Hundreds of years ago rapeseed oil use was confined to heating and lighting applications. The primary use for this oil has been as an industrial lubricant, in fact, it is particularly capable of adhering to surfaces. Like many “old” food crops the parent genetics were poisonous to homo sapiens prior to selective breeding. Demand for this oil increased dramatically during World War II and Canada began refining the plant genetics. As of around 1970 the market for lubricants was dominated by fossil derived sources. Canadian bred rapeseed oil due to the homophone, rape, was rebranded and trademarked as Canola Oil (Canadian oil, low acid or Canadian Ola (from Oleum) depending on who you believe) and sold for domestic consumption. In a feat of marketing genius canola oil (now a generic term) positioned itself as the “healthiest” oil during the USDA and USFDA movement towards diets higher in monounsaturated and Omega 3 acids and lower saturated fatty acids. Thus, the “optimum” diet became one which most closely resembles that of a well balanced vegetarian or one who eats minimum amounts of lean meat.

The duration of human consumption and prevalence of “anti-nutrients” make this oil the anti-definition of “Paleo”. Support for the health claims used by canola oil trade organizations is provided by the American Dietetic Association and American Heart Association. In addition, the USFDA and USDA allow it to be labeled with a “Qualified Health Claim”. The above organizations are and have been the primary proponents of reduced saturated fat diets substituted with higher quantities of Omega 3 and monounsaturated fats. Should anyone be unaware the above organizations and their dietary guidelines are the primary target of ridicule by the “Paleo” camp. The language coming from the Paleo’s regularly reaches so far as to indicate a grand conspiracy by the above entities against your very health.

In response to a series of adept challenges from diverse backgrounds today’s rebuttal comes in the form of a scientifically apologetic treatise and a study. The study “raises interesting questions” so let’s explore those. Before we begin make note that with respect to the above, their use of Canola Oil and mayonnaise seems to demonstrate that they do not even respect the core idea that they espouse. First, the “study” is billed as a clinical trial despite having a sample size of ten, no control group, and a duration of ten days. In the clinical trial hierarchy this falls somewhere off the chart in an area called the landfill.

Second, it was noted that investigators had to increase participants’ calorie intake; from what exactly? How were the participants caloric needs and prior consumption determined, are there confounding factors such as increased exercise over the period, how much did the lowest increased caloric consumption increase by, how much did the highest caloric intake increase by, is the stated increase percentage the mean or median value, and etc challenges to the protocol arise as basic experimental methods appear to have been willfully ignored? To include, “Their bodies naturally wanted to shed fat on the new diet, so they had to be overfed to maintain weight.” is a non sequitur unless qualified as pure speculation. This study does not support that assertion. Further, there is no scientific data that supports this belief and much that serves to contradict it.

Third, authors note: “In all these measured variables, either eight or all nine participants had identical directional responses when switched to paleolithic type diet, that is, near consistently improved status of circulatory, carbohydrate and lipid metabolism/physiology.” It smacks of hypocrisy that they use and champion the results of standard lipid profile and cholesterol tests in spite of the dominant Paleo theologians deeming those metrics irrelevant or of minimal consequence. They indicate that “improved directional responses” were measured, how and by what protocol? Can we hope that the protocols applied to testing lipid profiles and insulin resistance was more rigorous than the experimental design? Perhaps, but the study would still have scientific relevance equivalent with its experimental procedures.

Fourth, AYFKM, really did you post this “study” just to piss me off?

Besides the last above paragraph, reactionary behavior is better exemplified in today’s post than in any of the anti-Paleo writings; an example of which is the lines, “I don't wish to see the level of discourse even remotely approach that of the recent troubles in the broccoli-vs-bread brou-ha-ha. Keep it respectful, and don't confuse someone's opinions on food with their general value as a person, intelligence etc. Any comments of this nature will be removed.” Competently refuting an assertion, even one identified as stupid, does not represent an opinion on the individual’s general value as a person. A straw man argument is used to encourage self-censorship or face the promise of forced censorship, nice. A, “bs mechanism, quackery, pseudo-science which is not only stupid but dangerous,” asserted by others as well as all the assertions that I leveled were stated and backed with sound reasoning. Arguments presented by the “Paleo” side have been mostly devoid of sound reasoning; further, they rely on logical fallacies, conjecture, pseudo science, a lack understanding of agriculture, history, evolution, taxonomy, genealogy, statistics, probability, and on and on to make their statement. This is what it is and nothing more.

