The Old Friends Hypothesis:

In the mid 1960s scientists made the observation that MS was more common in those who had had very clean childhoods. In 1986 Godfrey published in the Lancet what would become known as the hygiene hypothesis, based on his observation that allergies were less common in later siblings in large families. He reasoned that their increased exposure to infectious organisms throughout their childhoods via their elder, numerous, siblings was the cause.

Since then hundreds of scientific papers have been published looking at this issue and the majority confirm or extend his ideas. The result had been to refine and expand the Hygiene Hypothesis is to produce the Old Friends Hypothesis (OFH).

The OFH suggests that the immune response to infection, particularly by large multi-celled and complex organisms like helminths , is effective in moderating immune response in large measure because we and our immune systems (and by we I mean all large complex organisms) have co-evolved with every organism that has parasitized or infected us long term.

The case for immunotherapy based on the use of benign infectious organisms for the treatment of immunological disorders
http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977623982

If childhood infections do not protect and home hygiene does not correlate, what might be the protective factors associated with pets, farms, and day care centres? The answer might lie in certain relatively harmless microorganisms (including helminths, saprophytic mycobacteria, and lactobacilli) that have been present throughout mammalian evolution. We have called this the “old friends” hypothesis.1 Contact with “old friends” is greatly diminished in rich countries but increased on farms, in cowsheds, and through contact with pets. A number of reports have provided evidence for this interpretation. Allergic disorders are less frequent in individuals with helminth infections, and atopic sensitisation increases after treatment of intestinal helminths.15 Similarly, there are less lactobacilli in the guts of children with allergies,16 and a preliminary clinical study suggests that high doses of lactobacilli may inhibit development of atopic eczema in genetically high risk children.17 Finally, the saprophytic mycobacterium M vaccae, originally isolated, as its name suggests, from a cow shed, potently drives maturation of Treg that will treat pre-existing allergy in a mouse model18 and has given encouraging results in clinical trials in allergic disorders.19,20

Microbes, immunoregulation, and the gut
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1774411/

The Umami Hypothesis:

"We like foods with sour, umami, and complex tastes/flavors.  My evolutionary explanation: these preferences increased microbe intake, which increased health. Fermentation, which increases microbes, easily produces all three of these characteristics. They are not easily produced otherwise (in the absence of lemon trees). As a result, until recently these three characteristics were  correlated with the microbe content of food. For example, until recently, the more sour a food, the more microbes. Seeking out sourness caused us to eat foods with more microbes. It’s easy to see this correlation today. As milk becomes yogurt, it becomes more sour and more microbe-rich at the same time. As juice becomes vinegar, same thing. The Chinese character for sour connects it with fermentation. As meat ages, it gets a stronger umami flavor and becomes more microbe-rich. For example, umami in dry-cured hams increases with time. Umami flavor is produced by glutamate molecules. They increase in concentration when proteins break down into components. Nowadays meat is aged because it tastes better aged than fresh. The flavor improvement with age presumably caused our ancestors to age their meat. Microbes add complexity to flavor because they produce many byproducts. Many experiments support the idea that our food preferences are a guide to what we should eat. When children chose their own food, they turned out very healthy."

- Seth Roberts, The Umami Hypothesis: We Need to Eat Microbes
http://blog.sethroberts.net/the-unami-hypothesis-why-i-believe-fermented-foods-are-necessary-for-health/

A raw Paleo diet fits well with these hypotheses, as it provides more of the "old friends" (and umami taste) in the raw and raw fermented foods and a Paleo/ancestral type lifestyle also promotes more exposure to the old friends.

Blogging About the Paleo Diet Can Get You Shut Down in North Carolina
Brian Doherty | April 23, 2012
http://reason.com/blog/2012/04/23/blogging-about-the-paleo-diet-can-get-yo

"[T]he state diatetics and nutrition board decided Cooksey’s blog — Diabetes-Warrior.net — violated state law. The nutritional advice Cooksey provides on the site amounts to “practicing nutrition,” the board’s director says, and in North Carolina that’s something you need a license to do. ....

that someone should be able to describe his experiences with it and advocate for his own good results should go without saying, though my saying that may well contradict a directive of the California Board of Going Without Saying."

(The link was shared by Chris Kresser http://chriskresser.com/)

Lower Paleolithic Controlled Use of Fire? Not so much
By K. Kris Hirst, About.com Guide   March 16, 2011
http://archaeology.about.com/b/2011/03/16/lower-paleolithic-controlled-use-of-fire-not-so-much.htm
"....

Roebroeks and Villa don't argue that the evidence for very early use of fire doesn't exist--at sites such as Gesher Benot Ya'aqov (780,000 bp) and (possibly) Zhoukoudian--but that the use was opportunistic rather than controlled (that is, prehistoric residents couldn't start their own fire from scratch).

