re probably okay.  If you go for the extremely lean cuts of meat, say, skinless chicken breasts, or if you are supplementing your diet with low-fat protein shakes, you could have a little more trouble low-carb adapting."

Peter of the Hyperlipid/high-fat-nutrition blog recently hypothesized that most of the Inuit (and other Artic/subarctic peoples) "did not develop high levels of ketones," due to a genetic mutation:

The P479L gene for CPT-1a and fatty acid oxidation
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 2014
http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2014/11/the-p479l-gene-for-cpt-1a-and-fatty.html

Peter: "I have some level of discomfort with using the Inuit as poster people for a ketogenic diet. That's fine. They may well have eaten what would be a ketogenic diet for many of us, but they certainly did not develop high levels of ketones when they carried the P479L gene. ...

Ultimately, point scoring on the internet about what the Inuit did or didn't eat shouldn't destroy people's chances of health. Destroying a circular argument about Inuit diets may [make] the destructor feel good. ...."

Dr. Eades does not appear to agree with this hypothesis:

Michael R. Eades, M.D. said...
"@Tim Steele

You wrote: "I'm not sorry I helped topple a faulty core tenant of the modern day Ketogenic Diet."

Pretty hubristic, I would say. I would argue that it hasn't come close to being toppled by you or anyone else."

It will be interesting to see where this debate leads.

Did You Know That There's Sugar in Your Shrimp and Lobster?

It was shocking enough for many in the Paleo/ancestral and LC communities to learn that there's a super-"safe" starch called resistant starch. When they get around to investigating trehalose, their minds may really be blown! Trehalose (aka "mushroom sugar") is a super-healthy sugar that's found in fungi (such as shiitake, maitake, nameko, and Judas's ear mushrooms), sea algae, honey, and even crustaceans (such as shrimp and lobster) and insects.

As with resistant starch, Paul Jaminet, the "safe-starches" guy, was ahead of the crowd, touching on trehalose back in 2010: http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2010/09/high-carb-diets-can-be-tough-on-bacteria-too

Trehalose may provide some amazing benefits. Physician and anti-aging researcher James Watson reported that trehalose "activates autophagy via an mTOR-independent mechanism." (Autophagy – the housekeeper in every cell that fights aging, Posted on 19 April 2013)

Paleo dieters and Peatarians alike might be interested to learn that trehalose has been found to suppress lipid oxidation, a partiular concern with polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) that are sensitive to oxidation. Trehalose may also "have a kind of suppressive effect on the development of osteoporosis." (Novel functions and applications of trehalose, Takanobu Higashiyama, Pure Appl. Chem., Vol. 74, No. 7, pp. 1263–1269, 2002. http://www.iupac.org/publications/pac/2002/pdf/7407x1263.pdf)

Diabetics have been reporting that trehalose improves their blood sugar numbers. (JC Spencer, "The Sugar Trehalose is helping Diabetics," http://forum.endowmentmed.org/index.php?topic=87.msg219#msg219)

Trehalose even reduced the symptoms of parkinsonism in mice. (Trehalose ameliorates dopaminergic and tau pathology in parkin deleted/tau overexpressing mice through autophagy activation, Neurobiol Dis., 2010,
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20546895)

Out of curiosity, I've been experimenting with a trehalose powder (I know, I know, an "evil processed powder"! ;-) ). Instead of causing my teeth and gums to become coated in gunk, I find it slightly cleans them. It seems to reduce my remaining minor dandruff a bit too, though that's more difficult to tell. I haven't noticed any negative effects. It's a bit pricey, though, so I doubt I'll buy much more of it. Trehalose may at least be another reason to eat mushrooms, crustaceans and honey, and some day maybe even insects.

WARNING: Serious problems have been reported with very low carb diets

See Spanish Caravan's online comments about this, such as at http://tinyurl.com/m2f73fc.

Resistant starch seems to be especially important. I recommend reading up on it and the Old Friends Hypothesis.