I have now used all the words in the universe, but should I desire to reorder them again in the future, it should be clear that if the level of debate observed thus far cannot be tolerated (I included that for you Rebecca), I am out. Quality information, logically, and competently discussed should be a foundation of all communities.

Gita:

I wonder if you are a victim of a seemingly pernicious email hoax regarding "canola" oil - remeber hearing about this some time ago and finding it far-fetched at the time. Knowing you it seems unlikely that is so (read the preceding carefully before responding), but I did find this:

Snopes on Canola

This scentence:

"The language coming from the Paleo’s (sic) regularly reaches so far as to indicate a grand conspiracy by the above entities against your very health"

is an example of "weasel words". If you are taking folks to task for less-than-rigorous thinking and writing, I should think you should have your ducks in row on this count. I don't disbelieve you, but please provide on reference, unless this is so prevalent that it rises to the level of common knowledge and I just have my head in the sand. "Grand conspiracy" is pretty strong language...

However upon considering your points, I have to agree the study is pretty weak - I still believe it point in an interesting direction.

Finally, Gita, I'm not sure exactly what you are reacting to here, but it seems to be in your own head (you are of choleric disposition my friend) and not in the words I wrote:

I have no (or very little) problem with anything anyone has written here, and none with anything you have written. In fact I have presented opposing viewpoints. It was simply a statement to keep it civil, as it has been: if you want to go through the masochistic exercise of reading all 600 comments on the "Why I got fired" thread (I have) I would say about 1/5th of it rises to the level that I would remove from a forum (insults, rumors, gossip, unfounded accusations, etc.). I did not really see that happening here, but figured I would put it out there.

Dear "Comrade Crash Diet":

[in the third person for dramatic effect]

Our post last week wasn't in response to the quantity of meat in your proposed diet, we wrote with wrinkled nose because the ideas behind the diet are the epistemological equivalent of high fructose corn syrup.

As we showed last week, the idea that the diet of our far-distant ancestors is optimal because that's what humans evolved to eat is absurd. It's a myth built on a misunderstanding of evolutionary theory. This is lucky for you, because, as "Crazed Bread Addict" pointed out, the diet you proposed has about as much in common with what our far-distant ancestors had for dinner as Tofurkey does with what was on the Pilgrim's plates that first November.

We think your proposed mechanism (evolution) and it's conclusion that we should eat more like our long-forheaded Neanderthal ancestors are wrong. Below, we offer a mechanism that supports the conclusion that you might consider eating a little more like your grandparents. We also think that this is likely closer to what you were planning to have for dinner.

Humans didn't evolve to be optimal engines to run on the food around them (that's not how evolution works). Humans have optimized their diet by spending a lot of time thinking about food. Humans have learned about food, talked about food and experimented with food. This process has built an amazing corpus of knowledge of what food is good, in some cases why it is good, and in many cases allowed us to grossly alter both the physical and chemical makeup of the plants and animals we eat to improve their dinnerability. Knowledge is a funny thing, sometimes it takes awhile, but because people tend to tell others about the stuff that works and forget the stuff that doesn't, over time, knowledge tends to increase both in accuracy and quantity. -- As a side note, human knowledge will increase at a faster pace if we try to avoid repeating things that are incorrect *especially* if they sound good because they have good marketing.

A key difference between your "we physically changed" mechanism and our proposed "we figured it out" mechanism is especially interesting. Evolution is a passive process that absolves the individual (perhaps to raindrop's relief) from the responsibility of thinking about the decisions they are making because it implies that improvement requires intergenerational change that we can neither understand nor control. Under evolution's invisible hand all that's asked of us as individuals is to be as selfish as possible. If as we suggest above, the food we eat has been optimized by learning what to eat rather than our physically adjusting to the foods available, individuals have agency to discover better things to eat than what their parents ate and the optimal solution for humanity is found not by each individual being as selfish as possible but by learning, inventing, sharing and experimenting -- by growing knowledge. We think the curve of human history supports this. Since we left the garden, it's clear that as a force for improving the human experience, the exponential growth in human knowledge has long ago eclipsed the linear (but bursty) force of evolution.

