Everything about The Paleolithic Diet totally explained
The
Paleolithic diet (or
Paleolithic nutrition), also popularly known as the
paleo diet (var.:
paleodiet),
caveman diet,
Stone Age diet and
hunter-gatherer diet, is a
dietary regimen which seeks to mimic the
diet of wild plants and animals that
humans habitually consumed during the
Paleolithic, a period of about 2.5 million years duration that ended around 10,000 years ago with the development of
agriculture.
Based upon commonly available modern
foods, the Paleolithic diet consists mainly of lean meat, fish, vegetables, fruit, roots and nuts, and excludes
grains,
legumes, dairy products, salt, refined sugar and processed oils.
First popularized in the mid 1970s by a
gastroenterologist named Walter L. Voegtlin, this
nutritional concept has been expounded and adapted by a number of authors and researchers in several books and academic journals. Building upon the principles of
evolutionary medicine, it's based on the premise that
modern humans are genetically
adapted to the diet of their Paleolithic ancestors and that human
genetics have scarcely changed since the dawn of agriculture, and therefore that an ideal diet for human health and well-being is one that resembles this ancestral diet.
This dietary approach is a controversial topic amongst
nutritionists and
anthropologists. Advocates argue that modern human populations subsisting on
traditional diets similar to those of Paleolithic
hunter-gatherers are largely free of
diseases of affluence, and that such diets produce beneficial health outcomes in controlled
medical studies. Supporters point to several potentially
therapeutic nutritional characteristics of preagricultural diets. and have disputed certain dietary prescriptions on the grounds that they pose health risks and may not reflect the features of ancient
Paleolithic diets. It has also been argued that such diets are not a realistic alternative for everyone, and that meat-based diets are not
environmentally sustainable.
History
Gastroenterologist Walter L. Voegtlin was one of the first to suggest that following a diet similar to that of the
Paleolithic era would improve a person's health. In 1975, he published a book His dietary prescriptions were based on his own medical treatments of various digestive problems, namely
colitis,
Crohn's disease,
irritable bowel syndrome and
indigestion.
In 1985,
Melvin Konner and S. Boyd Eaton, an associate clinical professor of radiology and an adjunct associate professor of
anthropology at
Emory University, published a key paper on Paleolithic nutrition in the
New England Journal of Medicine. In 1989, these authors published a second book on Paleolithic nutrition.
Since the end of the 1990s, a number of medical doctors and nutritionists have advocated a return to a so-called Paleolithic (preagricultural) diet. and created websites to promote their dietary prescriptions. They have synthesized diets from commonly available modern foods that would emulate the nutritional characteristics of the ancient Paleolithic diet, some allowing specific foods that would have been unavailable to preagricultural peoples, such as certain processed oils and beverages.
Practices
The Paleolithic diet is a modern dietary regimen that seeks to mimic the diet of preagricultural hunter-gatherers, one that corresponds to what was available in any of the
ecological niches of Paleolithic humans. The ancestral human diet is inferred from historical and
ethnographic studies of modern-day
hunter-gatherers as well as archaeological finds and
anthropological evidence.
The Paleolithic diet consists of foods that can be hunted and fished, such as meat,
offal and seafood, and that can be gathered, such as eggs, insects, fruit, nuts, seeds, vegetables, mushrooms, herbs and spices. Food groups that were rarely or never consumed by humans before the
Neolithic (agricultural) revolution are excluded from the diet, mainly
grains,
legumes (for example
peanuts), dairy products, salt,
refined sugar and processed oils, Unlike
raw food diets, the Paleolithic diet doesn't limit the consumption of cooked foods.
According to certain proponents of the Paleolithic diet, practitioners should derive about 56–65% of their
food energy from
animal foods and 36–45% from plant foods. They recommend a diet
high in protein (19–35% energy) and
relatively low in carbohydrates (22–40% energy), with a fat intake (28–58% energy) similar to or higher than that found in
Western diets. Furthermore, some proponents exclude from the diet foods which exhibit high
glycemic indices, such as potatoes.
Paleolithic nutrition has its roots in
evolutionary biology and rests on the principles of
evolutionary medicine. The reasoning underlying this nutritional approach is that
natural selection had sufficient time to genetically adapt the
metabolism and
physiology of Paleolithic humans to the varying
dietary conditions of that era. But in the 10,000 years since the invention of agriculture and its consequent major change in the human diet, natural selection has had too little time to make the optimal genetic adaptations to the new diet.
Medical research
Based on the subsistence patterns and
biomarkers of hunter-gatherers studied in the last century, advocates argue that modern humans are well adapted to the
diet of their Paleolithic ancestor. The diet of modern hunter-gatherer groups is believed to be representative of patterns for humans of 50 to 25 thousand years ago, including those individuals who reach the age of 60 or beyond, seem to be largely free of the signs and symptoms of chronic disease (such as
obesity,
high blood pressure, nonobstructive coronary
atherosclerosis, and
insulin resistance) that universally afflict the elderly in western societies (with the exception of
osteoarthritis, which afflicts both populations).
The results of controlled medical studies on the Paleolithic diet have also been interpreted as evidence of the health benefits of this diet. The first animal experiment on a Paleolithic diet suggested that this diet, as compared with a cereal-based diet, conferred higher
insulin sensitivity, lower
C-reactive protein and lower
blood pressure in domestic pigs. In the first controlled human
trial on a Paleolithic diet, researchers found that the diet improved
glucose tolerance more than a
Mediterranean diet in individuals with ischaemic heart disease. including obesity,
cardiovascular disease,
diabetes,
osteoporosis,
autoimmune-related diseases, certain
cancers, and
acne, as well as many diseases related to
vitamin and
mineral deficiencies.
