I like it!!!
 

I have to admit, the argument about eating life to sustain life makes a lot of sense. Militant vegans seem to be following a hypocritical woe and lifestyle when they put meat eaters down and villify us and see themselves as following the "higher road." Life is precious, no matter where it's found bcause it provides other species a chance to live...whether it be in the slime mold that moves across the tree trunk, or that noble Bambi that was blasted by the hunter and carted home to become venison (much higher in omega 3 fatty acids, and lower in omega 6 transfatty acids than cow meat, incidently) on his barby. Let's all face it. If we want to survive (and there are some who think that Humans are the reason that the world is in such straights and should be eliminated...I call these folks, WACKOS) we must eat something dead which was once alive...plant, animal, whatever, but it must be from living organisms. We don't do well eating dirt, or rocks. If life isn't precious in any form, why are we spending billions to see if the most primitive forms of life could exist elsewhere in the universe? So, to all you militant vegans who read this and think we are the epitomy of evil and that you are on the "high road" to moral living...GET OVER IT!!! GET A LIFE!!! LEAVE US ALONE! GO SPOUT YOUR MORALITY TO SOMEONE WHO CARES!! This is a forum for meat-eating omnivores...OH WELL! TOO BAD! I ain't changing to poorer health to satisfy your need to kill off more species (as evidenced by the number of little animals and insects that are wiped out from each pass of the tractor in your fields of grain) than meat eaters do, for anything! Does this sound mean-spirited? It really isn't. Anybody who comes on this forum to preach to us about the evils and "stupidity" of our WOE is the mean-spirited one who should mind his/her own business!

Veggiemax is confused. While it is true our closet genetic relative is the chimp at about 98% to argue we should adopt their diet is very simplistic. First, chimps eat meat at every opportunity; their evolutionary circumstances don't always permit this. Thus, they are forced to adapt. This is not always evolutionarily optimal in a biological sense. Evolution does not imply forward progression and in fact often force spices backward in terms of biological optimality. Second, the human brain was forced to evolve, as hunting needs demanded. Your brain is far more developed due to the hunting for meat cave men had to do. Third, all evidence points to the fact that we evolved as a separate species because we were hunter/gatherers not gatherer/hunters. As such we developed our own unique set of biological needs based on our evolution. We are 99.999999% genetically similar to those who hunted over 11,000 years ago. As such a diet based on preagrarian times would logically be the most optimal. Fourth, we are 95% genetically related to 95% of most of the creatures on this planet. Even creatures within the same spices but in differing subgroup can have vastly differing dietary requirements, so to say we should eat what chimps eat is way off. Chimps would be better off low carbing and probably would if they could.

Hi M,

Welcome to the active lowcarbers forum, and congratulations on your first post, which I thought was well-judged, well-argued and instructive.

You have naturally gravitated to a viewpoint very similar to that held by the person responsible for getting me into low-carbing in the first place. His name is Dr Richard Mackarness, whose book "Eat Fat and Grow Thin" was based on what he described as the "Stone Age" or "pre-cereal" diet. It was his contention that biological adaptations take hundreds of thousands of years to take place, so humans eating cereals were not biologically equipped to digest them properly. This was not so bad when processing was done by hand, because a lot of husks and other roughage found its way into the processed product. But many people cannot metabolize cereals processed mechanically because we lack the specific enzyme chains which would make this possible. Thus, for those of us with this defect (that is all of us here), as long as we eat what our forbears would have eaten 11,000 years ago, our bodies will be in good shape and we will be healthy. Incidentally, Mackarness's book was first published in 1958, some 14 years before Atkins.

I have reviewed Mackarness's book for this forum (among other books) and if you would like to read more about it, click on this link:-

http://www.lowcarb.ca/atkins-diet-a...mackarness.html

Best wishes,

Andy

LOL
 

And through all of this, we've lost vegiemax... I think close to page 3... Too bad he missed all the good arguments to his theory.

Yup...Veggiemax made a total of 8 posts and hasn't been heard from again since January 17, 2002. It's a shame they didn't stick around to hear the very sound rebuttals to their position, but everyone else who reads this will get the benefit so it's a good thing that a dialogue on the subject was opened even though the originator didn't stick around to benefit from it.

Somtimes I think that people come to this forum to "save" us from our "unhealthy" ways thinking that we haven't thought through or WOE and then split when they encounter strong and well-reasoned arguments in favor of what we are doing before they get "converted". LOL

Note from a Blood Type B "recovering vegetarian"
 

Sixteen years of vegetarianism left me overweight, sick and tired.
Despite my philosophical leanings toward a vegan/vegetarian diet it just does not work for my body. Period.

