I blame it on the Gluten

And I never said "banana who" said that meat caused blah blah blah.

And speaking of "chemicals"...you do realize that everything in the universe is made out of "chemicals," right?

There are chemicals, and then there are chemicals. Splenda is just like sugar, you know. You need the Hadron collider to synthesize it, but it's just like sugar. Otherwise.

Tamukha Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There are chemicals, and then there are chemicals.
> Splenda is just like sugar, you know. You need
> the Hadron collider to synthesize it, but it's
> just like sugar. Otherwise.


And you realize that the tomato has undergone genetic modification, too? Only it wasn't with the benefit of modern science but just some illiterate farmers on both sides of the Atlantic....

Please understand that I'm not trying to rain on anyone's parade here, only that as a newcomer to this vegan neighborhood it's just my instinctive skepticism that makes me wonder about fancy claims and fancy promises. If something's chemically identical -- not "similar," mind you, but outright one-for-one "identical," as in the case of sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, to take another bogeyman -- then what's the harm?

I guess I'm also just having a very personal reaction to this topic because, like I'd said before, I live in a Jewish neighborhood of religious nuts who don't think twice about jumping in front of an oncoming car but will sniff at the food I bring into their shops because some red-eyed desert nomad thousands of years ago proclaimed pork and shellfish to be "unclean!" I really wish people would stop judging one another like this already....

JuicingBodybuilder,

There's hybridization, and then there's hybridization

Because something is chemically "identical" to something else it does not automatically follow that the body will react the same way to each substance. This has been demonstrated in clinical research by Dr. Richard Johnson in the case of HFCS vs cane sugar. As an aside, it is good to assess with a jaundiced eye anything that patently involves industry, as with the "A Sweet Surprise" nonsense brought to us by the Corn Refiners Association of America. Hello! Red flag! I always try to remember that there's a lot of bad science passing for good science, and that I must employ discernment. You know, "consider the source."

Well, Tamukha,

I guess what I'm trying to say is that no one really knows. Cigarettes used to be prescribed by doctors! HFCS was actually the healthy alternative to sugar back in the '70s, IIRC, according to Gary Taubes' book. You say to consider the source. But I'm saying that even well-meaning people can be seriously wrong, and indeed have been.

So how about some common sense, so-called? If stranded on a deserted isle, à la Tom Hanks in "Cast Away," would a Burger King Whopper a day not keep me alive for years and years? Okay, then; it's "food." It may not be the best food, the perfect food, but it's food enough. I may only live to be 70 instead of 85, but it's food. I may even only live to be 60, with sleep apnea or whatever, but I'll live, reasonably long -- so it's food.

That's all I'm saying: no one really knows, unless they were with God at the creation of Adam and Eve, so we're all just supposing this, that, and the other.

So no need to make fun of folks who eat differently -- at least, not in all earnesty!

JuicingBodybuilder,

I am asking this sincerely: Have you seen "Super Size Me" by Morgan Spurlock?

Tam, totally off subject (well, not totally) but although I enjoyed "Super Size Me," I felt that having him eat McD's three times a day just allowed people to say "well, I only do it once a day or five times a week." I wish he would have done the same experiment with eating fast food once a day or every other day. Maybe the negative results would have taken longer than a month, but they would have been there.

banana who,

I agree. Of course there are micropopulations of Americans that consume fast food every day, or several times a week, and seem in relatively good health. I suspect, though, that over time, these populations will present with the perhaps milder forms of the same severe effects Mr. Spurlock experienced. You know, you can look fit, but be incapable of sprinting 20 yards without getting winded--the first manifestation of cardiovascular impairment. Eventually, it does manifest physically in most individuals. This is because, even if only a few times a week, you are still eating something that is virtually devoid of bioavailable nutrients and which your body has not evolved to chemically recognize as food! There is going to be an aggregate negative impact from that, even if it takes years to show up. Personally, I'd rather never develop Type II diabetes or atherosclerosis, and if a high fast food diet didn't result in them, economically distressed urban areas, for example, wouldn't be hot zones for these disorders . . .

There is a fascinating show from the BBC, called "SuperSizers Go . . ." where the two amusing hosts "travel" back in time to other eras of history and subsist on the typical diet for a week, after which they get a follow-up health report(one precedes each adventure)to evaluate what the damage or benefit was in that short a time. Even purportedly "natural" diets are found to have serious flaws, depending on how much cooking food undergoes and what the ratio of macronutrients is. Absolutely fascinating, and not a little gross, I'll admit! You can view episodes on YouTube; I highly recommend it!

Thanks for the tip. I would also like to see Dr. Gabriel Cousen's movie about 30 days to ending diabetes where he took some people with (I think) Type 2 diabetes and was able to cure them of it by raw foods and holistic living. I saw a clip of it on some raw foods DVD and it looked compelling. Maybe it was insulin-dependent diabetes! I seem to recall that some of the candidates needed shots. That would be even more dramatic because it has always been claimed that Type 1 is incurable.

banana who,

I saw that, and as I recall, there was one Type I diabetic who virtually stopped his insulin--his pancreas was shown to have healed itself and the islete cells to have resumed producing insulin! Conventional medicine holds this impossible[sigh]. He started working for the program as an intern after his results became clear; don't know if he's still with the center, though.