According to Cordain et al., seven crucial nutritional characteristics of ancestral hominin diets that have been fundamentally altered by food staples and
food-processing procedures introduced during the Neolithic and Industrial Periods serve to inhibit the development of
diseases of affluence in modern-day hunter-gatherers: Moreover, their diets are devoid of dairy products, such as milk, yoghurt, and cottage cheese, which have low glycemic indices, but are highly insulinotropic, with an
insulin index similar to that of white bread. These dietary characteristics may lower risk of diabetes, obesity and other related
syndrome X diseases by placing less stress on the
pancreas to produce
insulin, and preventing
insulin insensitivity.
Fatty acid composition: Hunter-gatherer diets generally maintain relatively high levels of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, moderately low levels of saturated fats (10–15% of total food energy) as well as a low omega-6:omega-3 fatty acid ratio. Moreover, they're devoid of artificial trans fat. These nutritional factors may serve to inhibit the development of cardiovascular disease. as well as atherosclerosis.
Sodium-potassium ratio: Since no processed foods or added salt are included the sodium intake (~726 mg) is lower than average U.S. values (3,271 mg) or recommended values (2,400 mg). Further, since potassium-rich fruits and vegetables comprise ~30% of the daily energy, the potassium content (~9,062 mg) is nearly 3.5 times greater than average values (2,620 mg) in the U.S. diet.
Fiber content: Contemporary diets devoid of cereal grains, dairy products, refined oils and sugars, and processed foods have been shown to contain significantly more fiber (~42.5 g/d) than either current or recommended values. In response to this argument, advocates of the paleodiet state that while Paleolithic hunter-gatherers did have a short average life expectancy, modern human populations with lifestyles resembling that of our preagricultural ancestors have no or little diseases of affluence, despite sufficient numbers of elderly.
Causes of the diseases of affluence
Critics further contend that food energy excess, rather than the consumption of specific novel foods, such as grains and dairy products, underlies the diseases of affluence. According to Geoffrey Cannon, Similarly, William R. Leonard, a professor of anthropology at Northwestern University, states that the health problems facing industrial societies stem not from deviations from a specific ancestral diet but from an imbalance between calories consumed and calories burned, a state of energy excess uncharacteristic of ancestral lifestyles.
Evolutionary logic
The evolutionary assumptions underlying the Paleolithic diet have also been disputed.
They further question the notion that 10,000 years since the dawn of agriculture is a period not nearly sufficient to ensure an adequate adaptation to agrarian diets. Ströhle et al. argue that "the number of generations that a species existed in the old environment was irrelevant, and that the response to the change of the environment of a species would depend on the hereditability of the traits, the intensity of selection and the number of generations that selection acts."
Katharine Milton, a professor of physical anthropology at the University of California, has also disputed the evolutionary logic upon which the Paleolithic diet is based. She questions the premise that the metabolism of modern humans must be genetically adapted to the dietary conditions of the Paleolithic.
Criticism of low-carbohydrate and high-protein versions
The high protein and low-carbohydrate diet recommended by Loren Cordain and colleagues based on the dietary patterns of worldwide modern-day hunter-gatherers has attracted a number of criticisms, including the following:
Therapeutic merits
It has been argued that relative freedom from degenerative diseases was, and still is, characteristic of all hunter-gatherer societies irrespective of the macronutrient characteristics of their diets. Katharine Milton states that "hunter-gatherer societies, both recent and ancestral, displayed a wide variety of plant-animal subsistence ratios, illustrating the adaptability of human metabolism to a broad range of energy substrates. Because all hunter-gatherer societies are largely free of chronic degenerative disease, there seems little justification for advocating the therapeutic merits of one type of hunter-gatherer diet over another." seem to have a high mortality from coronary heart disease, and that many populations of horticulturists, pastoralists and simple agriculturists living today are ingesting a high-carbohydrate diet without having signs and symptoms of CHD. In response to this criticism, Wolfgang Kopp states that "carbohydrate food, consumed by hunter-gatherers, is high in fiber and low-glycemic in effect, eliciting small amounts of insulin only. [...] Are high-carbohydrate diets atherogenic per se? Not if they've a low glycemic load. In this point, Stroehle et al. are right. However, it's the question, whether diets high in low-glycemic plant food (which is relatively high in indigestible fiber and relatively low in carbohydrate) should be labeled as “high-carbohydrate” diets."
According to Erica Frank, professor of health care at the University of British Columbia, eating an animal also involves absorbing the toxins stored in its body fat. She quotes the EPA: "The average American intake is between 300 and 500 times the safe daily dose of dioxin."]]
Critics have argued that there are insufficient data to determine the average daily intake of animal and plant foods by Paleolithic humans. Furthermore, according to Katharine Milton, "data from ethnographic studies of nineteenth and twentieth century hunter-gatherers, as well as historical accounts and the archeological record, suggest that ancestral hunter-gatherers enjoyed a rich variety of different diets. Thus estimates of nutrient proportions for "the Paleolithic diet" are hypothetical, at best." They indicate that, because the plant–animal subsistence ratios of contemporary hunter-gatherers vary in a remarkable manner (0–90% food from gathering; 10–100% food from hunting and fishing), it's likely that the macronutrient intake of preagricultural humans varied enormously. They add: Ströhle et al. further mention that Staffan Lindeberg, an advocate of the Paleolithic diet, has accounted for a plant-based diet rich in carbohydrates as being consistent with the human evolutionary past. Barry Bogin, a professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan, argues that less intensive farming techniques, such as pasture-grazed cattle, won't produce sufficient meat to feed the world’s population.
Concerns have also been raised about the detrimental effects of meat-based diets on the environment.[Further Information]
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