Paleo Diet: Raw Paleo Diet and Lifestyle Forum
Raw Paleo Diet to Suit You => Carnivorous / Zero Carb Approach => Topic started by: PaleoPhil on January 25, 2010, 11:02:41 am
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The phenomenon of color blindness was brought up in another thread and it's got me thinking. Is it just coincidence that I seem to do best on a carnivorous diet and am color blind (a strong protanopia version), or is there a relationship of some sort? Does anyone have any thoughts to add beyond those discussed in the other thread? Any other colorblind people here? What sort of diet do you find you do best on?
The discussion started when RawZi proposed two fascinating alternative hypotheses at http://www.rawpaleoforum.com/welcoming-commitee/i-just-thought-i%27d-say-hello/msg25821/#msg25821: "All the guys who are colorblind, are they possibly a mutation to be obligate carnivore? Or maybe we all were colorblind, but developed colorsight at a time it made sense to eat fruit?"
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Not to do with color-blindness admittedly, but I've noticed that many carnivorous predators have light-coloured eyes(I think it helps them to see in the dark easier). So why don't most humans have light-coloured eyes(blue/green/gold etc.)
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I am rather sceptical that color blindness suggests a hunter past.
-Color vision deficiencies overall rather impair the ability to detect or spot the preys hiding in vegetation, for instance the often brightly colored male birds or bigger game with respect background color tones. Accurate shooting with best chances to kill rather than just injure the animal seems also favored by trichromatic color vision.
-Only about 8% human males have color vision deficiencies.
-Many vegetarian species are just mono or bichromatic.
So in my opinion there is probably no simple relationship between diet (plant versus animal) and color vision
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I've noticed that many carnivorous predators have light-coloured eyes(I think it helps them to see in the dark easier). So why don't most humans have light-coloured eyes(blue/green/gold etc.)
According to Ayurveda, green, yellow or orange eyed people most often are what they call the constitution or dosha of Pitta (element=fire). They do best with soothing foods like raw meat and to stay away from spices and oils. I think they tend to be good hunters. They have good musculature and can tend to not have extra fat on their bodies. I could go on. Anyway, I think they'd be good hunters.
Cats are obligate carnivores and so often I see cats with green eyes, sometimes yellow, sometimes orange.
Dogs are facultative carnivores. They almost always have brown eyes, except Siberian Huskies when have a blue eye.
I have thought of this before. Also the shape of the pupil in relation to diet.
Goats and deer have horizontal pupils. Cats have vertical. Humans and dogs have round. Cat eyes are made to detect motion in some ways more so than other animals' are.
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I am rather sceptical that color blindness suggests a hunter past.
I agree that it's good to take a skeptical approach.
-Color vision deficiencies overall rather impair the ability to detect or spot the preys hiding in vegetation,
Interestingly, these sources suggest the opposite:
"There are some studies which conclude that color blind individuals are better at penetrating certain color camouflages and it has been suggested that this may be the evolutionary explanation for the surprisingly high frequency of congenital red-green colour blindness." [Morgan MJ, Adam A, Mollon JD. "Dichromats detect colour-camouflaged objects that are not detected by trichromats." Proc Biol Sci. 1992 Jun 22;248 (1323):291-5. PMID 1354367. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness]
"About 6-8% of humans today are red-green color blind. Most of them are men. This X-linked inherited condition known as deuteranomaly is due to opsin pigments that are normally sensitive to green light behaving more like the red-sensitive ones. This results in a difficulty in distinguishing between colors in the red and green wavelength ranges. However, people with this condition are at an advantage in differentiating slight variations in khaki colors. This could have been a benefit in the dry grassland environments of East and South Africa where humans first evolved." ["PRIMATE COLOR VISION," http://anthro.palomar.edu/primate/color.htm]
for instance the often brightly colored male birds
Right, and then most prey animals are much less boldly colored--especially land-based prey animals, which are more important prey for humans than birds. As a matter of fact, they tend to have camouflage or dull colors.
-Only about 8% human males have color vision deficiencies.
Yes, that's about what I've seen. Six to eight percent is statistically significant. What I'm wondering is, why did it persist if it's only a disadvantage (assuming the scientists are right that it was present during the Stone Age)? Could it be that around 8% of us are somewhat more designed to hunt and eat meats than the avg person? Could that partly explain why I seem to do much better on a carnivorous diet than some other folks? Could RawZi be on to something here?
