Journal of Evolution and Health (Ancestral Health Society Research)
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To Restore Health, “Do we Have to Go Back to the Future?” The Impact of a 4-Day Paleolithic Lifestyle Change on Human Metabolism – a Pilot Study.
No full textOn their way from the Stone Age via the Agricultural Revolution to current high-tech conditions, humans lost their primal foraging behavior. Today, energy expenditure is not necessary anymore for gathering nor hunting, and metabolic diseases are epidemically arising wherever our original Paleolithic lifestyle is turning into a modern sedentary lifestyle. In this pilot study, we followed through the concept that a radical change towards a Paleolithic hunter-gatherer lifestyle could serve as therapy against any metaflammatory disease, even in the short term. Thirteen healthy adult volunteers were transferred to the DELUX National Park (Germany and Luxembourg) for four days and three nights, where Stone Age conditions where mimicked. Thirty-eight biochemical and bioelectrical parameters were measured from participants before and after this relocation. Body weight (-3,9%), body fat (-7,5%), body mass index (-3,8%), visceral fat area (-14,4%) and metaflammation-related parameters (fasting glucose = -18,2%; fasting insulin = -50,1%; HOMA = -57,8%) decreased significantly. C-reactive protein, as the main indicator for low-grade inflammation, increased up to an average of 169,6 %. Our data show that returning to our Paleolithic roots may have positive effects on risk factors commonly associated with metabolic disorders, such as obesity and type 2 diabetes. These findings may lead the way to further research to answer the question whether the already existing metabolic conditions and/or autoimmune and neuroinflammatory diseases could be influenced by a Paleolithic lifestyle
Dietary Weight Loss Advice in US Health Magazines and its Relation to Ancestral Diet
No full textAs rates of overweight and obesity have risen in the US, the public has sought effective strategies for weight loss through dietary modification. A proliferation of processed foods and changing governmental nutrition guidelines have both impacted dietary intake patterns. While physicians are considered respectable sources of weight-loss information, increasingly the public has turned to the media, particularly magazines, for weight loss advice. This study investigated the dietary recommendations found in the five leading US health-related magazines and compared those recommendations to ancestral diets. With a couple notable exceptions, leading health magazines present consistent recommendations for dietary modifications to promote weight loss including reduction of caloric, sodium, carbohydrate, and fat intake. In many regards the prescriptions are aligned with an evolutionary diet. Acknowledgment and clarification of ancestral diet practices in popular magazines may promote increased compliance and sustained weight loss
Vitamin C and Disease: Insights from the Evolutionary Perspective
No full textThe role of vitamin C at the physiological and cellular levels is indisputable. In line with this, blood level of vitamin C is inversely related to disease parameters such as risk of cancer, cardiovascular disease and mortality in prospective cohort and correlational studies. At the same time, adequately powered clinical intervention studies consistently provide no evidence for a beneficial effect of supplementing vitamin C. Here we provide a framework to resolve this apparent conflict. Besides providing an overview of the widely-known facts regarding vitamin C, we review evidence that are of potential relevance but are seldomly mentioned in the context of vitamin C. We invoke the glucose-ascorbate antagonism (GAA) theory which predicts that as a consequence of their molecular similarity glucose hinders the entry of vitamin C into cells. Integrating data coming from research at the cellular level, those from clinical, anthropological and dietary studies, in the present hypothesis paper we propose an evolutionary framework which may synthesize currently available data in the relation of vitamin C and disease. We put forward that instead of taking vitamin C as a supplement, an evolutionary adapted human diet based on meat, fat and offal would provide enough vitamin C to cover physiological needs and to ward off diseases associated with vitamin C deficiency
Proceedings of the 2nd annual symposium of the German Society for Paleo Nutrition held in 2014
No full textWe present the scientific abstracts of the 2nd Annual Symposium of the German Society for Paleo Nutrition (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Paläoernährung e.V.) which was held on November 8th 2014 in Schweinfurt, Germany. The topics presented had a great variety that included (i) a discussion of specific foods (one talk addressed the potential problems associated with cow’s milk consumption and one talk dealt with the staple foods of the Hadzda hunter-gatherers); (ii) the emerging role of ketogenic diets in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases and cancer; (iii) an overview of intermittend fasting and its effects on health and performance; (iv) an extension of evolutionary principles beyond nutrition and their incorporation into everyday life in a way we term the paleo concept
Proceedings of the 3rd annual symposium of the German Society for Paleo Nutrition held in 2015
No full textWe present the scientific abstracts of the 3rd Annual Symposium of the German Society for Paleo Nutrition (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Paläoernährung e.V.) which was held on July 26th 2015 in Berlin, Germany. The focus of this year\u27s symposium was on the future challenges of human society including topics such as nutritional sustainability, the paleo-deficit syndrome or frailty of the elderly due to body composition change
Play as the Foundation of Human Intelligence: The Illuminating Role of Human Brain Evolution and Development and Implications for Education and Child Development.
