Tyler, no matter how you try to slice it, the fact remains that both that study and Leach's research report that the Hadza HG's eat plenty of tubers and they do not report that they "loathe" them. They could be wrong, but you haven't provided convincing evidence to refute the research. If you don't believe me, then ask the first-hand witness and researcher, Jeff Leach, yourself like I did. He answers some questions online.

I said "fruit-heavy diet," not "raw tropical fruit diet"--I wasn't trying to imply fruit-only or nearly so. I suspected that you might try that straw man approach, so I also mentioned greens, fiber and tubers (and the traditional Hadza diet also contains meats, insects, nuts, honey, etc., not just fruit). I haven't drawn any firm conclusions on the subject, just pondering it. Iguana's views on it don't seem quite as outlandish to me now, though I doubt that I eat as much fruit as he or GCB do, but who knows.


Van, I didn't say that I hold the Hadza's diet as supreme. Please don't try to put words in my mouth/keyboard. Scientists focus on the Hadza/Hadzabe'e because there is still a small group of them that are living in a manner rather similar to that of Stone Age hunter gatherers, which is an increasingly rare thing (and the last of the traditional Hadza are starting to modernize, so time is running out to study them). Stone Agers are of course long dead and they and their microbiota thus can't be studied (aside from dig-site remains), so living HG groups like the Hadza are the closest thing that scientists have (and they also seek other types of evidence, of course).

Someone asked Jeff the same basic question after his presentation--why the Hadza (even though he had already given some reasons)? He responded by asking "Who would you suggest I study instead?" (He has studied other populations, BTW, and is developing a growing database of evidence).

I suggested the Chukchi to him on his blog. They would be an interesting contrast.

It sounds like we agree that meats, fruits and tubers have all long been part of the human diet. The evidence so far suggests that the consumption of meat and tubers increased as brain size increased, so both have been posited as possible fuel for larger brains (though that doesn't necessarily mean that they triggered the growth, of course).

Re: brain growth, it's not my reasoning, it's the reasoning of some scientists and others. I just shared the fact that the hypothesis exists. Here is one place it was discussed where there is info that touches on your questions: http://drbganimalpharm.blogspot.com/2014/07/legumes-and-potatoes-are-certainly-p-l.html

As for me, I don't know what the primary cause of brain growth was and I am open-minded on the question. I go wherever the best science takes me. The various hypotheses on it are interesting. It will be interesting to see where the research leads on the question.

In the past in this forum I wrote about another hypothesized factor in brain growth of hunting and/or scavenging of marrow and brains and how the Inuit had one of the largest cranium sizes measured. I don't recall you taking issue with my discussing that, nor claiming that I was calling the Inuit diet "supreme," but perhaps I forget? How is it cherry picking for me to discuss BOTH the Hadza and the Inuit (and the Chukchi, Nenets, etc.), whereas it's not for you to only take issue with the Hadza? Do you have a problem with scientists studying the Hadza or people discussing the research? Should we only discuss research on LC groups (such as the "Medicine Men" doctors who studied the heart health markers of Chukchi hunters, which I discussed previously)? Isn't more information helpful in learning, generally?

I doubt it. That contradicts what I've read. My understanding is that cool/cold temps just slow microbiota growth and hinder pathogens more than beneficial bacteria.

PP is right in stating that the growth in hominid brain-size occurred well before the advent of cooking. He is however quite wrong re tubers being responsible for increased brain-size as it has been shown that  average hominid brain-size actually decreased when lots of starchy foods like tubers were introduced into the human diet in the neolithic era.

I said that it may  turn out that tubers were important in brain growth, and there are other possible factors too, such as increased meat/fat eating (brains, marrow and fish have been hypothesized by scientists) and increased hunting, which I discussed before.

Tubers, such as sedge grass tubers for example, were not introduced into the human diet during the neolithic. They go back millions of years.

Two million years ago, human relative 'Nutcracker Man' lived on tiger nuts
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140109003949.htm

http://news.discovery.com/human/evolution/eating-paleo-dont-forget-worms-and-tubers-140110.htm

Did Our Ancestors Prefer Meat or Potatoes? [meaning tubers, not literally potatoes]
Findings show that our relatives liked to dig up underground foods
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21775270/ns/technology_and_science-science#.VC0w8vk7sts

Sex Differences in Food Preferences of Hadza Hunter-Gatherers, http://www.epjournal.net/wp-content/uploads/EP07601616.pdf

Gut microbiome of the Hadza hunter-gatherers

http://huntgatherlove.com/content/siberian-potatoes

"One interesting food plant used by Stone-Age man was the water chestnut, which now grow in the lakes as far north as Lithuania. Water chestnuts have also been found in old sediment deposits, such as those in Lake Jäkälä at Savitaipale." http://www3.lappeenranta.fi/museot/museo/english/karjala_elo.html
[Note: water chestnuts are interestingly similar to tiger nuts. Both are sedge grass tubers.]

etc., etc.

Do you mean that human genetic make up is MESSED UP compared to Chimps and Gorillas?  Are there studies on this?

