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posted by
janrinok
on Wednesday April 02 2014, @08:32AM
from the the-answer-is-blowing-in-the-wind dept.
from the the-answer-is-blowing-in-the-wind dept.
A new study published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health authored by researchers at the University College of London has found that the more vegetables (and, to a lesser extent, fresh fruit) you eat the better your chances of longevity.
As the popular press is reporting, Oyinlola Oyebode, the study's lead researcher, said in a prepared statement that "We all know that eating fruit and vegetables is healthy, but the size of the effect is staggering." The research established correlation, not causation, but the findings are consistent with already-established guidelines from worldwide governmental health agencies. If you want to live a long and healthy life, eat plenty of veggies.
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New study: the More Veggies, the Better
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I'm wearing PAMPERS!!
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday April 02 2014, @11:50AM
Alternate theory:
1. Eating fruits and vegetables is part of our evolutionary history going back to at least the "swinging from the trees" period.
2. Eating meat is part of our evolutionary history from right around the time we went from australopethicus to early homo species.
3. Eating grains and other species' dairy regularly as a major food source only really goes back to the agricultural revolution a mere 10,000 years ago or so.
Why would it be any surprise that we're best adapted to eat fruits and vegetables, can generally handle eating meat and fish, but only tolerably adapted to eat grains and dairy?
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by fliptop on Wednesday April 02 2014, @12:05PM
This. Not to mention the fact that, when you eat most fruits and vegetables, the seeds pass through your body undigested and have a nice warm fertilizer pack to sprout from when excreted. Unlike grains, where you actually destroy the germ part of the seed when your body digests it.
For me it's been Paleo for almost 2 years and I doubt I'll ever go back!
To be oneself, and unafraid whether right or wrong, is more admirable than the easy cowardice of surrender to conformity
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday April 02 2014, @12:22PM
Not an alternative, but a different way to phrase it, looking at the industrial and transportation infrastructure required to create sugar from sugarcane or corn syrup from corn, just a few generations ago no one ate that kind of junk food. Or even just plain old grains other than occasional hunter gatherer successes.
Also our digestive system isn't wildly different than other mammals (oh yeah, different, but its not like they're from planet Vulcan) and if farmers make a lot of money by simultaneously fattening and sickening livestock mammals using a certain type of food, we'd probably be pretty dumb to eat it ourselves, yet we do... and the livestock are pumped full of antibiotics and hormones and supplements to keep them healthy enough (barely) but we aren't, which is even stupider as part of a diet plan.
The fish thing is interesting studying archeological dig results the main difference in diet between the neanderthals and sapiens species seems to be we eat fish. Big 3-way argument over we need to eat fish for brain development, or we were finally smart enough to catch and eat fish, or most likely both effects feed on each other. So either need to eat fish or need to rely on industrially produced supplements and very careful dietary monitoring. Requiring it, or requiring an intellectually complicated set of dietary hacks to avoid it, is different from can generally handle.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 02 2014, @06:50PM
Answer: Because it takes significantly less than 10000 years for a species to adapt to a new diet.
From an evolutionary perspective, shouldn't all of these dietary changes enhance the organism's chance to survive through its reproductive period? Don't the ill effects we're talking about typically occur long after most reproduction occurs? How could natural selection possibly have a significant effect on these long term effects?