Its interesting that we evolved as omnivores (referring to my earlier post on early flavor learning and Hannah's post on teeth) but some recent studies have suggested that meat is actually BAD for you and that a vegan diet can actually reverse deleterious heart diseases and cancers.
Why is it that our evolutionary tendency towards meat actually hurting us?
Check these out:
"Forks Over Knives" movie: http://www.forksoverknives.com/about/synopsis/
"The China Study" book: http://thechinastudy.com/
- Effie
I haven't had the chance to read/watch the links, but I wonder if the problems associated with eating meat are more due to eating more than is necessary and not meat in general.
ReplyDeleteIn that vein, do you think that part of the reason that we are finding that meat is bad for us is because of our lifestyle has changed from the lifestyle our ancestors?
That's possible Rebecca. There seems to be a few confounding factors in their claim so I am going to take it with a grain of salt. I think many of the heart diseases and cancers that we have today have a lot more to do with lifestyles rather than just eating meat.
ReplyDelete-Rachael Morris
Hi Rebecca,
ReplyDeleteDefinately, lifestyle has contributed a lot to it, but it also has to do with the fact that many of the animals we eat are not exactly "natural" anymore - we've genetically modified so many of them and feed them unnatural chemicals to keep them disease-free so that the meat no longer simply meat...although most of these enzymes denature once we cook the meat, many of the chemical compounds, upon entering our bodies can have pretty serious effects.
I'm not sure if anyone knows the exact answer to this (if it has to do with lactose again) but the book focused a lot on cancer/lifespan and how consuming more dairy products (independent of meat consumption) led to a longer, healthier life. Does anyone happen to have an explanation s to why this seems to be happening?
- Effie
Like the rest of you, I definitely think human lifestyle plays a big role in our unhealthiness. We evolved with sweet tooth and love for fat and sugars because those foods were hardest to come by for our early ancestors. Now that we have easy access to these 'unhealthy' foods, we ate them in quantities that are much too large, and I think that's what is mainly responsible for disease related to our diets.
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