The human gene pool is apparently less diverse, which is a disadvantage, though we have a more diverse microbiome, which is an advantage. Unfortunately, Americans have thrown away much of that advantage by developing the least diverse microbiome in the world (which is what Jeff Leach's research has shown).

Heh, heh, when it comes to the gods, GS, I take most seriously those who say there are many and that they are crazy. I distrust those who say there is only one, omnipotent (male) god who I must enslave myself to, and carry a book around. I don't trust book-carrying people, sorry.  When I see someone carrying a book, I run the other way. 

"Junk DNA" probably means "I haven't figured this stuff out yet, so I'll dismiss its importance and claim that everyone is basically the same, because that will ensure my tenure." 

BTW, when my grandfather came to this country (USA), his "race" was listed as "Irish," and his color "white." So when the census dude came around to me and asked for my race, I told him "Irish." He didn't like that answer (despite the fact that he's supposed to accept whatever the respondent tells him), and asked again, so I responded along the lines of "My grandfather's race was listed as 'Irish,' and if it was good enough for my grandfather, then it's good enough for me." He grudgingly accepted that. LOL

Race used to mean something more along the lines of ethnicity/nationality/tribe. Lately it has come to basically mean skin color, which is ridiculous and will some day be seen as such.

I read that chimps actually have way more genetic diversity than H. sapiens sapiens. However, Jeff Leach said that the human microbiome is one of the most diverse populations on earth, which gave us quite an advantage over other species. Thanks little guys! 

Great find GS! Thanks for sharing it. This should make plenty of PC libtards squirm.  More importantly, one can only hope that it will reduce the censorship of genetic research at liberal universities and reverse some of the damage that the political dogmatist S. J. Gould did to the field. No surprise that this study does not appear to have been widely reported in the mainstream media.

Peter Frost wrote a good blog article on it back in 2007. Here are some good quotes from it:

"The findings reveal “human-to-human variation is more than seven-fold greater than earlier estimates, proving that we are in fact very unique individuals at the genetic level,” -J. Craig Ventner, PhD

“one-tenth of 1 percent of 3 billion is a heck of a large number -- 3 million nucleotide differences between two random genomes.” -John Hawkes, PhD

"a tiny sliver of the genome still amounts to a lot of DNA." -Peter Frost, PhD

http://evoandproud.blogspot.com/2007/12/999-truism.html

why do you regret it?

I've written about it in past posts in the forum (probably best not to go on a tangent by rehashing it in this unrelated thread), though perhaps the experience of myself or Goodsamaritan or others who don't completely avoid carby foods, or nearly so, will not speak to you. You do seem to take Aajonus Vonderplanitz seriously, so to get some idea of part of what I'm talking about, you could check out his writings and presentations on what he viewed as beneficial carby foods, such as raw honey (note: I'm not trying to imply that I agree with everything that he ever said or wrote--and I doubt that I agree on absolutely everything with anyone--I'm just trying to meet you where you're at and avoid potential unconstructive arguments over details). This past Aajonus honey thread is a start: http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/primal-diet/why-honey's-good-for-you-aajonus-explains/msg25986/#msg25986

No harm, no foul.

I do find it puzzling that so many people seem to regard cooking as not processing. Why would refining be considered processing, but not cooking?

Sure, different forms of processing do differ in how bad they are and there are traditional forms of processing that go back millions of years (such as cutting meat with a sharp stone or cracking open a nut with a stone), so I get that, it's just odd that some forms of processing aren't regarded by many as processing, even when they involve using very high temperatures in factories (not trying to imply that that's the case here, I've just seen that elsewhere).

I've even seen a LC uber-coctivore claim that high-heated crispy-fried bacon and factory-produced high-heat pasteurized and churned butter are not processed, but raw home-made food starch, prepared simply by grating, soaking and separating, is.  They are both types of processing and the heat-blasted food is probably more processed in the sense of the changes it imparts on the food molecules.

A HCLF member of the Mark's Daily Apple forum has become so inundated with questions and pleas for help from chronic VLCers (granted, they aren't rawists) that she created a link to a spreadsheet of her diet. More and more people there, and even at the Low Carb Friends forum, are adding back carbs into their diets, including starchy plant foods. A Carnivore forum changed its name after more and more people started developing problems on VLC, including the forum owner, and the activity dwindled. The ZIOH forum dwindled from over a thousand members down to around 100, the last I checked some time ago. A moderator on a ketogenic diet forum reported improvements when he increased his intake of resistant starch:
http://freetheanimal.com/2014/08/australian-reaction-ketogenic.html#comment-645468 (see the comment at August 19, 2014 at 08:59).

It's more evidence that the problems we've seen here over the last few years are only the tip of the iceberg. If anyone is still unaware of them, I've already posted plenty about them in this forum. I predict that there will be lots more to come as more chronic VLCers experience serious longer-term problems, though with luck, maybe many will start adding back carbs and prebiotics in time to avoid the worst problems.

More and more info has been coming out that LC advocates don't talk about--such as that some cancer cells and fungi can feed off of ketones, not just glucose, and that not all cancers respond well to ketogenic diets.

