I asked a similar question a few weeks ago, because Cordain's (Paleo) writing is so technical as to make you believe he knows what he's talking about. But since that time I personally have rejected Cordain and am continuing to follow Neanderthin. Cordain claims to have a group of researchers dedicated to determining the appropriate diet based on what he believes we ate prehistorically. However, he has no problem recommending canola oil, an entirely modern processed oil which, like other plant oils, goes rancid at room temperature and produces trans fatty acids and free radicals when heated. And the reason he recommends this is to make the numbers work out with respect to omega-3 to omega-6 ratios. That's tantamount to feeding astroturf (artificial plastic grass) to cows to simulate being grass fed.

He continues to denounce saturated fat as "artery clogging," which is the typical, antiquated, fatophobic thinking that characterizes the rest of mainstream medicine. There is such overwhelming evidence that saturated fat is not only ok, but necessary for health, that I simply cannot believe there is no hidden agenda on his part. The only reason he has any success is that he rejects grains, sugar and processed food. My perception from the discussions and from the recipes posted on this board is that most people here generally follow Neanderthin.

Howard

One more thing I forgot to mention. Your cholesterol definitely looks like what doctors want to see. I personally am not convinced there is any correlation between blood cholesterol and any particular disease. I have never had mine tested and have no intention on doing so. What would be the point? If it were high there's no way I would take a statin drug.

Just the fact that your depression and fatigue are improving should give you confidence that you're on the right track.

Howard

I totally agree with you, that is why I started this post, as we are trying to go back to find out what our true body is design to eat, we need to understand that we are EVOLVING and the world is not the same today. i.e Omegas are not the same as a result of feeding animals with grains, but on the other hand the oils today are a mess so we might be better with just natural fat...

I do believed that we are just in a crucial point in Nutrition Evolution, where all this questions will be answerar sometime soon, how to apply the Paleo diet to cure and control some huge and major sicknesses, I am specially surprise on how in 15 days my Immune system is recovering.

I been craving so much FAT Meat, like pork, red meat that I have to push myself to eat some fish and shrimp? would this be only a phase?...

I found this post trying to find more answers, and I found this one like a year ago, I might go and bye that book..

I totally agree with Howard.

Cordain wrote with a huge chip on his shoulder. He claims to have found 100's of studies showing low-carb, high-fat studies show many danger signs, but he failed to list any references to those studies. He mentioned one "study", conducted on 10 male athletes for one week or two, which is hardly scientific, and too short a period to show any signs of danger or health, and a very small sample.

If someone really had 100's of studies to support their point, why not list them for us to look up and verify his claims?

To me, he's the pre-historic version of Weight Watchers and SlimFast

I prefer Neanderthin.

Wa'il

The thing about Cordain is that, as far as I can gather he is basing his arguments on the stone age peoples who were the ancestors of modern europeans, and from them much of the population of North America, Australia etc.

However much if not most of the world's paleo population would have eaten quite different combinations of foods and fats. For example the ancestors of the Inuit loved blubber, blubber and more blubber.
Modern American Indians show the typical body shape and facial types of arctic peoples, as they absolutely had to be to cross the 'land bridge' to get to Alaska so presumably they were blubber enthusiasts as well, in the past! Australian aborigines on the other hand found it very hard to get enough fat and resorted to things like witchetty grubs which are actually quite delicious, and a huge lizard called a goanna (a mini komodo dragon!) which is fatty and was broiled whole in the skin. I regularly eat kangaroo and it is so lean I cook it in beef fat!

What seems to be common is that fat seems to be prized wherever you go. In the 19th century when polar exploration started it soon became clear that the explorers needed to get at least 50% of their calories from fat otherwise they could literally not carry enough food on their sleds to get back to base on a long trek.

The ancestors of modern europeans, coming out of an ice age, surely would have needed a high fat diet.

Michael Gardner

Australia

This is very true. I remember watching a documentary about the Inuit and the women were absolutely *thrilled* that the men had killed a couple of caribou that had so much fat on them.
The first words out of thier mouths as the men skinned the animals were "Look at all the FAT!!!!" and they had huge smiles on thier faces.

It was subtitled.

I chose to go with neanderthin because when I eat low fat, it just doesn't make me feel any better or do any better. When I eat low fat I am much more likely to fall off the paleo woe and when I eat the neanderthin way, I don't have as much of a problem with it.

I didn't like a lot of the statements that Cordain made about fat. They didn't seem right to me, they didn't feel right. I was reading his book earlier today and I find that I still feel that way.

Marty

Howard:

“I personally am not convinced there is any correlation between blood cholesterol and any particular disease.” Well, Howard, it is very well proven that high level of “bad” cholesterol is correlated to high risk of cardiovascular diseases. Since about 50 % of western people die from these and related diseases it would be a bad advice to tell people not to care about their cholesterol levels. But most of the cholesterol is produced by the body and diet cholesterol seems to have very little influence on blood cholesterol levels. This is not to say that diet has no influence on cholesterol. The amount of food is sure important
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea...o-crd041404.php
and very likely also the composition.