Resistant-Starch-Rich Rhymes

As we saw with Ahem! Avoid Margarine, folk/nursery rhymes can contain good health information. Here are some more examples:

Boxty (quick-fried or oven-baked raw grated potato pancakes that were traditionally popular in the Irish counties of Mayo, Sligo, Donegal, Ulster, Fermanagh, Longford, Leitrim and Cavan) contains some healthy resistant starch, especially if allowed to cool:

Boxty on the griddle,
And Boxty on the pan;
The wee one in the middle
Is for Mary Ann.

Boxty on the griddle,
boxty on the pan,
If you can't bake boxty
sure you'll never get a man.

Boxty on the griddle,
Boxty on the pan,
If you don't eat boxty,
You'll never get a man.

Cold nine-day old pease porridge http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pease_porridge was a traditional English dish also rich in resistant starch (which, unfortunately, few are willing to eat today):

Pease porridge hot, pease porridge cold,
Pease porridge in the pot, nine days old;
Some like it hot, some like it cold,
Some like it in the pot, nine days old.

Full spectrum hormetic therapy

Why wouldn't it make sense to use the full spectrum of hormetic therapies, rather than just one side or the other? For example:

 •  Eating pro-oxidants as well as antioxidants
 •  Gorging as well as fasting
 •  Heat therapy in addition to cold therapy
 •  Minus lens and plus lens therapy for overcoming nearsightedness
 •  Relaxation and high intensity exercise

Presumably both extremes of the spectrum would be practiced intermittently.

What is Ancestral Nutrition Really About?

The key concept of ancestral ("Paleo"/primal/evolutionary) nutrition is not to avoid foods that you thrive on just because they're on someone's list of "forbidden" foods, it's to eat what you thrive on--the foods your body is best adapted to within the context of your lifestyle, to maximize your overall health and fitness goals. Evidence from the archaeological record and observed hunter-gatherer and horticultural peoples are just clues in helping to form a basic template to start from, not final detailed answers for everyone.

It's not about blind nostalgic emulation for emulation's sake, nor is it about excessive reductionism or refusing to employ lessons from biomimicry because of rigid neomaniac ideology. Here are some terms used by proponents of various flavors of ancestral nutrition that give a sense of the basic overall concept:

> Weston Price: "living in accordance with inherited traditions" and "accumulated wisdom"

> Walter Voegtlin, MD: human ecology

> Boyd Eaton, MD: our ancient genome, biological discordance vs. adaptation, Paleolithic nutrition, evolutionary nutrition

> Loren Cordain, PhD: evolutionary template, Paleolithic nutrition, evolutionary nutrition
> Art DeVany: evolutionary fitness, new evolution diet

> Robb Wolf and Chris Kresser: Paleo template

> Mark Sisson: Primal Blueprint
> Kurt Harris, MD: evolutionary metabolic milieu (EM2)

Raw and Raw-Fermented Paleo Tubers

Before cooking there was fermenting. Human beings and pre-human ancestors have been eating raw Paleo starchy foods for many millions of years. This is something that most so-called "Paleo" dieters are not aware of. Most are also not aware of the fact that some traditional people bury their roots and tubers to ferment them, so as to make them more tasty and digestible. If someone tells you that a food must be cooked to be made edible, check into whether it can be made edible via fermenting (or bletting in the case of some fruits) before assuming they are correct. Here is some info on the topic:

RAW YAMS

> Raw Yam?, http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/omnivorous-raw-paleo/raw-yam/25/

African Species of Yam (Dioscorea) that are Edible Raw (these are not available in American supermarkets):
> Dioscorea bulbifera - the "air potato"/"potato yam" (native to Africa and Asia; apparently only certain varieties are edible raw per http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yam_(vegetable); http://tiny.cc/t89pow)
> Dioscorea transversa - Long Yam or Parsnip Yam (native to Australia):
Women Hunters - Ray Mears Extreme Survival - BBC
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwklPPEDbWM#

