The Paleo Diet (2002): [citation needed]
Jun. 12th, 2011 06:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsI've been a long time fan of George Dvorsky and Sentient Developments. I don't agree with everything Dvorsky writes: he's way into the "Transhumanism is an appropriate expression of socialism." He's long been an advocate of uplift just for the sake of uplift without sufficient underpinnings explaining why the arbitrary process known as evolution should necessarily lead to uplift as a moral imperative.
George recently revealed in a no-comments post, replete with completely predictable pre-emptive push-backs, that he had gone onto the Paleo diet, that his health required the intake of animal protein, and that his audience should rest assured that he is a "conscious carnivore" and still an animal rights proponent.
Curious about this Paleo diet, I went and picked up the original book by Loren Cordain, publish in 2003.
The book is a long list of statements that should all end with [citation needed].
In order to distinguish his work from competing diet, Cordain spends an inordinate amount of time in the early chapters dumping on the Atkins diet, but he does so in a way that skews the research. He complains that the Atkins diet does away with fruits and vegetables, "Cancer-fighting fruits and vegetables![citation needed]" A lot of the book is like that. He goes deep into anti-salt and anti-fat, which I supposed looked good in 2003. Recent studies show that low-salt diets do nothing to prevent progression to hypertension, and low-fat diets do little to moderate or control cholesterol and atherosclerosis. My own physician pointed me to recent articles in JAMA indicting starches.
But what irks me most is that the Paleo diet, like the Slow Carb diet and every other diet on the market, is that to justify it to the masses it must delve deep, deep into nutritionalism.
Food is not a set of nutrients. It's not just a vehicle for the transmission of components, for Omega 3 and polyunsaturated fat and calcium chloride and so forth. Food is what we eat to sustain ourselves, it's pleasure and socializing and ritual and experimentation. Boiling food down to a Power Bar and a glass of water isn't breakfast, any more than porn is sex.
But somehow, to sell the product to the masses, The Paleo Diet, just like Tim Ferriss' Four Hour Body, must describe in excrutiating detail the trade-offs at the micro level.
I guess the basic message has been heard so often it no longer registers: all that sugar, simple starch, and readily digestible calories is what's making America fatter than ever, so stop eating those. Just like "exercise more" no longer registers.
Hell, I can shorten the modern guidelines to one sentence: Eat food you cooked yourself.
George recently revealed in a no-comments post, replete with completely predictable pre-emptive push-backs, that he had gone onto the Paleo diet, that his health required the intake of animal protein, and that his audience should rest assured that he is a "conscious carnivore" and still an animal rights proponent.
Curious about this Paleo diet, I went and picked up the original book by Loren Cordain, publish in 2003.
The book is a long list of statements that should all end with [citation needed].
In order to distinguish his work from competing diet, Cordain spends an inordinate amount of time in the early chapters dumping on the Atkins diet, but he does so in a way that skews the research. He complains that the Atkins diet does away with fruits and vegetables, "Cancer-fighting fruits and vegetables![citation needed]" A lot of the book is like that. He goes deep into anti-salt and anti-fat, which I supposed looked good in 2003. Recent studies show that low-salt diets do nothing to prevent progression to hypertension, and low-fat diets do little to moderate or control cholesterol and atherosclerosis. My own physician pointed me to recent articles in JAMA indicting starches.
But what irks me most is that the Paleo diet, like the Slow Carb diet and every other diet on the market, is that to justify it to the masses it must delve deep, deep into nutritionalism.
Food is not a set of nutrients. It's not just a vehicle for the transmission of components, for Omega 3 and polyunsaturated fat and calcium chloride and so forth. Food is what we eat to sustain ourselves, it's pleasure and socializing and ritual and experimentation. Boiling food down to a Power Bar and a glass of water isn't breakfast, any more than porn is sex.
But somehow, to sell the product to the masses, The Paleo Diet, just like Tim Ferriss' Four Hour Body, must describe in excrutiating detail the trade-offs at the micro level.
I guess the basic message has been heard so often it no longer registers: all that sugar, simple starch, and readily digestible calories is what's making America fatter than ever, so stop eating those. Just like "exercise more" no longer registers.
Hell, I can shorten the modern guidelines to one sentence: Eat food you cooked yourself.
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no subject
Date: 2011-06-13 04:14 am (UTC)Yesterday I did my grocery shopping for the week. When I got to the checkout, I realized that the only things in my cart that didn't come from the produce section were eggs and yogurt. I thought to myself, "That's what I should be eating." Michael Pollan would be proud.
Ah, one other piece that would seem obvious
Date: 2011-06-14 10:29 am (UTC)When you buy food that isn't overloaded with sugar, simple starch, and readily digestible calories... eat it before it goes bad.