-Many vegetarian species are just mono or bichromatic.
That's interesting, though I hope you don't mind if I clarify a little...the scientific terms are herbivorous and frugivorous. "Vegetarian" is a purely human dietary choice and a Neolithic phenomenon that has nothing to do with nature. That's one of my pet peeves, having encountered a lot of vegetarian propaganda in the past, sorry.
So in my opinion there is probably no simple relationship between diet (plant versus animal) and color vision
I think it's too early to draw conclusions. I'm in the data-gathering stage myself. What I'd be particularly interested to see is if there are any other colorblind folks out there among the members of this forum and, if so, what foods they find they do best on.
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Could it be that around 8% of us are somewhat more designed to hunt and eat meats than the avg person? Could that partly explain why I seem to do much better on a carnivorous diet than some other folks?
Maybe if the color-blindness tendency is also on the same gene as the needing-to-be-mostly-carnivorous tendency. Otherwise, I doubt it.
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I'm not colorblind but I am near sighted but have night vision that is second to none. I've also been a night owl my whole life even as a child not sure if this has anything to do with the topic at hand just throwing it out there
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... I ... have night vision that is second to none. I've also been a night owl ... just throwing it out there
When you are out at night, do you have distance vision?
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When you are out at night, do you have distance vision?
Its hard to describe. During the day I am constantly squinting to the point that I get a headache at times (I hate wearing my glasses) At night though my eyes are totally relaxed. and I can see just fine. I have kick ass peripheral vision as well which might have something to do with it.
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I'm also near-sighted and have excellent night-vision and am not colour-blind(that is, I passed the above test 100% but was unable to get a previous 100% score on another colour-blindness test ages ago - but then they could have been testing for a greater sense of colour than is common amongst most humans.
Re the 8% claim:- Sometimes negative mutations stay present in the genome provided that there are other related mutations which are even more beneficial. So, for example, some 8% of men are colour-blind but some women have such acute sensitivity to colour that they can see shades of colour that no one else can.
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Yes, that's about what I've seen. Six to eight percent is statistically significant. What I'm wondering is, why did it persist if it's only a disadvantage (assuming the scientists are right that it was present during the Stone Age)? Could it be that around 8% of us are somewhat more designed to hunt and eat meats than the avg person? Could that partly explain why I seem to do much better on a carnivorous diet than some other folks? Could RawZi be on to something here?
In a group of HGs it was perhaps not necessarily a disandvantage. On the contrary since hunting involved usually a group of people, in some specific situations the ability of bichromatic people to perceive camouflage nuances that most of the trichromatic hunters could no see confers a collective advantage to the group. Obviously in a group of twelve hunters statistically one of them had this special ability. In more common situation or hunting action the trichromatic vision was probably an advantage but there is no disadvantage that 1 out of 12 people in the group does not exhibit this ability.
It is also possible that color vision deficient people have other not yet known selective advantages that explains that a high percentage of them is maintained generation after generation.
That's interesting, though I hope you don't mind if I clarify a little...the scientific terms are herbivorous and frugivorous. "Vegetarian" is a purely human dietary choice and a Neolithic phenomenon that has nothing to do with nature. That's one of my pet peeves, having encountered a lot of vegetarian propaganda in the past, sorry.
Yes sure. I was never a vegan or a vegetarian victim so these words are not linked to any particular emotion in my mind :)
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For lack of a better term, I'm going to call RawZi's hypothesis the hunter-vision hypothesis or HVH for short.
According to Ayurveda, green, yellow or orange eyed people most often are what they call the constitution or dosha of Pitta (element=fire). They do best with soothing foods like raw meat and to stay away from spices and oils. I think they tend to be good hunters.
If colorblindness is indeed associated with super-hunter ancestry, then all those variables match me, interestingly (my eyes are greenish-brown, they were greener at birth and the rims seem to be gradually turning a bit greener and the brown centers getting lighter as I eat a raw carnivore diet).
They have good musculature
That doesn't match me, but I suspect that's because of generations of wheat-eating in a family of gluten sensitive people.
and can tend to not have extra fat on their bodies.
Yes, that's me if I don't eat plant foods.