> Dioscorea batata (opposita; nagaimo; Chinese yam; yamaimo) - Mountain Yam (native to China; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yam_(vegetable))

> Gbodo: Nigerian fermented and dried or parboiled yam
-> Effect of local preservatives on quality of traditional dry-yam slices 'gbodo' and its products, http://www.idosi.org/wjas/wjas2(3)/6.pdf

OTHER TUBERS EDIBLE RAW (FERMENTED) OR BRIEFLY COOKED

> Biochemical changes in micro-fungi fermented cassava flour produced from low- and medium-cyanide variety of cassava tubers. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18087867

Studies on bio-deterioration, aflatoxin contamination and food values of fermented, dried and stored ipomoea batatas [sweet potato] chips
http://www.sciencepub.net/nature/ns1011/018_11118ns1011_123_128.pdf

Tubers as Fallback Foods and Their Impact on Hadza
Hunter-Gatherers
Frank W. Marlowe* and Julia C. Berbesque
http://www.bioanth.cam.ac.uk/fwm23/tubers_and_fallback_foods_21040_ftp.pdf

The Annual January Spike in Paleo Diet Interest

In 2010, 2011 and 2012, there was a spike in interest in the Paleo diet online in January (when people make New Year's resolutions to lose weight), and 2013 was no exception. Each year the spike gets larger. You can see it at Google Trends:

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=paleo%20diet&cmpt=q

You can also see that the "Paleo diet" search term eclipsed "vegan diet"

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=paleo%20diet%2C%20vegan%20diet&cmpt=q

and "vegetarian diet":

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=paleo%20diet%2C%20vegetarian%20diet&cmpt=q

and even "Atkins diet". There's still quite a ways to go before "Paleo diet" reaches the level that "Atkins diet" was at in January 2004, though:

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=paleo%20diet%2C%20atkins%20diet&cmpt=q

Interestingly, the interest in "Paleo diet" doesn't drop off substantially after January like it does with most other diets and dieting in general:

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=diet&cmpt=q

Could this suggest that people find that the diet works, stick with it, and continue to be interested in learning more about it for a long time afterwards? Is this one of the few diets that really does become a long-term way of eating instead of just a quick-fix fad?

CrossFit has contributed greatly to the growth in the Paleo diet trend and it too has experienced extraordinary growth in interest:

http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=crossfit


1.24.13 update: "Paleo diet" was the top diet search term for the week ending January 5th, 2013: http://www.experian.com/blogs/marketing-forward/2013/01/08/the-paleo-diet-is-top-2013-diet-search/ "Gluten free diet" was also popular. The broad concept of the Paleo template is rapidly eclipsing all other diets.

Intelligent Tinkering

“If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.” - Aldo Leopold, Round River, 1993, p. 146

The Coming Gluten-Free Craze

More Gluten-Free Sports Star Successes

The rapid rise of Novak Djokovic to #1 in the tennis world after he adopted a gluten-free diet shook up the tennis world (The Diet That Shook Up Tennis?), but a single case could be dismissed as a fluke. Now other tennis pros like Sabine Lisicki and Andy Murray and other prominent athletes like Steve Nash, Raul Ibanez, and Cedric Benson (http://edwardandsons.com/blogpages/?p=85, http://glutenfreeworks.com/blog/2011/08/08/gluten-free-spells-success-for-big-time-athletes/) have reported that they avoid gluten and experience benefits as a result. Jefferson Adams of Celiac.com rightly foresees where this is likely heading in the tennis world:

"After five months on a gluten-free diet, top professional tennis player Andy Murray has more energy than before, a faster recovery time, and a new-found ability to wake up early, according to comments Murray made when asked by reporters.

The Scot says that he is amazed by the energy he's gotten from his gluten-free diet. He also says that his change in eating habits is proving beneficial on the court. ….

