WEBVTT - How the Paleo Diet Works 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:02.600 This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:04.800 in one platform that makes it fast and easy to 0:00:04.840 --> 0:00:08.520 create your own professional website or online portfolio. For a 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:11.119 free trial and temperason off your first purchase, go to 0:00:11.200 --> 0:00:15.160 squarespace dot com slash stuff and use the offer code stuff. 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:19.440 Welcome to you, Stuff you should know from house stuff 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:27.840 works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm 0:00:27.920 --> 0:00:30.800 Josh Clark, and there's Charles w. Chuck Bryant and Jerry 0:00:30.920 --> 0:00:37.080 and this is stuff you should know the podcast. Hm. Hey, 0:00:37.080 --> 0:00:41.760 congratulations to Jerry. Oh yeah, she's got married. Congratulations Jerry, 0:00:42.080 --> 0:00:45.080 way to go. She just gave a thumbs up. She 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:49.240 has the right. Germain silent. Yeah, So congratulations to Jerry 0:00:49.240 --> 0:00:51.519 and Anna and uh sadly Jerry had to go to 0:00:51.600 --> 0:00:55.840 a different state to get married, but she did it, yes, 0:00:56.320 --> 0:00:59.920 because they have initiative. That's right, don't you, Jerry. Yeah. 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:05.360 Some of the nice yeah congratulations chairs were very happy 0:01:05.360 --> 0:01:09.560 for you guys. Um so happy in fact that we 0:01:09.600 --> 0:01:11.880 have a podcast. I just realized I said I'm very 0:01:11.880 --> 0:01:13.679 happy for you guys, and its sounded not at all 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:16.880 happy for them. I'm very happy for you. I'm really 0:01:16.880 --> 0:01:21.160 happy for you guys. Yeah, but I think everybody bought that. 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:24.080 You're happy for him. Everybody knows you, they know me. Well, 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:26.440 Jerry bought it, and that's what counts. Jerry, did you 0:01:26.440 --> 0:01:33.880 buy it? Think interesting? I like your French chuck thanks 0:01:33.880 --> 0:01:38.000 to something I know how to say. Uh is it? No? 0:01:38.200 --> 0:01:41.679 I mean I've got the bonjour down and Frosch fries, 0:01:42.880 --> 0:01:49.920 Frosch bread, France dressing, fross dressing. Uh. So you say 0:01:49.960 --> 0:01:54.640 all those things, French dressing, French bread, French fries, and 0:01:54.760 --> 0:01:59.560 I can tell you that none of them were around 0:01:59.600 --> 0:02:02.640 years ago. Nice segue, my friend. It wasn't. It was 0:02:02.680 --> 0:02:07.240 pretty clumsy. It felt clumsy, but thank you. Yeah. Are 0:02:07.160 --> 0:02:12.040 you talking about the Paleo diet? Yeah, which, by the way, 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:16.760 short for Paleolithic diet. And um, this thing's been around 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:19.040 longer than I thought. The book was written by a 0:02:19.040 --> 0:02:23.120 guy named Dr Lauren Cordain, the creator of the Paleo 0:02:23.240 --> 0:02:27.520 Diet back in two thousand two, and um, Dr Cordain 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:33.239 is no slouch. He is a celebrated PhD in Health 0:02:33.760 --> 0:02:40.000 and Health sciences UM, and he started looking at the 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:46.040 massive chronic health problems that face Westerners and Americans in particular, 0:02:46.520 --> 0:02:50.200 I think we might be the most chronically unhealthy country 0:02:50.200 --> 0:02:54.119 in the world. Um, as far as like beats, obesity, 0:02:54.760 --> 0:02:58.480 heart disease, all of these things go uh, and Dr 0:02:58.560 --> 0:03:01.799 Cordin is like, there's out to be a better way. 0:03:01.880 --> 0:03:05.000 And what he focused on was the idea that the 0:03:05.040 --> 0:03:09.280 Western diet is also a very modern diet, full full 0:03:09.320 --> 0:03:14.920 of processed foods, foods that are pre prepared, prepackaged, boxed. 