Not Eaton & Konner, I am not familiar with them. Paleolithic nutrition is an area I know very little about, I just read a report from a Swedish biologist doing evolutionary medicine research. This guy M Grahn, together with another medical researcher S Lindeberg, hypothesised that carbohydrates and sugar are the main causes of "wellfare diseases" such as obesitas, coronary disease, hyperbolia, diabetes, etc. According to them, genetic studies reveal that man evolved to eat a diet of mainly animal proteins (except milk), green vegetables, fruit, berries, nuts and roots. This is also what people are believed to have eaten here in the paleolithic times.Originally posted by Gwalchmai
@CE: “Paleolithic Diet” Hummm. Eaton and Konner? That idea has been around for a while, hasn’t it? Their book is even out of print, according to my wife
I’m not sure what the Paleolithic Diet consisted of in Europe, but I’m sure many aspects of it have been worked out by archaeologists. Pollen, macrobotanical, and (sometimes) phytolith sampling are standard procedures at US sites, and I’m sure that they use similar methods in the Old World. I think they’ve even found Neanderthal coprolites. All of this can provide tons of data on ancient diets. Here, pre-agricultural diets were not entirely reliant on hunting for meat. Gathered foodstuffs provided a large quantity of vegetable calories.
Now, I'd be extremly surprised if the US paleolithic people had a different genetic makeup than the European. Considering how stable and homogenic the human genome is, the genetic differences must have been very small. If US and European people had differences in diet, it would not have changed the genome - rather, it simply reflects the flexibility in what humans can eat and still survive well.
Also, our genetic constitution versus what we eat today is only part of what causes "wellfare disease". Other life style factors are at least as important - the lack of exercise is perhaps a more determining factor. Personally, I actually live very much on a "paleolithic diet" when I'm not exercising a lot, but when exercised hard 20 h a week, I used to eat much more carbohydrates. However, it's obvious that people survive very well on a vegetarian diet also, although I do think many of the militant veggy-organisations use a lot of disinformation in their propaganda. @Nael: I have seen no studies demostrating that meat from animals cause bad health effects. I have not seen any scientific foundation to claims that vegetarianism is more healthy that a balanced diet including both meat, carbohydrates and vegetables/fruit. If we should eat meat or not is IMO a moral choice, not a health issue.
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