[switching from 3rd to 1st person and from epistemology to the conclusions about food that i draw from the epistemology ]

It's true that this exact process of learning and experimenting with food (juiced by new ideas of mass marketing) is what created the terrible current American diet. False paths are part of the discovery maze of knowledge. Human knowledge doesn't always immediately (or perhaps ever) get everything right, the ratchet function only insures that it's harder to forget what's right than to forget what's wrong. We collectively operate this ratchet, it's our responsibility to understand the reasoning behind the decisions we make and make a point of repeating things that we believe to be true.

So if I agree that the food people eat today is a false path, but we also agree that more than a few of the discoveries about food since the pre-intellectual age are likely correct, why did I choose our grandparents diet to mimic? and how as individuals should we decide what to eat? Expanding on the ratchet framework for knowledge from above, generally the longer an idea has been around, the more it has been tested. Similarly, the more radical an idea's departure from more tested ideas the less likely it is to stand the test of time, simply because it's underpinning have not been tested. There is also a tradeoff, as you discount newer ideas, you miss the potential benefits of those ideas. Putting these three things together, using our grandparents diet as a starting point seems about right. The parts of their diet that we still remember -- those that haven't already been proven wrong and largely forgotten -- have been tested for two generations and their diet was also formed before the radical changes in how people eat that were driven by the commoditization of agriculture in the 50s and mass marketing in the 60s, which clearly need a little more time to season. While I might use their diet as a guidebook, i'd continue to experiment with newer ideas and older ideas that may have been spuriously discounted in proportion to their risk/reward and how well I understand the mechanism behind them.

As for what individuals should eat? My feeling is that if you're going to make a radical departure from ideas about food that have stood the test of time, you should personally understand what you are doing. I make a point of completely ignoring almost everything anyone in the healthfood or exercise industry tells me about food especially if they're selling something and double especially if it has a catchy marketing phrase. There is a long rich history of these classes of people suggesting radically different diets and the test of time has shown perhaps all of them to be fads marketed by snake oil salesmen. Why should the current crop be any better than the previous groups?

While most of what these people sell probably won't hurt you (they just do nothing but cost money), in at least a few cases it has. Of these, my favorite is Chemistry (not Biology) Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling. Pauling believed that mega doses of vitamin C could cure many human ills (the list and prescribed does was always changing). Because he was a Nobel Laureate, many people followed his advice and rejected other treatment in favor of taking large doses of vitamin C. Some of these people including Pauling (who was treading his cancer with 10,000mg of vitamin C a day) died.

Pauling's story is of interest because by extension, he gets a not small part of the blame for the massive amount of bad information in print and the horrendous studies performed to support the nutritional supplement industry. Pauling wanted to sell his book on his then unproven and now thoroughly disproven use of vitamin C to treat everything from hair loss to cancer and the FDA wouldn't let him do it without first doing the research to back it up. He used his considerable political muscle as a Nobel Laureate to create the unregulated nutricuticals industry, where you don't have to prove that something does what you say it does, you just have to prove that it won't hurt.

Interesting commentary and analysis by the CFEB royal orators. I'm not sure anything in Max's post today offended the principles behind Gita, Alex, and Rebecca's arguments (forgive me if I misread, I'm taking a break at work, not a sabbatical). Your problem does not seem to be the diet recommendation's Max posted today, but rather the use of evolution as the basis for this diet and paleo as the primary term to describe it. I don't think any of you three has taken issue with a diet as proposed above, so I'm assuming you're addressing those who promote strict "Paleo" diets and who think the study referenced above qualifies as clinical proof of something. The study itself is crap and no conclusion other than speculation/hypotheses for future clinical studies can be drawn from it. However, Max posted it saying that it raises some interesting points - in that sense I think Max is correct. How you design a GOOD clinical study of a particular diet that is designed to be long-term, what constitutes a viable health indicator, and whether this diet truly does impact insulin sensitivity in a way that could prevent/control diabetes are excellent questions that merit study in a rigorous way as described by Gita. Speaking of insulin sensitivity, while "paleo" may be a misnomer and should perhaps be nixed as a catchy name, the arguments I've heard in support of a "paleo" diet that cite the impact of eliminating high GI carbs on insulin resistance and related disorders seem to be at least compelling in theory and merit legitimate discussion and study. Perhaps someone who understands biology can enlighten me if this is not the case.