There were early warning signs about the problems years ago when GCB's wife died of cancer and later when people doing the LCHF "Optimal Diet" started developing stomach and colon cancers, yet many LCers dismissed it.  http://perfecthealthdiet.com/category/diets/optimal-diet

There were so many other clues too--Bear Stanley getting throat cancer (and blaming it on some broccoli his mother made him eat as a child  ), Vilhjalmur Stefansson dying of his third stroke after 7 years of a meat-heavy diet, Stefansson himself reporting that traditional Eskimos aged rapidly, an autopsy of Dr. Atkins showing he had "a history of heart attack, congestive heart failure and hypertension," http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Atkins_(nutritionist), and on and on.

Part of the problem seems to be that many people do the lowest carb early versions of the OD or Atkins or Primal Blueprint that are intended to be temporary, until one gets relatively lean and calms down the immune system, and then instead of adding back foods rich in digestible and resistant carbs down the road, they stick with VLC, sometimes even zero starch or zero carb, for too long. They figure if LC is good, then VLC or even no carb must be better, and since they feel good, why not stick with it indefinitely. But then problems develop years down the road. Forewarned is forearmed.

Another part of the problem was that early Paleoanthropological research focused on evidence of meat eating, because the bones of animals were so easily found. Since then, more sophisticated technology is revealing that Stone Agers ate plenty of plant foods, including starchy plant foods, even Neanderthals, which Tyler posted some interesting articles about.

There's also the problem for some of the self-fulfilling prophecy that Tyler wrote about, which can become a vicious cycle (avoid carbs, which worsens carb tolerance, which seems to further justify avoiding carbs, ...):

It is a common characteristic of people that when they turn to ZC diets, that their whole body's digestive system changes in fundamental ways(re different enzymes/bacteria being needed etc.) so that they then lose their ability to digest carbs properly. The result is that they then claim that all carbs are evil. I had the same experience when I went VLC(hardly any carbs at all) for many months at a time. I would develop minor side-effects from eating carbs or not be able to properly digest them - of course, as soon as I went back to eating a diet slightly higher in carbs, those issues vanished quickly and completely.

Unfortunately, not everyone's issues vanish as quickly and completely as they did for Tyler when carbs are added back, which can mislead folks into thinking that they should avoid carbs forever and that maybe they just aren't genetically designed for them, instead of digging deeper and trying to figure out and fix the underlying problems that are causing the carb sensitivity.

I think eating plenty of raw foods may help reduce the risks from VLC, but not eliminate them. Plus, in the case of underweight and eating disorders, raw diets tend to be even harder for many people to get adequate calories from in this fast-paced age. FWIW, There's even one anecdote (which I'll share in the interests of open-minded examination--not likely to be popular here, sorry) in which a guy who has been tracking dietary effects on his microbiome found that including some cooked and cooled starchy foods in his diet provided better results than eating only raw starches. It's a whole new field of science, so who knows what we may learn.

There do seem to be some cases where VLC/ketogenic diets can be therapeutic, at least in the short run (ketogenic diets to treat epilepsy are typically not done for more than 3 years by Johns Hopkins, for example), and the new information about the microbiome and prebiotics seems to be leading to safer versions of it, but it's probably best to be monitored by a physician while doing it, and to be aware of the early signs and symptoms of problems.

Thanks for the heads up. It's strange how I don't get email notifications from them. I'd like to see Jeff Leach's presentation, though there might be a family get-together that weekend. Which one(s) are you going to?

People might be interested in lists of the foods highest in the various toxins you discuss.

Birlouez-Aragon I, Saavedra G, Tessier FJ, et al. A diet based on high-heat—treated foods promotes risk factors for diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular diseases. Am J Clin Nutr 2010;91:1220-1226. http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/91/5/1220.abstract?ijkey=8de560da0bfef7e4a3b741a35fd3687ec4b52eda&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha


Richard D. Semba1, Emily J. Nicklett2 and Luigi Ferrucci3, Does Accumulation of Advanced Glycation End Products Contribute to the Aging Phenotype?
Received December 12, 2009, a "review of the scientific literature," http://biomedgerontology.oxfordjournals.org/content/65A/9/963.full


Stig Bengmark, MD, PhD, FRACS (hon), FRCPS (hon). Advanced Glycation and Lipoxidation End Products–Amplifiers of Inflammation: The Role of Food, 2007. [A review of 800 full papers and thousands of abstracts]
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17712153
http://pen.sagepub.com/content/31/5/430.full


Henle T. AGEs in foods: do they play a role in uremia? Kidney Int 2003;63(suppl 84):S145-S147.
http://www.nature.com/ki/journal/v63/n84s/full/4493792a.html


Glycation in food and metabolic transit of dietary AGEs, 2003, http://www.biochemsoctrans.org/bst/031/1383/0311383.pdf


Šebeková, Katarína et al. Plasma levels of advanced glycation end products in healthy, long-term vegetarians and subjects on a western mixed diet, 2001, http://www.springerlink.com/content/6mhb24hyajh4qkk1/fulltext.pdf