The latest food fad, the Banting diet, is a sad setback to animal liberation. It is often justified as a return to our Palaeolithic roots, the hunter-gathering lifestyle that characterized 195 000 years of prehistoric human existence. The argument goes that we evolved to eat a high (animal) protein, high (animal) fat and no or low carbohydrate diet. Many of the various illnesses and diseases of modern civilization are blamed, ultimately, on the traumatic shift to agriculture that most humans underwent about 10 000 years ago, since the agricultural revolution resulted in a carbodydrate-centred, nutrient impoverished diet. A recent book by evolutionary biologist Marlene Zuk, entitled Paleofantasy, provides an incisive and much-needed critique of this argument:
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/apr/24/paleofantasy-evolution-sex-diet-review
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/10/paleofantasy_stone_age_delusions/
The high (animal) protein, high (animal) fat diet, currently rehashed in Tim Noakes's book The Real Meal Revolution is nothing new. An earlier proponent was Atkins. Doctors and dieticians have serious reservations about these diets, particularly their implications for cholesterol. Noakes's book also lacks scientific rigour, according to dietary experts. For me, a major omission is the counter-case to his claims, the more scientific and comprehensive work The China Study by Colin Campbell.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/apr/24/paleofantasy-evolution-sex-diet-review
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/10/paleofantasy_stone_age_delusions/
The high (animal) protein, high (animal) fat diet, currently rehashed in Tim Noakes's book The Real Meal Revolution is nothing new. An earlier proponent was Atkins. Doctors and dieticians have serious reservations about these diets, particularly their implications for cholesterol. Noakes's book also lacks scientific rigour, according to dietary experts. For me, a major omission is the counter-case to his claims, the more scientific and comprehensive work The China Study by Colin Campbell.