0:03:15.040 --> 0:03:18.520 Even a lot of the pictures of the food are 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:22.560 on the box laden with chemicals, vaive, stuff you're not 0:03:22.560 --> 0:03:27.360 gonna do at home, and um, stuff that tastes really good, 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:31.399 mainly because it's been designed to taste really good. Um. 0:03:31.440 --> 0:03:35.680 The problem is Dr Cordain believes this stuff is really 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:38.640 bad for us because of those preservatives as chemicals, and 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:40.560 a lot of the good stuff that was present in 0:03:40.640 --> 0:03:44.200 and at one point has been worked out removed. So 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:47.800 his idea was, well, let's create a diet that's the 0:03:47.840 --> 0:03:51.960 opposite of modern, that's prehistoric even. And what he came 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:55.000 up with was the paleo or Paleolithic diet. And the 0:03:55.040 --> 0:04:02.160 Paleolithic era um ended at about the advent of agriculture. 0:04:02.440 --> 0:04:05.000 So the premise of the diet is like all of 0:04:05.000 --> 0:04:07.680 this stuff would be the same diet that a hunter 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:10.400 gatherer would eat. Yeah, And the idea is, and this 0:04:10.480 --> 0:04:13.280 is there's a lot of controversy. Not everyone believes us 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:16.520 any there's controversy with every diet, with every diet, But 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:20.240 if you subscribe to this, the idea is that our 0:04:20.520 --> 0:04:25.400 body chemistry and physiology has not changed. Like if you 0:04:25.440 --> 0:04:27.080 look at a if you think of it like a 0:04:27.160 --> 0:04:31.640 hundred yard football field, we went ninety nine yards as 0:04:31.720 --> 0:04:37.120 hunter gatherers, and then the last yard is since agriculture 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:40.360 has come around, that's the longest yard. So are so 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:45.479 our bodies have not changed genetically and they're the same 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:48.680 way they were back then. So to eat how they 0:04:48.680 --> 0:04:51.880 were back then and they did for thousands and thousands 0:04:51.880 --> 0:04:56.200 of years, makes more sense with that analogy with what 0:04:56.240 --> 0:04:59.560 happens when we succore a touchdown, like is at the 0:04:59.680 --> 0:05:03.560 end of vanity. I don't know, Um, but the dude 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:05.160 you mentioned he wasn't the first. That was actually a 0:05:05.160 --> 0:05:08.480 guy in the seventies that wrote a book. Um Walter 0:05:09.240 --> 0:05:12.279 Voting wrote a self published book in seventy five called 0:05:12.279 --> 0:05:15.120 The Stone Age Diet. Oh, I didn't know that based 0:05:15.160 --> 0:05:17.440 on in depth studies of human ecology and the diet 0:05:17.440 --> 0:05:19.760 of man. But like I said, it was self published 0:05:19.760 --> 0:05:23.719 and he didn't like it didn't blow up. It definitely 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:27.279 took till the two thousands to gain traction. Has Cordaine 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:29.800 like given this guy credit and he said, like he's 0:05:29.800 --> 0:05:31.960 based his ideas on this guy or what. I don't know, 0:05:32.080 --> 0:05:34.039 but I think he was the first guy to actually 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:37.400 coin that term. But um, yeah, these are people who 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:42.159 subscribed to that notion that since we haven't changed physiologically 0:05:42.400 --> 0:05:44.000 and how we're supposed to eat, then we shouldn't be 0:05:44.040 --> 0:05:45.919 eating how we're eating, right, we should eat how we 0:05:46.000 --> 0:05:49.080 used to eat. I would suggest that that's not necessarily true. 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:51.599 And part of the problem with saying things like that, 0:05:52.279 --> 0:05:56.440 or saying like, you know this is this is how 0:05:57.279 --> 0:06:02.680 paleolithic body human body um absorbed nutrients or these are 0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:05.760 the nutrients that could absorbed. You're you're making a pretty 0:06:06.080 --> 0:06:11.480 broad and unsubstantiated claim in and of itself, like they did. Okay, Well, also, 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:16.760 you don't have a paleolithic body to dissect to study. Um. 