Dietary Opposites

I had two interesting pieces of dietary information hit my desk today, taking opposite points of view.

The first was the latest Time magazine with an interview with Ingred Newkirk of PETA. She espoused the expected stuff about how humans have to be weaned from animal products because it is cruel to animals (she includes cow's milk because it deprives calves of same, and PETA has suggested to Ben and Jerry's that their ice cream be made with human milk, a sort of 'creme de tit' cuvee, one supposes). Basically everything they could come up with against a meat based diet. Including the hope that a tissue culture meat product can be developed so that those who absolutely MUST consume meat won't have to do so at the expense of the suffering of the animals.

Not sure how this lady would have responded to the Rick Steves travel program on the Dordogne I watched last evening, where geese were seen lining up to be voluntarly fed with a tube at a foie gras producer (the producer insists that the geese be 'free run' and be able to wander about at will.)

The second piece of material I received was a write up of a new book called "Trick and Treat: How Healthy Eating is Making Us Ill" by Barry Groves, a doctor that insists that our (human) gut is analagous to a predator like a carnivorous big cat, and that the studies showing that saturated fat leads to heart disease are flawed. He said that the one in the 50s showing that a cholesterol rich diet would 'fur up' the arteries of rabbits was flawed as rabbits eat no cholesterol as part of their natural diet. He said that the second study, relating dietary fat intake and heart disease and showing a positive correlation in six countries was also flawed as the author had data on 22 countries and chose only the ones whose data could be made to support his hypothesis.

You couldn't get two more opposite views than those! An interesting week for dieticians.

PETA is loony. As to the second, I will loudly observe that our mouths contain both tearing and grinding teeth, which implies that our diet consists of both meat and plants.

Our evolution shows that we are by nature, meat eaters. Stone tools of Homo Erectus were used for skinning, butchering and smashing bones. The diet of Neandertal, based on studies of fossilized turds, shows their diet consisted of 80% meat. Other archeological sites near coastlines show large deposits of discarded shells associated with human habitation.

PETA is loony. As to the second, I will loudly observe that our mouths contain both tearing and grinding teeth, which implies that our diet consists of both meat and plants.

As to the first, I shall not dispute with you.

As to the second, the parity between morphology and diet isn't always that close, but I think that most evidence points to humans having developed as opportunistic eaters consuming a preponderance of animal material but also a significant amount of plant material - an omnivore in other words.

The diet of Neandertal, based on studies of fossilized turds, shows their diet consisted of 80% meat

Be careful about bringing up the Neandertals Howie. Most people still think that they died out rather than being assismilated!

I think I am relatively healthy for an old fart.

I eat butter virtually every day. Olive oil, too. Eat meat several times per week - local , organic, naturally raised. I eat whole wheat bread and eggs nearly every day. Eat one or two vegetables every day.Eat fruit every day it is in the building (most days). I drink milk - skim. I drink red wine every day and whisky most days. I eat seafood about one day per week - I usually prefer shellfish. I drink a pot of coffee every morning. I don't exercise as much as I'd like which no doubt account for my wild weight fluctuations between 172 and 178 (been going on for several years). I'm a hair over six feet tall - although I'm sure I'm shrinking.

I eat two meals. A small breakfast and then one more meal sometime during the day or evening.

I take a multi-vitamin, Vitamin E, a couple of grams of Vitamin C, a dose of calcium/magnesium/zinc and an aspirin every day.

But, if I violate any of the above I don't worry about it for a second.

Don't worry in the least about cholesterol as I'm convinced that its tenuous relationship to cardiovascular disease is shuck and jive.

Why did I tell you folks far more than you'd ever wanted to know about my personal habits?

Because there is so much bullshit out there.

Because it is different for everyone. My diet and habits just naturally evolved over the decades. I know it's trite, but if you STFU and listen to what your body is telling you you'll profit greatly.

(Oh, and Bill, the farms that produce foie gras in this country are infinitely more humane than the CAFO operations where the millions upon millions of pounds of caged, crowded, steroid and antibiotic-laden pork, beef and chickens being fed diets totally foreign to their species are manufactured).

(Edited to add I also eat dark chocolate a couple of times per week).

Not sure how this lady would have responded to the Rick Steves travel program on the Dordogne I watched last evening, where geese were seen lining up to be voluntarly fed with a tube at a foie gras producer (the producer insists that the geese be 'free run' and be able to wander about at will.)

Aw, heck, Bill. You don't have to go to the Dordogne for that.

I see that every day when I drive past the local MacDonalds. And the KFC. And don't even go close to one of those Hawaiian lunch places.

Not sure how this lady would have responded to the Rick Steves travel program on the Dordogne I watched last evening, where geese were seen lining up to be voluntarly fed with a tube at a foie gras producer (the producer insists that the geese be 'free run' and be able to wander about at will.)

Aw, heck, Bill. You don't have to go to the Dordogne for that.

I see that every day when I drive past the local MacDonalds. And the KFC. And don't even go close to one of those Hawaiian lunch places.

You don't belly up to the poi bar?

Aw, heck, Bill. You don't have to go to the Dordogne for that.

I see that every day when I drive past the local MacDonalds. And the KFC. And don't even go close to one of those Hawaiian lunch places.

Never thought of McPukies as an example of gavage, but you may have a point.

And Joseph - I think you are correct about cholesterol not having the direct connection the health minions would have us believe.

And while I used to enjoy poi with fish or roast pork, I admit to not haing chowed down on poi for many a year - and not really missing it.

I am always reminded of the scene in Woody Allen's "Sleeper" where he awakes in the future to find that coffee, chocolate and cigarettes are considered "health foods." We've already seen the rehabilitation of coffee and chocolate, so Woody begins to look like a Futurist. Epidemiology is a tough business, as it's so hard to control the many variables at play. Metastudies are probably one of the better ways of weeding out systematic error in those studies. My take as someone who can be classified as a "biomedical researcher" is that what's peddled to the public is almost always oversimplified. The actual publications usually contain tenuous conclusions made to inflate the importance of the study, but the data will usually tell a far more nuanced and complex story than either what the authors want to promote or what the popularizers sell to the public. Inevitably, it leaves the public with a distrust of public science, as they're not so stupid as to fail to see the obvious reversals and contradictions present in public health data.

Mark Lipton

Well put.

Both of those extremists (the PETA loon and the "humans are carnivores" loon) are wrong.

-Paul W.