Alex, your point on the justification for certain dietary protocols is well taken, but it seems as though Max's approach is mostly, if not entirely, consistent with your view (outside of acknowledging that the term paleo is used to describe a diet). Would you edit what he has suggested his list of five rules? Or would you generally support those rules with the catch that the reasoning and justification is important and must avoid misleading/inaccurate references to the historical record?

Brandon - What got me started wasn't the diet but the bunk theory behind it. In the post that I wrote at lunch today, I tried to be constructive and offer a theory that isn't total bs but could supports similar conclusions to the evo/bio thing.

I don't know anywhere near enough about biology that I would want anyone to listen to what I have to say about food, so i won't bother mentioning my thoughts on what we should eat.

What i've noticed is that most if not all ideas that include the word "diet" are heavily marketed fads and should be considered with a big dose of skepticism and the fact that the theory behind this one is total bunk doesn't help...

The Snopes article completely agrees with my summary. Not at all ironic is reading the actual “hoax” email which bears eerie similarity to the means and methods used by proponents of the Paleo and similar diets.

Undermining one part of the “amazing corpus of knowledge” as being (add your modifier, I chose the rhetorical flourish grand conspiracy for a reason) fundamentally flawed is critical to perpetuation of the false exclusivity fallacy that the Paleo Diet and its many ilk require for commercial success. If I have correctly interpreted your statements you believe this as well.

The accusation of using "weasel words" charitably lacks your applied meaning. I certainly, and with much shame, did misuse a possessive apostrophe (sorry Andrea and anyone else who hates this). There are other minor grammatical errors in my text (and many in yours) but less-than-rigorous writing, mine is not. The sentence you quoted was intended to have a double significance but that does not qualify it as “weasel words” in my understanding.

So let’s get to the heart of your assertion. The seeming hallmark of this poor cousin to Aristotle’s fallacies concerns the use of purposefully vague text. Correctly interpreted, your statement relies on false attribution and or a misunderstood definition of conspiracy to undermine my statements. To rehash I said, “Should anyone be unaware the above organizations and their dietary guidelines are the primary target of ridicule by the “Paleo” camp. The language coming from the Paleo’s regularly reaches so far as to indicate a grand conspiracy by the above entities against your very health.” Did my text obfuscate my opinion? Your statement that the sentence is “pretty strong language” indicates that it did not. I used the modifier “regularly” to demonstrate that I was not implying a quorum, I thought that was clear. Should it have been clearer?

Puzzling to me is how among the many things stated in that writing you chose to focus on this when numerous examples should be obvious. Some of these are the first pages of Cordains book (as I faulting recall it has been years), Robb Wolf’s blog, Mark’s Daily Apple, etc and the comments associated with said content. The sentence purposefully and easily stands on the literal, some might say historical, definition of a conspiracy.

But a previous visit to the Mr. Sisson’s site provided the genesis for an additional intent. This was to parody Paleos use of commercial/government conspiracies (root word: conspire) as a basis of their theories while deriding those who claim they are conspiracy theorists. I find Mr. Sisson’s site particularly clever in that he repeats these statements while discussing how susceptible people are too group think and corruption with the occasional buy my vitamins dropped in. On a side, I suspect Mr. Sisson was a marketer or similar before the charlatan band wagon came a calling. Point being, I intended to invoke the more modern definition of conspiracy theories as fringe element views unsubstantiated by any conclusive evidence. Any guess as to why?

In summary, I am not sure what point you were trying to make. Today’s post did state that, “I don't wish to see the level of discourse even remotely approach that of the recent troubles.” Looking at your statement with standard logic concerning literary structure the rest of the sentences that follow indicate respectively a justification for and an intention to censor similar discourse. That may not be the way you intended it but I would surprised if that was not the implication understood by other readers. From that perspective I took exception.

Finally, two days ago I would have gladly had this ridiculous subject heaped onto the scrap pile. However, I am now torn as if that happens I will be truly saddened if Alex does not have an inspiration to keep writing.