In the past three years I've been doing a lot of experimenting, going on and off LC. And I've found what works for me and it involves eating meat or eggs at least 2x per day. My body rebels when I try to go veg; my blood sugar gets unstable, my thinking becomes unfocused and I tire easily. Who needs that?

Chimps, vegans, vegetarians, go ahead and eat what feels best to you and I'll do the same.

Bon apetit!
amie

Well, hey?! What about the Breatharians????

I just read this whole thread...I have to be amused at the theory of eating like a chimp just because we share nearly 99% of genetic material with them. On the other hand, that makes them so far removed from us that we can't interbreed with them. A horse and a donkey are much more closely related, and they can interbreed, but cannot produce a viable offspring. And look at goats and sheep--both are considered ovines, yet they can't interbreed either. So my question is: Do we *really* have that much in common with a chimp? Actually, it is known that chimps do eat insects and small animals. I believe gorillas are the only known true fruitarian primates aren't they?
As someone pointed out earlier, we seem to have much more in common with pigs, as we can use their organs, and pigs are also omnivorous, just like us. I have to be amused at folks who consistently try to argue that we are vegetarians--especially the folks who argue the 'back to Eden' way of eating. Well, keep reading your Bible folks...God also gave us animals, birds and insects to eat and with very strict guidelines as to how to choose what to eat and how to end their lives swiftly and mercifully and to prepare them with honor and gratitude. Granted, today's slaughterhouses aren't great in that respect (some are better than others), but one can find a local abbatoir where the local grassfed cattle/sheep/goats are taken to the back door and quickly shot then freshly prepared. At least you know the animal didn't suffer in that situation and arrived at the abbatoir's in good condition. Yes, I am one of those folks who believes a person should have killed and prepared an animal or fowl at least once in order to truly appreciate what the creature is giving you--and thank it for it's sacrifice. It will live on through you.....

These people need to research!!!
 

Phil Kaplan had too much to say about how he was shafted out of TV interviews. Perhaps that is why he is so anti Atkins???
He talked about Kidney stones in Atkins diet followers. Well, read any medical journel or search the web, and most Doctors cannot determine what causes Kidney stones. It is more than often hereditary or a lack of sufficient water intake and in the extreme Hypothyroidism.
Dr Atkins suggests lots of water.
It reminds me of when a family member (in-law) got kidney stones. She was always on a diet, however low fat, and she would not drink water or any water based beverage.
She contracted Kidney stones and the best advice her Dr gave her was to drink 8 glasses of water a day and steer away from sugar laden food.
Now,------ doesnt that say something, and that was in 1984.
Helen
Anyway, dont body building types like Phil, live on protein and then eat carbs before a competition to bulk themselves up??? Isnt that more damaging??

well as I understand it
 

The best body builders eat a diet that is fairly normal but high in veggies and protiens without worry about carb intake except that its clean (ie whole grains) in the months of training before a competition.
Then when they have gotten the size they want in muscles just in the few weeks before the comepetion they go.. Yes folks.. VERY LOW carbs to get the muscle definition they want as carbs help hold the water in the body.
Its a delicate balance between size and definition. They are judged on Both.
Nedra

Let's take this a step further - chimp lifestyle
 

The chimp that is genetically closes to us is the Bonobo chimp, which can communicate with sign language, add, subtract, and even do fractions (I saw a film when I was studying cognitive science).

Bonobos also are incredibly peaceful animals and have no war. Why not? They are too busy having sex and various kinds of sex-related play. I'm serious, they fool around all day. (More info here.)

So, even more important than eating fruit and termites as "VegieMax" suggests, we should adopt their behavioral habits, and we'd all be happier and healthier, wouldn't we? The world economy would come to a screeching halt, but there'd be no more war or killing.

I don't think it's for me, though. I wouldn't want to catch everyone's fleas. :D

I will NOT--I repeat NOT-start eating termites!!! Not even for sex!!! :D

the vegetarian is lost?
 

Just reviewing some posts since I have been off the low carbers forum for some time.
Just for any one's information: I lost a brother in 1987 who was a vegetarian for years and years was slim and died suddenly. No autopsy was preformed, {at family's request} and no hint as to what he died from. But he was the only one in a family of 6 men and one female {me} to skip the obvious, a stress test.
Three brothers had by pass operation and one had a stent put in place at 75yrs.
The person they thought would not need the stress test died. It was more than certain the cause was a heart attack.

So the high and mighty veggie can run around as smug as can be but he should get a paid up life insurance because no one knows for sure what is happening to his arteries unless he is tested or scanned.