Roebroeks and Villa point out the large number of Middle Paleolithic open-air sites in cold climatic areas where people might have needed fire to stay warm but do not include evidence of it at all. They don't dismiss evidence of heat-treated stone tools or charred bones from African sites such as Chesowanja (Kenya) and Koobi Fora FxJj20 (Tanzania), some as early as 1.6 million years ago. Instead, they argue that hominids such as Homo erectus did not have controlled use of fire, but used it when they ran into it--closer to the equator where lightning strikes and thus natural fires would have been more common."

I'm creating this thread for collecting info and discussion of all things relating to fermented fruits.

Gold Diggers
A game warden in this video said that black bears are attracted to fermented fruit.

There are no "zero carb" animals in the wild. Scientists don't put animals into "zero carb," "low carb," "moderate carb" and "high carb" categories. That's not how nature works. Instead they use terms like "carnivore," "frugivore," "herbivore", etc. (omnivore is not a truly scientific term and is rather controversial in scientific circles, though it probably has some practical utility for humans--though it's weaknesses caused me to adopt the term "adaptivore" for now).  Wild animals eat the foods that are available to them which they find tasty. They don't measure the carbs and say to themselves "Oh no, I can't eat that--too much carbs." Terms like facultative and obligate carnivore are far more scientific and relevant to nature.

Terms like "zero carb" and "low carb" also mislead humans, leading them to think they have to measure the carb content of foods and that processed low carb products like Atkins sports bars and Sucralose sweet syrups are "healthy." Apparently, humans couldn't be healthy until food labels came along that listed the carb content of foods. Utter nonsense.

Wow, even Copenhagen has a Paleo restaurant now:

http://www.smh.com.au/world/bronto-burger-off-stone-age-menu-20120303-1u9kj.html
''Bread is the devil,'' says head chef Thomas Rode Andersen

Organic Cavendish banana plantations don't use fungicides, herbicides, pesticides, etc. and the bananas are reportedly highly susceptible to Panama disease. Once infected, because they don't use fungicides, the plantation reportedly has to be completely abandoned and then they have to move to new pristine forest, which they clear cut to make way for another organic banana plantation. Even fungicides don't stop the disease, so nonorganic bananas are also a destructive crop.

Plus, economies based largely on bananas apparently tend to produce atrocious despotisms called "banana republics." So Cavendish bananas are destructive of human freedom as well as the environment.

So perhaps heavy consumers of Cavendish bananas, such as some Wai dieters perhaps, may wish to consider other fruits?

See also:

Bananas: The Worlds Most Destructive Crop #288
Banana: R.I.P.
By Dan Koeppel
http://classic.the-scientist.com/news/display/54710/

Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World
By Dan Koeppel

http://queensjournal.ca/story/2012-01-13/postscript/fad-dieters-face-drawbacks/

The interesting thing about this uninformed hit piece in a minor section of a Canadian student newspaper is that it's the closest thing I've seen to a news article about raw Paleo and it shows that more people are becoming aware of raw and Paleo diets.

The author complained about the restrictiveness of the raw diet and only lasted two days on it and then we learn why--SHE restricted it more than necessary or wise herself: "Wishing to preserve my health and avoid salmonella and other food borne diseases, I stayed away from raw meat and adhered to the raw vegan model." 

Here is an MS success story and some related links.

An amazing MS success story from a physician who tried a Paleo diet aimed at feeding her mitochondria:
Dr. Terry Wahls - Minding Your Mitochondria
TEDxIowaCity - Dr. Terry Wahls - Minding Your Mitochondria She went from having to use a wheelchair to being able to ride a bicycle.

MS is one of the areas of focus of Dr. Cordain's team. This video presentation by Cordain summarized their findings up to that point:
The Paleo Diet and Multiple Sclerosis (MS)
Part 1/7
October 3 2007
The Paleo Diet and Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Part 1/7

http://jackchallem.com/pages/nomorefatigue/Chapter4.pdf  Jack Challem on Fatigue, including an MS Success Story
http://www.paleodiet.com/ms/  MS and Dietary Intervention
http://www.mult-sclerosis.org/Paleolithicdiet.html  Paleolithic diet and MS Web Site
http://www.ms-diet.org/ Ashton Embry's Best Bet Diet

I figure it's likely that a raw version of Paleo would produce even more amazing results.

Most of the posts on tubers are in a yam thread. Since yams aren't generally regarded as edible raw, I figured there should be a raw tubers thread. I'll start it off with Eskimo potato (aka Indian potato), which can be eaten raw and of which there are reports of at least three varieties. Because they can be eaten raw, Eskimo potatoes qualify as raw Paleo/Instincto per the definition of Ray Audette and Instinctos.