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:20.000 All you have are modern bodies and assumptions about what 0:06:20.240 --> 0:06:23.919 paleolithic diets were like. Now, I mean, there are still 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:29.599 hunter gatherer tribes currently, but I haven't seen anybody say, well, 0:06:29.680 --> 0:06:32.800 we study these hunter gatherer tribes specifically for a very 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:37.679 long time, and we've concluded that this paleo diet is 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:42.919 is totally supported by this. It's basically people saying, no, 0:06:43.080 --> 0:06:46.400 this is what Paleolithic people would have eaten, so this 0:06:46.480 --> 0:06:47.880 is how how their body would have been. And when 0:06:47.920 --> 0:06:51.719 they make a step to that second sentence, you're you're 0:06:51.760 --> 0:06:56.320 making a jump into an unsubstantiated claim. Just keep that 0:06:56.360 --> 0:06:59.960 in mind. That's all. And like you said, every every 0:07:00.120 --> 0:07:03.640 diet on earth is you're gonna find studies that say 0:07:03.640 --> 0:07:05.960 they're great and studies that say they're not so great. 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:08.599 You're going to find people who say the food pyramid 0:07:08.760 --> 0:07:10.640 is what you should look at, and other people to 0:07:10.680 --> 0:07:13.160 say the food pyramids out of whack and we shouldn't 0:07:13.160 --> 0:07:17.400 be eating that many grains. Pyramid is out of whack. Yeah. 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:22.240 But like you know, there is no definitive right or wrong. 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:25.240 I think because every time there's a study done, it 0:07:25.240 --> 0:07:28.920 seems like there's another study that can refute it. You 0:07:29.080 --> 0:07:31.000 just hit the nail on the head. There is no 0:07:31.560 --> 0:07:35.880 right or wrong because we don't understand our body, our 0:07:35.920 --> 0:07:40.800 bodies and our bodies metabolic processes enough to say this 0:07:40.840 --> 0:07:44.040 one's right and this one's wrong for everybody. Yeah, you know, 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:47.080 there's no there's no baseline that's been established. We don't 0:07:47.120 --> 0:07:50.080 know quite enough yet. And so the problem has been 0:07:50.120 --> 0:07:55.640 as we've set ourselves back decade after decade by basically 0:07:56.280 --> 0:08:00.920 picking a study whichever one got the media play and 0:08:00.920 --> 0:08:04.920 seemed the most sensible, and going with that, throwing lots 0:08:04.920 --> 0:08:10.560 of money and education, time and effort at bolstering that 0:08:11.120 --> 0:08:13.160 the findings of that study, even though it may or 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:16.360 may not have been the case, rather than just saying, like, 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:19.120 we're still figuring it out in the meantime, we think 0:08:19.160 --> 0:08:22.240 maybe don't eat so much of this or whatever. Yeah, 0:08:22.440 --> 0:08:24.400 And I think that that's set us back quite a bit, 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:26.680 which we'll talk about more later. Yeah. And I think 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:30.120 just personally, like, if you're if you're doing it healthily, 0:08:30.200 --> 0:08:33.720 then find something that works for you. If that's Sugar Busters, great, 0:08:33.800 --> 0:08:37.480 if that's Atkins, or if that's Weight Watchers or Jenny 0:08:37.520 --> 0:08:42.520 Craig or super Calorie Restriction or whatever. Not everything is 0:08:42.520 --> 0:08:46.280 gonna work for everyone, you know, or or paleo you 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:48.720 know what are the other names, the warrior diet or 0:08:48.760 --> 0:08:53.120 the caveman diet. They're you know, they're fads, but that 0:08:53.200 --> 0:08:55.320 doesn't mean there can't be something to some of them 0:08:55.360 --> 0:08:57.800 for some people. Well, the other thing I think about 0:08:57.920 --> 0:09:00.680 diets that makes each one so controversial two is that 0:09:01.520 --> 0:09:04.480 they do end up ultimately being fats. But every single 0:09:04.480 --> 0:09:09.600 one of the diets aspires to be that one diet 0:09:09.720 --> 0:09:13.400 that works for everybody. They all kind of claim that, 0:09:13.480 --> 0:09:15.880 and that's to sell books, you know, let's get real, 0:09:16.600 --> 0:09:19.800 But there are It's not like these things are are 0:09:19.960 --> 0:09:23.080 necessarily just totally made up out of the whole cloth. 