Big Brain
 

Somewhere along this genetic trail you have built, we departed from Pan Troglodytes in that we had access to a great deal of protein which physically enabled us to develop our big brains. We could not have done so without large and consistent amounts of protein. Vegan mothers have been found to produce children with protein defects in their brains, which cause them to be retarded. We are genetically tied to proteins in our diets. Reading the entrails of chimpanzees hardly qualifies as an intelligent aproach to understanding homo sapiens' nutritional needs.

Question: Was it even possible for a large group of humans to be vegitarians before the invention of agriculture? Agriculture was instituted, what?, Maybe 14,000 years ago? I am sure that seems long enough on a societal scale to appeal to people who are vegitarians and who come out of culture of vegetarianism, to say that we should be vegetarians because that is how some cultures have lived and thrived, but 14,000 years isn't enough time for us to have evolved to that changed diet, so to suggest it is our preferred eating situation is stretching things. Realistically, could a decent-sized poulation of humans (we are BIG primates) have found enough food to feed and sustain themselves without meat, before argriculture? You have to remember that wild foods are much smaller than the currently available modern varieties too. This includes seed sized for grains. Some were not even edible before cultivation. Take the almond for example, a staple of many traditional cultures, but poisonous in its pre-cultivated form (too high in tannins, I believe).

but I wanna...
 

I wanna eat crap waaaaaaaaaaaaaa

...not *literally* crap...I hope! :D :D :D

Re: Atkins? I dont get it. I follow a genetic diet.
 

Ummm, nuts, seeds and ants are a high protien, low carb diet.

"Chimpanzee Hunting Behavior and Human Evolution"
 

Chimpanzee Hunting Behavior and Human Evolution

by Craig B. Stanford
link to full article
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
excerpt:
In the early 1960s, when the British primatologist Jane Goodall first observed wild chimpanzees hunting and eating meat in Gombe National Park, Tanzania, it was widely believed that these animals were strict vegetarians. Skeptics suggested that the diet of the Gombe chimpanzees was aberrant. Others suggested that the quantity of meat the chimpanzees ate was trivial.

After more than 30 years of research, however, it is now clear that meat is a natural part of the chimpanzees' diet. Indeed, hunting has been observed at most of the other sites where chimpanzees are studied across central Africa. And, it turns out, a chimpanzee community may eat several hundred kilograms of meat in a single year.

chimps
 

I don't know. Some seem to take up low carbing almost as a religion. I have some medical reasons to lose nearly a hundred pounds. I will say I am never hungry on Atkins.

The only cravings i have are for comfort foods and emphasis on the comfort.

I am on low carbs cause I am effectively losing weight. Other than that, I don't pay much attention to it. I find watching my diet so closely boring but at least with Atkins i can only eat a few things and that's what i do.

I think Max offers some interesting ideas.

I was vegeatrian for 8 months and no flour and no sugar and lost only 7 pounds, despite vigourous exercise.

:wave:

limited meat eating due to injected hormones
 

i have been on a low carb diet for 2 1/2 years now and it has helped me greatly. it has inabled me to get controll of my diabtes and loose wieght. of corse i have to once again loose weight due to having a baby in febuary. but anyways i am on a low carb diet and do not eat much meat at all. meat makes me feel bogged down and slow paced. and i dont like all the added injected hormones in meat , it contributes to health problems. i have read that when we die we can have up to 5 pounds of yucky meat in our digestive tract. but i ,like almost anyone, like the taste of meat so i do eat it sometimes. but come on ppl it is not worth aruging about.
i figure in the begining God made us not to eat meat because there was no killing of anything so in those days no animal had to die to be eaten. but things changed so they began to kill animals and eat them. so our bodies have adapted somewhat so we can now eat meat. but i still think the avarage american eats way to much meat, that is why the average child now a days goes thru puberty way to early because of all the injected hormones in meat. but is it worth getting hard :Puke: feelings and fighting about? NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :spin:

genetic diet
 

I am heartily sorry if i have offended anyone at all. No hard feelings here at all.

You know i thought about people being born to eat only meat. But a total meat diet can cause scurvey, which is fatal. Some vegetable mater must have been included.

Ummm just my opinion again...I was a vegan for several years..In fact I work with a 350pd Veggie...Post me the FACTS..and I will post mine. On the healthy body front...I have seen some fat chimps in my time tooooo.... :eek: You mean diffrent strkes for diffrent folks? NOOOO everyone should be the same...life would be SO much more fun that way. NOT! :wave:

In Britain we can get 'organic' eat which is free from all chemicals - can't you get this in the States?
Robert

Ants are a veggie????
 