Eskimo potato (aka Indian potato)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskimo_potato

"The Eskimo potato is a type of edible plant that grows in the northern areas of Canada and Alaska. The plant's scientific is name variously attributed as either Claytonia tuberosa[1][2] (Inuit: oatkuk[3]) or Hedysarum alpinum (Inuit: mashu[3]). Both species have a range in the northern area of North America, have edible roots, and have been documented to have been used as a food source by Inuit peoples.[4] Due to its nutritional qualities, the eskimo potato is one of many edible foods listed in survival guides, such as the US Army's field manual Survival[2], and is used in modern times to subsist in nature; for instance, Christopher McCandless used the plant as a food source while he survived in the Alaska wilderness.[5]"

References

1. merriam-webster.com  Retrieved June 21, 2011.
2. a b United States Army. Field Manual 3-05.70 . May 2002. p B-50.
3. a b Heller, Christine A. and Edward M. Scott. The Alaska Dietary Health Survey 1956-1961. US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Public Health Service. p 180
4. Gucker, Corey L. "Hedysarum alpinum ". U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fire Sciences Laboratory. 2007.
5. Bryson, George. "Theories differ on the cause of McCandless' death"  Anchorage Daily News. October 8th, 2007. Retrieved June 24, 2011.




Using caribou antlers to dig up Eskimo potatoes. The author says they looked "like thin, brown carrots."


Caption: "Eskimo Potato, Hedysarum alpinum, photographed on the Bering Sea beach, along the Nome to Council Hwy, Alaska, 6/30/2007. The name is a result of the roots being eaten, raw and cooked by natives." The variety of Eskimo potato with pink flowers has the most Internet images.

Biocultural diversity and indigenous ways of knowing: human ...
Karim-Aly S. Kassam - 2009 - 270 pages
"Eskimo Potato is eaten either boiled or raw, often with seal oil (Ulukhaktok Interviews). Stefansson (1913) recorded that ... Eskimo Potato was abundant in the regions of Prince Albert Sound, Minto Inlet and Victoria Island."

The Associated Press Stylebook for Alaska - Page 45
Dean M. Gottehrer - 2000 - 128 pages
"Eskimo potato. White, fleshy, sweetly flavored root gathered by Natives throughout Interior, Western and Arctic Alaska. Roots are washed, dried and stored in seal oil, fish oil or bear fat and eaten raw, boiled or roasted."

Traditional plant foods of Canadian indigenous peoples, Page 193
Harriet V. Kuhnlein, Nancy J. Turner - 1991 - 633 pages
"They were eaten raw, or more commonly boiled or roasted by the Iroquois, Ojibwa, Huron, Abenaki, Mic- mac and Malecite ... Sweet Vetch, "Eskimo Potato," "Indian Potato," Licorice Root, Bear Root, or 'Alaska Carrot' (Hedysarum alpinum)"


Greenland Eskimo (domestic) potato farmer. I didn't know that potatoes could be farmed in Greenland.

Limited potatoes OK in Stefansson's idea of an "Eskimo diet":
"While there were in pre-white times many Eskimos who used no vegetables, there were some, especially in Labrador and Alaska, who got as many calories from vegetables as the Holiday Diet does; so, even with a few things like lettuce and potato, we may well name this regimen for the Eskimos. The same diet is described in my 1921 book Friendly Arctic, as used and enjoyed by whites who, like the Eskimos, found it nonfattening, and thus a good reducing menu." (The Fat of the Land, 1960, p. xxvi)

Continued from http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/off-topic/what-are-you-eating-right-now/msg79287/#msg79287

It may be fruitless, but I'm pleading with folks to please do less of making absolutist pronouncements as though they were all-knowing gods and instead put more thought and effort into their posts, especially in supplying specific evidence to support and explain their views. There are many types of evidence one could present, not just books and articles, but also years of personal experience, well-designed self-experiments, logical arguments backed by scientific knowledge, real-world observations of others, image/video documentation, and so on, but I'm not seeing a lot of it. It seems like there's a tendency for folks to act as if they are more interested in arguing than in learning and sharing and putting effort into their posts. Satya has done a good job at the Dirty Carnivore forum of redirecting the energy away from the mindless arguing and more into thoughtful, well-supported posts and I'd like to ask if folks could consider the same for this forum. I've seen it work, so it is possible.

Macronutrient ratios play indeed a fundamental important role in many medical conditions, for example fungal overgrowth, epilepsy, ADHD etc.