Cats are obligate carnivores and so often I see cats with green eyes, sometimes yellow, sometimes orange.
Interesting, there's green eyes again among meat eaters.
Dogs are facultative carnivores. They almost always have brown eyes, except Siberian Huskies when have a blue eye.
I think you mean domestic dogs almost always have brown eyes. If there's something to this stuff, then we should expect wild dogs to be less likely to have brown eyes and more likely to have one or more of blue, green, yellow or orange than domestic dogs. It's interesting that the breed of dog that's reportedly least changed from its wolf ancestors has blue eyes, an apparently more carnivorous color. I also wouldn't be surprised if huskies eat more meat, on avg, than more southerly breeds. It would make sense, given that Arctic people do.
I have thought of this before. Also the shape of the pupil in relation to diet.
Goats and deer have horizontal pupils. Cats have vertical. Humans and dogs have round.
Yet another physiological similarity between facultative carnivores and humans. Bears are facultative carnivores too. Do they have round eyes? Or perhaps one or more species of bears might even have vertical slits like cats, if their ancestors were more carnivorous? For example, like all bears, the giant panda is a facultative carnivore, and I remember reading that the giant panda is believed to have descended from even more physiologically carnivorous animals.
Cat eyes are made to detect motion in some ways more so than other animals' are.
I wonder if colorblind human vision is also better at detecting motion than color-enhanced vision, and whether people with green or blue eyes are better at detecting motion than people with brown eyes? I know, I'm speculating wildly here--it's called brainstorming. Let's focus on generating ideas and data for now and save the critiquing for later, please. Thanks.
Maybe if the color-blindness tendency is also on the same gene as the needing-to-be-mostly-carnivorous tendency. Otherwise, I doubt it.
I don't think they'd have to be on the same gene, just two genes associated with each other within a population (assuming it's real, then whether it would be the entire human race or a smaller population, I don't know).
From the hunter-vision model, since color vision wouldn't seem to provide even less hunting advantage in the Arctic than the dry African savannah, we might predict that people whose ancestors have lived in the Arctic for many generations might have a very slightly higher rate of color blindness than other people. Given that meat eating seems to be associated with green and blue eye colors, we should expect some green and blue-eyed people among many or all of the meat-heavy Arctic peoples, even some of the darker haired folk. We should also expect their eyes to change to darker and browner as they eat more modern foods and less meat/fat/organs/eggs.
I need to get some sleep, so no time to investigate this further now, but maybe I'll have more time tomorrow night. If anyone else can add more info or ideas in the meantime, that would be great. RawZi seems to be on to something here and I definetely think it's worth investigating. This is the sort of creative science and connection-making I enjoy. I want to focus on brainstorming and data-gathering in this early stage. We can do the critiquing later.
In a group of HGs it was perhaps not necessarily a disandvantage. On the contrary since hunting involved usually a group of people, in some specific situations the ability of bichromatic people to perceive camouflage nuances that most of the trichromatic hunters could no see confers a collective advantage to the group. ....
Correct and that's the gist of the HVH.
Yes sure. I was never a vegan or a vegetarian victim so these words are not linked to any particular emotion in my mind :)
I don't recommend living in a vegetarian/vegan-rules household or visiting vegetarian/vegan-oriented forums. The propaganda, nastiness and complaints about health problems (usually attributed to "detox") can get pretty bad. >:
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I think you mean domestic dogs almost always have brown eyes. If there's something to this stuff, then we should expect wild dogs to be less likely to have brown eyes and more likely to have one or more of blue, green, yellow or orange than domestic dogs. It's interesting that the breed of dog that's reportedly least changed from its wolf ancestors has blue eyes, an apparently more carnivorous color. I also wouldn't be surprised if huskies eat more meat, on avg, than more southerly breeds. It would make sense, given that Arctic people do.
I think a great many wolves have yellow eyes, and some have gray eyes.
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I think the eye color thing has to do more with how many generations stayed longer in a darker environment. I wonder who were in the north longer, eskimos or the blue eyed germanics.
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I wonder who were in the north longer, eskimos or the blue eyed germanics.
Yeah, I think blue eyed Germans come from a warmer climate.
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Temperature is not the issue, light or lack of light is. I think the eskimos are younger in my opinion. To go from dark eyed africans to blue eyed germans should take quite a while than going to dark eyed asianish.