[I]f Murray sees anything like benefits experienced by Novak Djokovic, who credits a string of big victories to his gluten-free diet, the tennis world is in for some gluten-free excitement!" (Gluten-free Diet Now Fuels Tennis Star Andy Murray)

Once other athletes realize that not just people with celiac disease or severe gluten intolerance, but most people, can experience performance benefits from eliminating gluten-rich processed foods from their diets, it will likely become a craze amongst athletes, and once most people's favorite sports stars are touting gluten-free, I expect it will become a societal craze.

Most people don't pay much attention to scientific studies, but many do pay attention to their sports idols. Sales of gluten-free foods will likely skyrocket, with resulting temporary shortages and increasing prices. Eventually many folks will figure out that processed gluten-free foods aren't all that great either and natural, whole foods like meats, seafood, fruits and veggies are better.

Richard Feynman on Science

“Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.” - Richard Feynman

From: "What is Science?", presented at the fifteenth annual meeting of the National Science Teachers Association, in New York City (1966) published inThe Physics Teacher Vol. 7, issue 6 (1969)

Ahem! Avoid Margarine

In Ireland there used to be a children's insult-rhyme with lyrics implying that people who eat margarine are no good and sickly (butter and lard were apparently the preferred fats):

Me Mother Is Gone to Church

Ahem! Ahem!
Me mother is gone to church.
She told me not to play with you
Because you're in the dirt.
It t'isn't because you're dirty,
It t'isn't because you're clean,
It's because you have the whoopin' cough
And eat margarine! [or "from eatin' margarine"]

The Clancy brothers tell a bit of the story and recite the rhyme here starting at 3:27 -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fDh7Ck1aF4

This poem was an oral folk news warning to not eat the new-fangled margarine because people had noticed that those who did were more likely to get the sometimes-deadly whooping cough that reached epidemic proportions in the early twentieth century. 

The Irish were right to link manufactured margarine to ill health:

Margarine Lung

Margarine Linked to Increased Risk of Heart Disease

You'd butter believe it: Margarine consumption is linked to lower IQs in children

People have forgotten this poem and its lesson and vaccination rates have been declining, so the whooping cough is slowly on the rise again:

Number of whooping cough cases doubles this year (Ireland)
http://www.thejournal.ie/whooping-cough-cases-double-ireland-714392-Dec2012

Whooping cough epidemic declared in Vermont (USA)
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2012/12/13/whooping-cough-epidemic-declared-in-vermont/1768527

The Procrustean Error: fitting humans to an unnatural world instead of restoring the natural order

Nassim Taleb, the philosophical and geographical flâneur (a stroller, physically and metaphorically, who has a "complete philosophical way of living and thinking" and a process of navigating erudition, that is, deep learning through experience, experimentation, socializing and self-directed reading, rather than through formal insitutional education) discussed in his The Bed of Procrustes the modern tendency to try to make life and the world fit our narrative notions instead of adapting our ideas to reality or admitting ignorance. Below are examples of modern variants of the Procrustean error supplied by Nassim and the Swedish "diet doctor," Aaron Eenfeldt, which involve medicating or even surgically altering our bodies to try to adapt them to modern diets and lifestyles instead of trying to restore the foods and environment we are naturally adapted to:

"Procrustes, in Greek mythology, was the cruel owner of a small estate in Corydalus in Attica on the way between Athens and Eleusis, where the  mystery rites were performed. Procrustes had a peculiar sense of hospitality; he  abducted  travelers, provided them  with a generous dinner, then invited them to spend the night in a rather special bed. He wanted the bed to fit the traveler to perfection. Those who were too tall had their legs chopped off with a sharp hatchet; those who were too short were stretched (his name was  said to be Damastes, or Polypemon, but he was nicknamed Procrustes, which meant "the stretcher").