0:09:23.200 --> 0:09:26.400 Like we'll talk about the paleo diet and and and 0:09:27.160 --> 0:09:30.480 the basis of it. Right. So the whole idea is 0:09:30.480 --> 0:09:33.720 is that, like I said, the modern diet has a 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:37.080 lot of foods involved in it that are not good 0:09:37.120 --> 0:09:42.360 for you. And by cutting those things out, that's step one, Yeah, 0:09:42.400 --> 0:09:46.360 basically eating cleaner. Right. But step two isn't just like, okay, 0:09:46.400 --> 0:09:48.920 so anything that you can find growing on a tree 0:09:49.160 --> 0:09:51.880 or you know that that has a face and you 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:56.720 and you can eat it, um besides humans is healthy 0:09:56.800 --> 0:10:01.040 for you. Um, there's if you take it a little 0:10:01.040 --> 0:10:03.800 bit further, Uh, there's some things that you really shouldn't 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:06.679 eat according to the Paleo diet. One of the things 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:09.640 that it's centered around are foods that if you have 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:13.360 to cook them to gain nutrients from them, Like beans 0:10:13.360 --> 0:10:16.760 are a really good example. Uh, you can't eat them. 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:20.240 You don't want them. In the case of the Paleo diet, 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:26.360 the reason is they affect gut health supposedly, right, what else, welch, 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:27.839 I mean, should we just go ahead and talk about 0:10:27.920 --> 0:10:29.679 what is on the good list and the bad list? 0:10:30.160 --> 0:10:32.360 Just so if you, I mean you've probably heard of 0:10:32.400 --> 0:10:38.280 the diet before, especially lately, but generally very high in protein. Yeah, 0:10:38.280 --> 0:10:40.160 And a lot of people make the mistake of saying like, oh, 0:10:40.240 --> 0:10:42.640 it's just like eating huge steaks all the time, and 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:46.520 and you know, pulling pulling women by their hair like 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:49.080 it's like that. It's actually now they say proteins like 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:55.720 fifteen or nineteen of the diet, right, whereas um protein 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:58.720 for the average diet here in the West is about 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:04.199 so more protein. Um. And when we say protein, we 0:11:04.240 --> 0:11:07.640 mean poultry and pork and fish and eggs, and uh, 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:11.560 you know, even red meat is on there of course. Uh, 0:11:11.679 --> 0:11:18.680 then lower carbohydrates, like a lower amount of carbohydrates and 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:21.960 different kinds of carbohydrates. That's right, Um, The carbs you 0:11:22.000 --> 0:11:25.959 want are slow burning carbs. UM. And the idea behind 0:11:26.000 --> 0:11:29.000 this extends beyond just the paleo diet. There's a lot 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:34.720 of diets, including Atkins, that believe in lowering carbs, and 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:37.600 they based it on But it's not no carbs. You 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:40.520 do want some carbs because your body does need some energy. 0:11:41.720 --> 0:11:43.680 But you you do want some carbs, but you want 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:47.040 carbs from things like an apple, or from celery or 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:51.680 black olives, things that are slow burning carbs that will 0:11:51.720 --> 0:11:54.800 give you energy without raising your blood sugar. Something with 0:11:54.840 --> 0:11:58.200 them low on the glycemic index. Yeah, that's how it's scored. 0:11:58.280 --> 0:12:02.240 So something that has about fifty five or lower on 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:06.560 the glycemic index is considered low. And that's what you 0:12:06.600 --> 0:12:09.560 want as far as the carbohydrate is concerned, because it 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:12.240 is going to give you energy without raising your blood sugar. 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:14.480 When you raise your blood sugar, as I think we've 0:12:14.480 --> 0:12:18.559 talked about recently, UM, the insulin comes out to stabilize 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:21.480 your blood sugar well, insulince and is a signal to 0:12:21.600 --> 0:12:26.200 your liver to start producing fat for storage and that's 0:12:26.240 --> 0:12:30.920 why you tend to gain weight when you eat carbohydrates, 0:12:31.040 --> 0:12:34.000 because your blood sugar spikes and your insulin comes out. Yeah. 