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I think a great many wolves have yellow eyes, and some have gray eyes.
They have lovely golden eyes. One of my relatives had gold-coloured eyes(well, goldish-brown). Sadly, I didn't inherit that trait.
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They have lovely golden eyes. One of my relatives had gold-coloured eyes(well, goldish-brown). Sadly, I didn't inherit that trait.
I have a relative with pale yellow colored beautiful striking eyes. They would never imagine going without meat either on a healthy diet.
Eye colors like yellow and violet are pretty rare in my experience. On rare occasion I've seen very unusual shades of green.
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I think a great many wolves have yellow eyes, and some have gray eyes.
Correct, and most wolf pups are supposedly born with blue eyes, and some adult wolves have blue eyes: (http://i512.photobucket.com/albums/t321/Anni_060/Wolf/Wolf-BlueEyes.jpg)
also here: http://fc03.deviantart.com/fs25/f/2008/184/e/4/Rain_in_wolf_form_by_Brambleclaw4evr.jpg
and here: http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/6800000/Beautiful-White-Wolf-With-Blue-Eyes-wolves-6880194-505-509.jpg and ...
"Though extremely unusual, it is possible for an adult wolf to retain its blue-coloured eyes."
http://www.animalcorner.co.uk/wildlife/wolves/wolf_grey.html
I have a relative with pale yellow colored beautiful striking eyes. They would never imagine going without meat either on a healthy diet.
Interesting. I didn't know that humans could get yellow eyes like a wolf other than from jaundice. Any chance the relative might have that?
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Wolf with yellow-green eyes:
(http://mexicanwolf.gluzberg.com/face2.JPG)
Fascinating, I didn't know that wolves could have greenish eyes (although I think it's also possible that these blue- and green-eyed wolves are mixed--but since dogs descended from wolves then the at least the genetic potential for blue and green eyes must be in wolves too). The evidence I've found so far suggests that yellow and orange aren't the only carnivore colors, but that green, blue, grey and mixtures of these are also meat-oriented eye colors. So ye with green, blue, greyish or yellowish eyes may be descended from cold-climate hunters who ate mostly meat--especially ye savages that be colorblind, ye bloodtirsty divils. ;) It's still just speculation at this point, but it is interesting how everything is falling neatly into place.
Of course, none of this helps with figuring out differences within African folk, unless there are indigenous folk with green or blue eyes there too, but this does seem useful for study of Eurasian folk. Keep in mind that if RawZi's HVH is correct, then the eye color at birth is most indicative of one's ancestors. Eating modern foods can turn green or blue eyes into brown or black.
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Interesting. I didn't know that humans could get yellow eyes like a wolf other than from jaundice. Any chance the relative might have that?
Good question, as I didn't say much, for you to tell for sure. Nope, the sclera are not yellow, nor the skin nor the rest. The yellow part is the irises. I believe there was a thyroid problem at one point and other endocrine. They were never zero carb nor paleo nor raw. I'm thinking it could be a gluten intolerance.
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Wow, I did find more info indicating that healthy humans can indeed have yellowish eyes:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/HumanFemalewithAmberIris.jpg/250px-HumanFemalewithAmberIris.jpg)
Wolfish eyes look cool!
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Wow, I did find more info indicating that healthy humans can indeed have yellowish eyes:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/HumanFemalewithAmberIris.jpg/250px-HumanFemalewithAmberIris.jpg)
Wolfish eyes look cool!
Yes, the relative I mentioned had very much the same colour. Well if it's related to grains-consumption or whatever, then I fear it's an unhealthy trait for humans.
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Yes, the relative I mentioned had very much the same colour. Well if it's related to grains-consumption or whatever, then I fear it's an unhealthy trait for humans.
I had a teenage friend who had blue and pastel yellow eyes. They were pre-diabetic and smelled "sweet". Otherwise were healthy. They did eat wheat and eat commercial grainfed dairy, but not in front of me. The mother was not big, ate those foods too, had breast cancer and gave birth only to very large newborns. That didn't last for long though. There were other health signs. Looking back now, I know they needed raw meat. I haven't talked with them recently. Maybe I'll call.