[W]e humans, facing limits of knowledge, and things we do not observe, the unseen and the unknown, resolve the tension by squeezing life and the world into crisp commoditized ideas, reductive categories, specific vocabularies, and prepackaged narratives, which, on the occasion, has explosive consequences. Further, we seem unaware of this backward fitting, much like tailors who take great pride in delivering the perfectly fitting suit—but do so by surgically altering the limbs of their customers. For instance few realize that we are changing the brains of schoolchildren through medication in order to make them adjust to the curriculum, rather than the reverse." -Nassim Taleb, PhD, The Bed of Procrustes (see http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com for more info)

Regarding bariatric surgery: "It's like trying to surgically alter our bodies to adapt to industrial food." -Aaron Eenfeldt, MD, "Evolution of a Diet Revolution," 2011 Ancestral Health Symposium, http://vimeo.com/29464690 (see http://www.dietdoctor.com/ for more info)

Update on What I'm Eating

[Edit - Warning: Please don't take my diet info as a recommendation for you and do your own homework. 

2.2.14 The below diet was low in resistant starch and I think this contributed to gradually rising fasting blood glucose that peaked at 115 mg/dl and I started to also feel colder, after it had deceptively early on made me feel warmer and good. Adding more resistant starch into my diet helped reverse this within days. Other people are reporting serious illnesses from diets that were too chronically low in carbs and resistant starch and kept them in chronic ketosis, and also reporting other benefits from resistant starch. Please read up on resistant starch.

I'll leave this diet here as a warning to myself and others to not do this. Surprisingly, not even the carby foods were enough to prevent my FBG from rising and other issues. I suspect that resistant starch is particularly important.]

My description of what I've been eating is overdo for an update, as I've expanded my food selection significantly since the more heavily carnivore phase, which I had been hoping I could do some day. Eating almost no plant foods provided many benefits, but my past chronic constipation was worsening again after initial improvement, so I reintroduced some foods to my diet and I've been emphasizing softer animal foods like eggs and marrow.

I don't seem to have problems with root veggies that are edible raw, such as parsnips and carrots, and it's interesting that recent paleoanthropological research has led scientists to hypothesize that pre-human primates like Australopithecus and Ardepithecus consumed raw roots and tubers and nuts as staple foods, possibly more so than fruits (EARLY HUMANS SKIPPED FRUIT, WENT FOR NUTS).

My Current Staple Foods:

Fertile chicken eggs and duck eggs
Grassfed ground beef
Fats: Bone Marrow, Suet and Tallow, Lard (all grassfed or pastured)
Tuna, Yellowfin, wild, Hawaiian sushi grade or regular, frozen
Salmon, wild, sockeye, frozen or wild "fresh" (previously frozen) or sushi grade, wild clams, and other wild fish
Liver, GF beef/lamb
Heart, chicken
Carrots and Parsnips (edible raw, spicy, high potassium, a starch I can tolerate, one local farm grows excellent-tasting parsnips, but they're no longer sold at my local market)
Lemons (low sugar, alkaline, high vit C; I squeeze the juice out of them)
Blackberries (moderate sugar, high vit C)
Duck breast
Bone broth usually made with pastured marrow bones
Raw fermented cod liver oil, mint flavored (for the vitamins A and D)
Raw high vitamin butter oil (for the vitamin K2)
Water, mineral water, teas------

My Current Secondary Foods:

Really Raw brand fermented raw honey (does wonders for my hair and scalp flakes for some reason, though this didn't work for a friend of mine)
Fresh figs (not dried)
Strawberries (low sugar, high vit C), raspberries and some other fruits
Pastured ground bison or pork, pork loin, top round steak, ribeye steak, wild oysters and other meats/fish/organs
Celery and other nonstarchy, low-toxin veggies [edit: but starchy veggies also appear to be important]
Ginger, fresh or pickled
Wasabi mustard
Kelp
Sea salt, black pepper, spices

