There is a great New York Times article by Anahad O’Connor (linked below) that pulls the rug out from underneath the debate over the optimal human diet with a look at the still remaining hunter-gatherer societies. Despite being a staunch supporter of low-carb and meat-only diets myself, I find this article a succinct explanation of our modern health troubles that comes to a clear point.
Before technology brought us to this current era of chronic abundance, humans ate everything that wasn’t nailed down to survive and focused on that which was most available to them. Humans ate what was within reach for their location and for the season and seasonal weather varied with climate, affecting choices. This of course included any and all plants and animals that didn’t poison the poor sap who ate it first. The differences between these societies that still follow their ancient diets and our societies’ modern diet is clearly the abundance of food, the diversity and formulation of choices. Though abundant, the nutrient density of the currently available choices is often very low and the formulations are designed to make you want to eat more. It’s not difficult honestly to wrap ones head around this change as the reason societal health is rapidly declining but yet we argue over what is optimal. A big step in the right direction is acknowledging what changed, what is not-optimal and how we got to where we are. Instead, we are overloaded with terrible advice and argue over plant vs animal, macronutrient vs macronutrient and whether or not we should be eating certain spices at all. As the article articulately points out, satiety and food choices are the key to it all.
“The lack of novelty and variety in hunter-gatherer diets may be part of the reason they do not overeat and become obese. Studies show, for example, that the greater the variety of food choices in front of us, the longer it takes to feel full, a phenomenon known as sensory specific satiety.”
The Hadza people could eat up to 80% carbohydrates in their diet from vegetation and starches, remain thin and almost entirely free from the diseases we face in modern society. The Inuit are likewise thin yet ate a very high-fat diet composed of almost entirely the flesh from seal, fish, whale and ruminant. The Inuit also remained almost entirely free from modern diseases of civilization. Each ancient society ate this way out of necessity, they did not have the luxury of considering what is optimal or “ethical”. Knowing this, it is entirely logical to conclude that nearly any composition of traditional, natural foods is species appropriate and “healthy”. The most interesting part is that if a member of one of these ancient societies left their home and ate a modern diet, they gained weight and were susceptible to modern diseases.
So what’s the takeaway? If you can be healthy eating any composition of carbs or fats, plants or animals, what advice do you follow? For the person who is struggling with weight and possibly a disease of civilization, like Type 2 Diabetes, Cardiovascular Disease, Cancer or an Auto-Immune Disorder, reading simple explanations like this, that there may not be an optimal human diet, are likely very frustrating. Understanding the issue boiled down in this way however is the first step to making a lasting change. Rather than a focus on an optimal diet, we should consider what is part of an un-optimal diet.
Modern food choices and abundance have inspired you to make the poorest of choices. The standard of modern dietary advice has also influenced those choices by purposefully ignoring processed foods or demonizing the consumption of natural foods (eg red meat, saturated fat) , consumed since the dawn of time, that hit your normal, human, satiety mechanisms. By understanding that modern foods and formulations ignore these satiety mechanisms on purpose, to sell more processed food, you can begin to make out the signal from the noise in health advice. Like the Hadza, there are of course many cases of people eating carbohydrate dominant diets, perhaps counting calories and losing weight but there are also a growing number of cases of people making large losses with low-carbohydrate diets and maintaining the loss, like the Inuit, without consequence. These methods are both tools, strategies to fix the same underlying problem, your relationship with food. Both strategies can work, if composed of just whole foods, but the strategy that makes you feel truly full, truly sated, is the key to lifelong success.
What brought you to this site was likely your interest in a low-carb diet. I won’t disappoint. What needs to be acknowledged is a big difference in the above strategies, that carb restriction can ultimately be a much better option for the already metabolically unhealthy who have a poor relationship with food. It is my personal experience and the experience of many others, that a low-carbohydrate diet hits human satiety mechanisms far more effectively than a dominant carbohydrate diet. This goes double if the dominant carb strategy is to count calories, and operate from an arbitrary calculation of a “deficit”. Those that do so are relying completely on willpower. A lack of willpower is what got most people in trouble in the first place. Trying to find a new strength of will in the headwinds created by intentionally going hungry could be seen as a fool’s errand. I see the longevity of such a plan as flawed as well. Would you honestly rather base all future eating decisions on counting caloric values the rest of your life or would you rather rediscover what feeling full is actually supposed to feel like? Which queue is more simple and easy to follow?
By following a strategy of abstaining from many carb-heavy foods, you also de facto eliminate a lot of choices that work against your metabolic health and satiety mechanisms. Whatever your opinion of carb-heavy, whole foods like potatoes and rice, going without to reach your goals and reevaluate how you eat is not going to kill you. In fact, replacing these foods with high protein, even high fat choices is going to make you full faster and for longer. This in-turn effects how much and how often you eat. If you have eaten a Standard American Diet or similar with a high amount of junk food for a while you may not even realize it but you have almost certainly forgotten what it feels like to feel truly full. I know you know what it feels like to feel “stuffed” and bloated, like you want to be ill or feel almost instantly lethargic. I know you know what it feels like to have gastric reflux or so uncomfortable that you need to take an over-the-counter med for gas. This is not truly full, this is pain from over-eating and is not at all natural nor optimal.
So what’s optimal? Carbs or fats? Animals or plants? I posit that feeling genuinely full on real, whole foods is optimal, which may require relearning what that’s supposed to feel like. It’s generally more difficult to relearn full while depriving oneself of food, which is why a low-carbohydrate diet, where you don’t count calories, is often the best choice. It’s unfortunate we must deal with government-sponsored advice and the food industry as saboteurs.