Where did I deny that? Don't expect sweet comments from me if you accuse me of making straw man arguments that I never did. This isn't relevant to what I actually wrote. I was talking about the wars on the Internet and via books and other media over low carb vs. high carb and low fat vs. high fat. I'm bored of the endless macronutrient wars and people that pronounce that "it's all about carbs" or "fat" or opinions to that effect or proclaim something like that the whole human race absolutely would do better on a low carb or low fat diet.

And even if I speculate about the diet of our ancestors 10k+ years ago, whats wrong with speculating? It's part of a thinking process.

Again, I didn't argue for that straw man that no one should ever speculate. I just pleaded for less speculative pronouncements and more learning and deeper and more skeptical thinking--especially when the speculation is used as the foundation for arguments. There's too much in this forum and the Internet in general of throwing out absolutist proclamations based on shoot-from-the-hip speculations pronounced as though they were dictates from heaven. I'm all for speculation when it's used as the starting point for thought and discussion, not as the conclusion.

Please realize that your speculations about word combinations like "must have" are of no use for anyone.

Please realize that you don't speak for everyone, unless you're claiming to be God or a Borg who has access to everyone's minds or a dictator who can kill any of us who disagree. Besides, it's not a speculation to point out that stating that something "must have" been absolutely so without providing evidence is asking the readers to accept an absolute assumption without evidence. It's a simple recognition of the logical fallacy called begging the question.

Have you learned anything from any hunter gatherer group? Or have you just read some nice books and articles like nearly everyone else here?

Are you now at least acknowledging that it's not true that we can learn "absolutely nothing" from HGs, but instead may be able to learn something by means other than books or articles? What if anything do you accept as useful sources of information on hunter gatherer groups (living as a HG, living among HGs, direct communication with HGs, videos of HGs, writings by HGs, observers reporting on HGs, field studies, lab studies, ...)?

Many of todays hunter gatherers are in a very poor shape and show detrimental habits like smoking and drinking alcohol.

I can't believe you're using the same style of proclamations without evidence, which I just decried, in your points to me, and you're not making it very clear who or what you're referring to or how it relates to what I wrote. If you're expecting me to be convinced by the methods I took issue with, that is puzzling.

This is a good example of where it would help for you to put in a little more effort and provide specific examples to not only support what you're saying, but to explain it. Which hunter gatherers are you talking about? Are you talking about traditional pipe smoking and home-fermented alcoholic beverages or store-bought modern versions? Are you saying that the HGs are in very poor shape because of their traditional foods and lifestyles or modern influences? Who do you believe have higher rates of chronic diseases (aka the diseases of civilization), the hunter-gatherer peoples that have maintained more of their traditional diet and lifestyle or those which have adopted more modern practices?

Are you seriously trying to re-animate Tyler's dead straw man argument in which he basically complained about people advocating mindless HG re-enactment that assumes without evidence that 100% of what HGs do is healthy, which I have actually argued against doing, not for? I don't recall anyone arguing recently in this thread for that inanity. As I pointed out, my signature and icon caption, which I think have been there for months now, show I don't believe that nonsense.

Regarding healthy diets for human beings there is not really SO much to learn, IMO. It's more about unlearning. The message is simple: Just eat all parts of HEALTHY animals (raw) and some raw plant food as desired. That's all.

Yet more of the same revelatory pronouncements. How can I make it plain to you that I'm not convinced of anything just because you say it's so and I'm much more interested in your actual experience, experiments and thorough research than in opinions that don't appear to have had much thought or effort put into them? Are you God or a prophet with a direct link to his mind? If not, I require more evidence than your say-so.

And of course, there are many other factors beside macronutrient ratios. Nobody denies this, PP.

Then we are in agreement on that, but my point was that there is too much emphasis on macronutrient ratios when it comes to diets for the general population and not enough on the bigger picture. I was not implying the ridiculous notion that all of the science and medicine that in any way touches on macronutrients must be discarded or ignored. Nobody that I know of has argued for that.

---*---

By the way, when I wrote this:

Some people have been making a lot of guesses and assumptions, which is typical on the Internet. Instead of doing that, why not read all you can about the actual hunter gatherer, pastoral and horticultural peoples you've been making guesses about and learn what you can? It's much more interesting and rewarding than pure speculation. Why not do as Stephen Covey advised and seek first to understand, then to be understood? http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/off-topic/what-are-you-eating-right-now/msg79137/#msg79137

I meant Stone Age hunter gatherers too, not just those that were observed in recent centuries, and it was a request, not a demand, but I'm hoping that people will seriously consider it and in the constructive way in which it was intended.

I noticed that the listed number of members dropped from over 5,000 before the upgrade to currently 851. Was that due to purging of inactive and bot "members"? Just curious.

I suggest that the default quote font size be increased from what looks like 8 to 10. At size 8, it's rather difficult to read, especially with the new forum format.