I try not to get carried away with fruit or raw fermented honey. If I eat too much of either, I start to develop skin and dental problems like chapped lips, dry skin, scalp flakes, increased dental plaque and loosening teeth. Tubers that require cooking, such as potatoes and sweet potatoes, produce similar symptoms in me and little or no of the benefits from honey and fruits re: GI functioning, hair and scalp condition, or taste, so I only eat them occasionally. [Edit: But I now consider tubers especially important because of their resistant starch content when raw or cooked and cooled for 8-12 hours or so. I get around the problems by supplementing with potato starch and eating dried raw plantains and other foods rich in resistant starch that I appear to handle better than freshly cooked hot tubers. 2.2.14]

Lex Rooker interviewed at Joanne Unleashed

Don't miss this excellent interview of a brilliant and honest man who has had great success with a raw carnivorous diet (for example, his migraines and precancerous lesions disappeared with this diet) but does not hide the problems he runs into.

Paleo Goes Mainstream

Well, it's happening. Both the Washington Post and New York Times have reported on Paleo diets in short order. The Paleo diet is making the radar, becoming known to the media elites and the masses. This could have both bad and good consequences. I'm hoping for more of the latter.

Below is a link and a couple of excerpts from the NYT article, which is much better than the Post article, though it unfortunately pokes a little fun at raw Paleo (but it's amazing that it even mentioned it):

The New Age Cavemen and the City

...."Several identify themselves as libertarians." [I noted this interesting connection in a post at the RawPaleoForum. Granted, the fact that prominent early adopters and near-adopters like Art De Vany, Michael Eades, Nassim Taleb and Kurt Harris appear to be libertarian-oriented probably skews the current, still-early numbers.]

An Upper East Side physician, Grant Macaulay, said he has recommended the diet to hundreds of his patients, and sends them to Barnes & Noble to buy a copy of Mr. Cordain’s “Paleo Diet.” [It's good to see more and more physicians recommending various versions of it.]

Water Consumption Important for Carnivores

In addition to fat, water is very important for carnivores, including humans eating a carnivorous diet. Inuits still eating a meat/seafood-heavy diet reportedly drink large quantities of water:

[The Inuit drink] large quantities of water (5 to 6 litres per day), characteristic of the protein-rich diet that triggers renal elimination of the products of catabolism. Jeremy MacClancy, Consuming the Inedible: Neglected Dimensions, p. 123

There's also the example of wolves and other carnivores who drink copious amounts of water after feasting on flesh. This vid is not of an actual wolf, but you get the idea: Josie Wales Wolfdog Wolf Dog drinking Water

Five to six liters is about 10.5 to 12.5 pints of water a day. That sounds excessive to me, so if anyone has any information on how much water the Inuit drank, I'd appreciate it.

I drink mostly mineral water myself, as some studies indicate it provides additional benefits and I figure Stone Age water was probably more mineral-rich than most of today's tap or bottled water.

Update: Still Doing Great

I'm still doing great on my stricter version of a Paleo diet (raw carnivore, with only occasional plant foods--basically an Inuit-style diet). The recent relapse of symptoms disappeared within a couple of months and my health is once again better than it's been in decades--even better than it was at my peak during the more conventional Paleo diet.

I don't tell people what to eat. I think folks should work out for themselves what foods they do best on. However, if you don't even try a Paleo diet, how will you know whether it works for you or not?

Note: when eating near-zero-carb like I am currently, one needs to eat a lot of fat to avoid eating excess protein and potentially even risking "rabbit starvation" (which is "protein poisoning" and malnutrition that occurs when eating too little fat or carbs with protein). I seem to do best on around 75 - 85% calories as fat.

Carnivorous Raw Paleo Diet working for me

After experiencing some relapse of certain symptoms I re-investigated my health and diet and tried a stricter approach, which quickly generated positive benefits. A very restrictive diet seems to work best for me. This is unfortunate, because it means that healthy foods are even less available for me than I realized and my diet is much less socially acceptable. I'm hoping I'll be able to stick with it despite the obstacles, as my health benefits dramatically when I do.