VegieMax, who originally started this thingy is gone, I guess, made her mark and left it up to us to talk this thing to death. I don't know if she ever bothered to notice that ANTS are a part of the animal kingdom...MEAT...PROTEIN...and that isn't all that chimps eat from the animal kingdom. Our good buddy of the rain forests, Jane Goodall, who now does chimp calls on Earth Day, also saw them chasing down and killing and eating baboons and monkeys...I think that would translate as MEAT under most circumstances. If you don't believe me, look at her book from the 60s by the National Geographic, or in an old Geographic and see the actual pictures of a chimp doing just that. Chimps are meat eaters...done! Enough Said...Bye Bye!

People who would eat a totally meat diet would not eat just the muscle meat like we would. They would eat every part of the animal that was edible.

Fresh, lightly cooked meat will give you all the vitamin C you need.

See the study about Steffansson and his partner who lived a year on meat and fat only and were in perfect health.


Beth

YES!!!
 

Elihnig!!!! You're soooo right! You have read about paleo diets??? Steffanson pretty well proved that a person could live comfortably...for a very long time...on an all meat/fat diet. Scurvy is caused by a lack of vitamin C...which is present in fresh meat and fat. The difference between Atkins and a true Paleo diet (like the one I'm on...Neanderthin) is that our metabolism has completely changed to a fat-burning metabolism (without complex carbohydrates)...carbs, in the form of dairy (yuk!!) and grains(complex carbohydrates) make me quite ill. I get almost all of my energy from fat, rather than from complex carbohydrates. I also really know when I'm in need of nourishment...not just "hungry." I get a weak, rundown feeling when I'm in need of food. I also have no cravings for anythiing other than a salad, at times (if I'm not eating enough greens). The trouble I had with Atkins, on the three times I went on that woe, was that the cravings for complex carbs never left! I was so addicted to complex carbs that the small amounts I was able to eat on Atkins just kept my addiction alive and I was miserable. I have totally givin up dairy and complex carbs and have been on this WOE for almost two years. I made the mistake of going out to eat Mexican Food...oh, MY GOD! It was awful for three days! I went to eat Chinese about three months ago...Not a good thing! There are certain foods I could certainly eat in both restaurants, but I was rebellious and tried to nosh the "forbidden" foods (rice, beans, CORN chips, tortillas, the "secret sauce" of the Chinese restaurant, bean sprouts). NEVER AGAIN! I am a Complex Carb Addict in REMISSION. I eat all of the meat AND the fat, along with bones (if they are soft enough). My metabolism is so different that I now can literally drink the fat juice that sits in the pan after a roast is cooked! That would have turned me off in the old days, I'll tell Ya'!!! Now, that is not necessarily a good idea with corn-fattened beef, chicken or pork (because of the high concentration of Omega 6 trans-fatty acids caused by the grains fed to them to fatten them up), but if I eat the meat of grass-fed animals, I could always do it. I sneak some, now and then because I am not perfect and I love the stuff...NOW! I have never felt so good.

Captxray, I read everything I can get my hands on.

I also read those long threads you and others wrote over in the Paleo forum. Great stuff!

I keep thinking to myself about going paleo some day.

Well, I kept thinking about doing BFL someday and now I'm doing it!


Beth

Well, there's always (almost) tomorrow..
 

Elihnig...hey! You're doing it and losing, I see. That's the main point. I think paleo is the best way to go because I'm basically a purist...NOT! I'm really just lazy and I don't have to count anything on Paleo...Looks to me like you're doing just fine on BLH. Like I said, I'm a "reformed carboholic" and I simply MUST abstain from all complex carbs. So, paleo is the only way to go for me. For all I know, being a vegan may be the right diet for some people...my daughter, for one. She just hates eating meat. Although, I'm very unpolitically correct and don't think we were ever designed to NOT eat meat. I know that grains and dairy are bad for all of us, though. I have researched this subject quite "heavily," if you catch my drift, and all indicators point to them being the bane of society and the reason for most, if not all, of our autoimmune disorders...did you know that 98% of us die from some form of autoimmune disease? Yup! Look what most people eat. No contest...no matter what they will say. People think there is nothing wrong, until they assume room temperature..."natural causes," they call it. HA!

Yes, Max... this isn't a diet--it's a change of lifestyle.

Diet's usually don't work, but changing the way you eat can, and does!

Of course you are welcome to ask questions, but don't be surprised if a lot of people who have had much success with this way of eating disagree with you and even resent what to them sounds like criticism of Dr. Atkins' plan!

~Debbie~LoveSong~ ;)