No full textChildren love to play. Why do they find such a frivolous activity so pleasurable and desirable? Perhaps it is not frivolous, but instead is an adaptation designed to guide proper cognitive development in human children. To understand why, I marshal evidence from different fields to build a case for play as a central behavioral mechanism of human brain and cognitive development. I start with a discussion of human evolution, focusing on the evolution of human physiology, tool-use, the human brain, and life-history strategy, and development, and how these are all connected as an adaptive suite. The anthropological and developmental evidence suggests the existence of an extended childhood adapted to establish the skills, knowledge, and understanding necessary to become a successful hunter-gatherer. I also compare human and chimpanzee brain development, and how brain-specific genes evolved uniquely in humans to foster human brain development. I conclude with the evidence from developmental psychology that even contemporary, first-world children are born with the drive to learn and develop intellectually through play. In this framework, human play can be viewed as an adaptation that guides human brain development to produce curious, intelligent and well-adjusted adults. I close by speculating on the possibility that barriers to or constraints on play may hamper intellectual and cognitive development. I focus on the important concept of developmental decanlization as a mechanism of evolutionary mismatch. I argue that more empirical study is needed to better understand the importance of play compared to other forms of education for optimal intellectual and cognitive development
Decolonizing the Diet: synthesizing Native-American history, immunology, and nutritional science.
No full textThis article examines historical evidence that correlates a decline in Native American health and fertility with ruptures to indigenous food systems following European colonization. It suggests new interdisciplinary ways to study the association between breached indigenous nutritional practices and a decline in Native American health. These objectives bring together students of history and natural science and entail new ways of synthesizing hitherto separate scholarly enterprises in the classroom. In light of the most cutting-edge scientific literature on nutrition, metabolic syndrome, and immunology, they require a new consideration of the historical association between Native American health and indigenous food systems
Use of Animal Fat as a Symbol of Health in Traditional societies Suggests Humans may be Well Adapted to its Consumption
No full textBackground and objectives: Recommendations to limit the dietary consumption of saturated fat have been adopted by public health organizations in most countries. However, recent scientific studies and reviews have questioned the alleged negative health claims regarding saturated fat.
This research aims to provide a historical, evolutionary point of view to the debate through a short review of evidence for animal fat consumption by Paleolithic and recent traditional societies, and the discernment of how recent traditional societies perceived animal fat in terms of health and other lifestyle aspects.
Methodology: Literature review of the importance of animal fat\u27s dietary consumption in prehistoric and recent traditional societies and scanning of ethnographic records for symbolic use of animal fat in rituals, linguistics and mythology. The contexts of such cultural expressions provide us with the peoples\u27 perception of the analogues quality that animal fat imparts in its use as a symbol.
Results: Collection of 200 cases from culturally and geographically diverse traditional societies, reveals that in all three expression forms, there appears to be a clear tendency to associate animal fat with extremely positive meanings like fertility , sacredness , wealth , health , and even a source of creation and life itself.
Conclusion: In line with evidence for the importance of dietary animal fat in prehistoric and traditional societies, the studied traditional societies perceived animal fat as a vital component of their diet and a profound source of health rather than an impediment to health as it is presented in many dietary recommendations today
Welcome to the Journal of Evolution and Health
No full textWelcome to the first issue of the Journal of Evolution and Health! The Journal of Evolution and Health is the peer-reviewed, open-access journal of the Ancestral Health Society, a community of scientists, healthcare professionals, and laypersons who collaborate to understand health challenges from an evolutionary perspective
Proceedings of the 1st annual symposium of the German Society for Paleo Nutrition held in 2013
No full textEvolutionary Medicine is an emerging medical field that mainly addresses the causes of diseases under the consideration of evolutionary principles [1]. Viewing diseases through the evolutionary perspective also opens up new and innovative treatment strategies. In particular, the understanding that most of the so-called “diseases of civilization” emerge from a discrepancy between our modern, civilized lifestyle and that towards which our human species (as hunters and gatherers) has evolved, challenges the concept of these diseases being chronic and provides new treatment approaches. Examples of such approaches were provided in the first annual symposium of the recently founded German Society for Paleo Nutrition (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Paläoernährung e.V., DGPE). The meeting entitled ”Modern Lifestyle – Modern Diseases” took place on October 5th 2013 in Schweinfurt, Germany, and focussed specifically on nutrition in health and disease from an evolutionary perspective. This paper is a collection of abstracts of the scientific talks given at the sympoisum