I decided to eliminate all foods that are questionable from a Paleo perspective:

Nightshades: Nightshades (like tomatoes, eggplant, and peppers, though not black pepper) are mostly New World foods. Even those available in the Old World were inedible during the Stone Age and had to be selected for reduced toxicity over time to be made edible. Recent research by Dr. Loren Cordain and others has implicated nightshades in diseases of civilization ("How to Treat Multiple Sclerosis with Diet;" multiple videos; covers the role of tomatoes in MS, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhkmDHLCUEs). Nightshades had also been linked in the past to arthritis and other diseases of civilization by many the anecdotal accounts of many patients. They were viewed as toxic for many centuries in Europe. I had been skeptical of these accounts, but not any more.

Foods inedible unless cooked: This mainly meant winter squashes for me (I got to the point of eating them nearly every day), but also some potatoes and occasional french fries. I had been eating increasing amounts of these starchy foods that are indigestible raw in a vain effort to gain weight and increase social acceptance of my diet. I know, stupid mistake on my part and I've actually gained more weight since going carnivorous, as it has improved my health and appetite.

Cheats: I decided to end all cheats. Once I started cheating by eating a "natural" corn-sweetener-free fruit juice popsicle or other cheat, I found myself eating more and more of them almost unconsciously. Such sweet treats are just too addictive for me.

I eliminated nightshades, foods inedible raw, and cheating first and the health benefits were fairly dramatic within a month.

Sugary foods: No more fruit juices or sweetened drinks, no matter how natural. No more dried fruits, or even fresh, sugary fruits like tropical fruits. Eliminating these helped immensely. I appear to be very sensitive to carbs.

Tree nuts: This one surprised me, as I thought that eating lots of walnuts was actually helping me. Yet, when I eliminated nuts I did even better. They do contain antinutrients, as do all plants, and tree nuts are a fairly common allergen. Being a Paleo dieter I had of course already eliminated non-tree "nuts" like peanuts that aren't actually nuts at all, but legumes.

The remaining plant foods: All plants contain antinutrients. They have to in order to survive, because these antinutrients are natural insecticides that fend off predators. Therefore, eating plants every day may theoretically build up toxic levels of antinutrients. Even primates that have been eating lots of plants for millions of years, such as chimps, have to consume clay and other detoxicants in order to offset the accumulated antinutrients they absorb by eating wild plants nearly every day.

Plus, I decided to try a carnivorous, raw Paleo diet, as that was where my experience and research were leading me, and that is what Lex Rooker was doing with tremendous success. I discovered his story here: http://www.rawpaleoforum.com/journals/lex%27s-journal/.

All beverages other than water: I don't stick to this one 100%, occasionally having some black coffee or tea, and I greatly resisted trying it, but I'm glad I did. Water was the only beverage of our early ancestors. I found that by not drinking sweetened or flavored beverages, water tastes much better to me. Whenever I'm the slightest bit dehydrated, water actually tastes rather sweet to me. People more experienced with this than me claim that it's the body's natural mechanism to keep my body properly hydrated.

So far, so good. I started going purely zero carb as of 8/5/2009, with only occasional spring greens or tea. As of 8/12/2009 I gave up those things and reached pure carnivory, eating only raw meats and fish (mostly pasture-fed or wild), low-heated beef jerky, low-heated tallow, raw bone marrow, raw suet and water. I know, it sounds weird and I never expected I would be eating this, but experience and research have led me here and the benefits have been marvelous: all remaining acne gone (and I no longer need to take zinc supplements to keep it under control), potassium-deficiency cramps gone and only return if I eat carbs, dental health dramatically improved (I actually have a hole in a tooth that is remineralizing--i.e. filling in--and my loose teeth no longer move when wiggled nor require a retainer to keep them standing straight), etc., etc.

Eating a mostly-raw carnivorous diet sounded impossible, even to me, but it hasn't been nearly as hard as I thought it would be. I especially love jerky with tallow, pemmican, and raw ground venison.