Michael G (and Lobstergal):

“What seems to be common is that fat seems to be prized wherever you go.”
Yes, and what does that prove? What also seems to be common is that Coca-Cola, Beer and Cigarettes seems to be prized wherever you go! ??

“In the 19th century when polar exploration started it soon became clear that the explorers needed to get at least 50% of their calories from fat otherwise they could literally not carry enough food on their sleds to get back to base on a long trek.” Aha? What does this say about human evolution? What do the popular references to Inuit diets say about human evolution and diet? Inuits and American indians (and to some extent Australian aboriginals) are very recent parentheses in human evolution and tell you very little about a natural original diet. Humans developed in Africa for two million years, so the food available there seem more relevant to me. You can also find examples of natural tribes that were 100% vegetarians. These are just exceptions (as the Inuits) and give no clue about the best natural healthy diet.

Regards - JHT

Regarding "100%" Vegetarian tribes:

"It is true that Hindu vegans living in certain parts of India do not suffer from vitamin B12 deficiency. This has led some to conclude that plant foods do provide this vitamin. This conclusion, however, is erroneous as many small insects, their feces, eggs, larvae and/or residue, are left on the plant foods these people consume, due to non-use of pesticides and inefficient cleaning methods. This is how these people obtain their vitamin B12. This contention is borne out by the fact that when vegan Indian Hindus later migrated to England, they came down with megaloblastic anaemia within a few years. In England, the food supply is cleaner, and insect residues are completely removed from plant foods (16)." [Weston A. Price Foundation]

Howard

How can you draw any conclusion from a study making claims regarding a single variable such as caloric restriction when they don't hold everything else constant. The composition of food of the two groups varied, as well. And then we don't know if they ate processed junk or all natural foods. We don't know if the fat they ate was poly, mono, or saturated. This study shows little, at least in the way it was reported.

Now, if it has been very well proven that there is a link between bad cholesterol and CV diseases, it should be easy to produce some evidence. Please post a link. Thanks.

Howard

Howard,

actually, the Indian Hindu were not the people I had in mind, but I buy you explanation about the insect supplement anyway. So I back of to a 99.5 % vegetarian diet. :-) If it in reality is 99.2, 99.5 or 99.8 is nothing I wish to dispute, because obviously nether you nor I think that is a good and healthy diet.

The study on calorie restriction was a correlative (comparing, not experimental) study so you are right that all other factors were not held constant. Factors that could be controlled (age, sex, etc) was controlled for as far as possible and of the factors that differed caloric intake was the one that varied the most, and the CR-restriction group had superior values of all measured CD risk factors. Diet composition sure varied, but not hugely and the result was not in favour of the “fat-eaters”.

This is citation from the discussion of the cited article and the references they gave:
“Of the risk factors documented by epidemiological studies, elevated serum cholesterol has the distinction that it can induce development of atherosclerosis in the absence of other risk factors. This is evident in people with familial hypercholesterolemia (23) and has been demonstrated repeatedly in studies on animals (24). Furthermore, lowering cholesterol levels has been shown to reduce cardiovascular disease mortality (25).”

23. Goldstein, J. L., Hobbs, H. H. and Brown, M. S. (2001) in “The metabolic & molecular bases of inherited disease, eds. Scriver, Baudet, Sly % Valle (McGraw-Hill, New York), pp. 28-63-2913.

24. Reardon, C. A. & Getz, G. S. (2001) Curr. Opin. Lipidol. 12:167-173.

25. Gotto, A. M. Jr. & Grundy, S. M. (1999) Circulation 99: 1e-7.

It will be no problem to come up with more references on the connection between high cholesterol levels and CVD, but I need a day or two, and it feels as such a widely accepted correlation that it is somewhat a waste of time. The much more interesting question is if and how diet composition affects cholesterol levels.

Cheers - JHT

Cucu,

we are discussing two different questions.

Cucu:
“THERE IS NOT A CONNECTION YET PROVEN of hi LDL and saturated fats”
I agree. I have not opposed Howard (or anyone) on this subject at all. But personally I am slightly on the careful side with all fats anyway, for other reasons (overweight and associated problems and diseases). IF there is such a connection anyway, it is probably weak and other foods may be much worse (fast carbs?)

But
Howard “ I personally am not convinced there is any correlation between blood cholesterol and any particular disease.”
This is a very different question and here I do not agree at all.

I am now going home to fry a big fat T-bone steak, see you tomorrow – JHT ;-)

I tend to the theory that there is a corellation between lipid levels and heart disease, but not the one that has been pushed on us.

An alternative theory goes something like:

Some unknown, perhaps variable factor (though clamidia is in the frame) causes inflamation and damage to the cardi-vascular system. In an attempt to protect itself the body ups blood lipid levels and lays down layers of arterial fat deposits.
Sadly, what is essentially a healing process can itself become dangerous if the causative factors are not removed.