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Yeah, it would be interesting to know if yellowish eyes changed upon eliminating grains and eating raw meat/fat/organs or stayed the same. In other words, are yellowish eyes always a sign of illness, or can they occur in healthy people, as the Wikipedia article seems to suggest?
One source I found said that yellow was only a bad sign if it's in the normally white area of the eyes, but OK in the iris. It was just a forum post, so I didn't save it.
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Yeah, it would be interesting to know if yellowish eyes changed upon eliminating grains and eating raw meat/fat/organs or stayed the same. In other words, are yellowish eyes always a sign of illness, or can they occur in healthy people, as the Wikipedia article seems to suggest?
One source I found said that yellow was only a bad sign if it's in the normally white area of the eyes, but OK in the iris. It was just a forum post, so I didn't save it.
Not sure. My eye colors have changed numerous times, often in relation to diet. I think eye color often has to do with health, but not sure if yellow irises go away, like I kind of doubt they turn blue. They may not mean ill health when yellow. Maybe they mean weakness in certain systems or combination of systems and/or propensities?
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OK, keep us posted of any developments in that area please. I think something unusual like yellowish eyes and any changes or lack of changes therein in response to dietary changes might prove most instructive.
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Check out iridology. It's all about cleansing and the changing colors of the iris. It must be awesome for people with light eyes to change their eye color. I got too much melanin in mine to see any difference. White chicks always seems to be fascinated with my dark eyes. I think they're pretty bland, but how weird would I look with blue eyes though.
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Check out iridology. It's all about cleansing and the changing colors of the iris. It must be awesome for people with light eyes to change their eye color. I got too much melanin in mine to see any difference.
Yours may likely turn to light brown, amber or dark blue after many years of cleansing. If they can't, brown eyes are nice anyway. It's just a physical color, but it seems to show certain character and strength.
If they stay a near black color even after all the cleansing and building one can imagine, that's kind of a "cool" color for that. Kapha constitution? Either that or demon eyes (I'm kidding).
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I doubt it, I'm pretty much damned to be a demon.
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Check out iridology. It's all about cleansing and the changing colors of the iris. It must be awesome for people with light eyes to change their eye color. I got too much melanin in mine to see any difference. White chicks always seems to be fascinated with my dark eyes. I think they're pretty bland, but how weird would I look with blue eyes though.
It seems that nonwhites on primal diet etc. generally get amber-coloured eyes(ie yellowish-brown) but not lighter-coloured eyes like blue/green etc. The blue/green etc. eyes are a purely Caucasian phenomenon.
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It seems that nonwhites on primal diet etc. generally get amber-coloured eyes(ie yellowish-brown) but not lighter-coloured eyes like blue/green etc. The blue/green etc. eyes are a purely Caucasian phenomenon.
Do you mean that even African folks with dark black skin can get amber eyes by eating a primal diet?
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Do you mean that even African folks with dark black skin can get amber eyes by eating a primal diet?
That's what the PDers claimed. I remember an Asian-American woman being concerned with all this talk about a number of people getting lighter-coloured eyes as a result of the PD diet, and she was reassured that this was different for non-caucasians with the latter getting amber-coloured eyes(amber= yellowish-brown so isn't that far off). At any rate, I DO know that Caucasians get born with light-coloured eyes even if they get brown eyes later.
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As far as eye color goes, I remember reading that blue eyes were only 6000 years old, and wikipedia says 6-10 thousand. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_color (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_color)
I'm skeptical that colorblindness would make any difference in the amount of meat you ate, but it could be advantageous for the group to have some coloblind individuals. But hey, I'm no scientist.
I'm partially colorblind, I grew up hunting in an area with gray-tan-red grass, and I never had any problems seeing animals. I don't have much to compare it to, since most people I knew hunted less, and experience is probably the most important thing when trying to find and distinguish animals that aren't out in the open, moving, or silhouetted in some way.
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I find that difficult to believe since some monkey species have light-coloured eyes. In other words, it's highly unlikely to have arisen as a recent mutation and simply existed within apeman DNA for millions of years.
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Eye color is indeed puzzling. Not as straightforward as color-blindness, it seems. I wonder if any scientists know that dark-brown African eyes can turn hazel? Everything I've read so far assumes they cannot change and when I mentioned it to a brown-skinned friend of mine she laughed and called it impossible.