I certainly am enjoying the well-written debates here. You need to separate Darwinian evolutionary theory out of the discussion. The fundamental point of this theory is that evolutionary change is selected from RANDOM mutations. You people want to "choose" what you believe is the best diet to consume. Chance is not based on human decision making (read, "Science") Did pre-agricultural man survive and pass on his genes because of a certain random diet? Perhaps, but that set of random choices did not include agriculture. Farmers destroyed hunter-gatherers. Was that Darwinian selection. No it was not. Agriculture may have started with chance events, but it proceeded and dominated because of CHOICES , choices made by humans, that is not darwinism. I guess its called culture, and its birth and continued life almost certainly involved argument.
There is Darwinian evolution in the human species. The junkie on the streets with a dirty needle in his arm and the elite professional athelete with a coterie of trainers, doctors and dieticians are each equally valid data points for evolutionary theory to act upon. There is not better or worse. Randomness by it very nature is without order.
What I am trying to get at here is that using Pseudo-evolutionary jibber jabber in support for or against fitness concepts is foolish. The same can be said for using such ideas to support libertarian/free market ideologies. (There, I said it) Unless,of course you want to give up making thoughtfull choices about how you go about your life.
Everyone knows what Einstein famously said about Quantum theory: "I can't believe God plays dice with the Universe" , most people haven't heard Niel Bohr's less famous rejoinder, "Einstein, don't tell God what to do"

Alex, I wasn't trying to snidely suggest you should explain the biology to me, sorry if it came off that way. In any event, I'm glad I dragged Cicero from his grave to chat with us. As I've said before, I think your argument against using false justifications for decent ideas is great. I'm just not sure Max was promoting the argument using evolution as a basis for his dietary suggestions. So far he's posted opposing viewpoints from different people along with his own dietary suggestions that are inconsistent with strict "paleo" or whatever you want to call it. Actually, his joke at the end even alluded to the point that named diets tend to draw out the marketers and become fads with packaged foods based on them sold by large processing and distribution companies. So I guess I'm agreeing with your major points while defending Max's post today at quite reasonable.

Wow, look at me. I'm a wuss. Maybe someday I'll actually disagree with someone on here...

Oh and the workout.

15:55 rx...knee's a bit sore now, but we're back in business. Big shout out to Ed again for helping get things back in working order.

23:50 scaled DL 140#

19:54RX - some of the most ludicrously slow running I have done in a while. Climbed Mt. Diablo top to bottom on Saturday wearing a hip pack. Big mistake! Low back not liking it. Also got confused at the end and started round 4. If I had not been holding back could have cut off maybe 90 seconds.

Hard one.

Max, maybe your stride is too long. I find when backpacking long distances that shortening my stride with a load really helps maintain energy and reduce lower back strain . . . the same goes for running. Maybe this helps keep your hips and the lower vertebrae more in line? Gita?
Also, the squats have made my snowboarding and running a heck of a lot stronger and responsive. I'm great on the uphills but tended to keep it in low gear on the flats and now I think all the leg work at crossfit has enabled me to turn it on on the flats and add in some prolonged speed work over long distance. This work seems to really improve my all around fitness.

Thanks Dave. Yes, my very experienced hiking partner was telling me much the same thing.

Most people experience a big benefit in skiing from CF. I less often hear it has helped an already-good runner get better! Cool!

Dave, when I am trying to teach someone basic running I have them use their arms as a metronome for foot turnover. Increased foot turnover is desirable precisely for this reason. Shortening the stride reduces transferred skeletal and muscle forces through a number of mechanisms. Correspondingly the body is able more efficiently cover a given distance. Walking, running, or sprinting similar principles apply although form for each is somewhat modified with respect to the other. Then the question is, is Max feeling it in his muscular-skeletal system or did he just rub his back raw via an ill supported pack?

I'm feeling it in the lumbar spine and 45 275# DLs were harder than they normally would have been, and the running was limited by my low back. No chafing. I actually threw the offending pack away (it was old) and got this:

Golight 25 L Technical Daypack

Suitable for ultralight overnight hiking/camping.

I'm finding it difficult to make good progress on steep uphills, but thanks to Gita, I can now run quite fast indeed on the downhills!

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