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:36.520 And the difference, like, that's the difference between eating a 0:12:36.520 --> 0:12:39.960 sweet potato or a regular baked potato. Sweet potato, good, 0:12:40.040 --> 0:12:42.640 baked potato not so good. Yeah, And it's glycemic index 0:12:42.880 --> 0:12:45.640 both carbohydrates though, right. The problem is also is the 0:12:45.640 --> 0:12:50.760 glycemic index is extraordinarily unproven. Still it's a I don't 0:12:50.800 --> 0:12:53.080 know that it's a relatively new thing, but it's been 0:12:53.840 --> 0:12:57.040 used much more frequently recently. But if you start really 0:12:57.040 --> 0:13:03.120 looking into the glycemic index, any uh reasonable source will say, like, 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:06.280 here's the glycemic index. This is a pretty good understanding 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:10.360 of it. But the difference between a tart apple in 0:13:10.400 --> 0:13:14.319 a very ripe sweet apple. You can't just say apples 0:13:14.320 --> 0:13:17.440 have a glycemic index of whatever, like one that's ripened 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:21.240 more than another that's just the same exact apple from 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:24.760 the same tree. You're going to have radically different glycemic induseries. 0:13:25.080 --> 0:13:27.400 That's interesting. So I mean, like a solid point too, 0:13:27.440 --> 0:13:31.199 because it seems like there are too many definitive statements 0:13:31.240 --> 0:13:35.120 about diet when there shouldn't be. Absolutely the one that 0:13:35.200 --> 0:13:38.280 I think keeps coming up again and again. That's the 0:13:38.320 --> 0:13:41.679 most sensible is Well, we'll get too later, but it 0:13:41.720 --> 0:13:45.800 involves it's moderation basically. You know, paying attention to your 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:49.480 food is very important, but but moderation, you know, like 0:13:49.880 --> 0:13:53.040 eating a bunch of Twinkies over the course of your lifetime, 0:13:53.080 --> 0:13:54.960 it's not gonna kill you. But if you have to 0:13:55.000 --> 0:13:57.920 box of twinkies a day, like that's that's kill you. 0:13:58.200 --> 0:14:01.080 And that's a moderate moderate ration. Is is I think 0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:03.760 the key to health. I agree, man, And that's sort 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:06.040 of the key to I think most things in life. Yeah, 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:10.559 I mean it pops up everywhere like moderation. Our moderation 0:14:10.640 --> 0:14:13.800 is the spice of life. No, I don't think that's 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:18.120 the phrase, but uh so. Fiber fiber is a big 0:14:18.160 --> 0:14:21.040 part of the paleo diet. Um fiber is super great 0:14:21.040 --> 0:14:26.080 for your health. And people are getting too much fiber 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:31.760 from um grains, or at least the thought is that 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:33.880 you're getting too much fiber from your grains, whereas you 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:38.560 should get it um and things like fruits maybe or 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:44.480 whole grains instead of refined grains, non starchy vegetables. Uh yeah. 0:14:45.480 --> 0:14:50.200 And you if you're if you're counting carbs to um 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:54.040 on like a low carb or no carb restricted diet 0:14:54.120 --> 0:14:57.680 like say Atkins or something. You actually look at the 0:14:57.760 --> 0:15:02.800 total carbohydrates and then some act dietary fiber to come 0:15:02.880 --> 0:15:04.960 up with what's called net carbohydrates, and those are the 0:15:04.960 --> 0:15:09.120 ones that you actually count because apparently fiber is counted 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:11.880 toward carbohydrates, which is why it shows up in things 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:15.760 like non starchy vegetables and things like that. But um 0:15:16.240 --> 0:15:18.880 it doesn't raise your blood sugar, which is what we 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:21.520 come back to again and again and again. Okay, as 0:15:21.560 --> 0:15:25.320 far as weight loss is concerned, right, another part of 0:15:25.320 --> 0:15:31.160 the paleo diet is um fat intake, higher fat intake, 0:15:31.240 --> 0:15:33.880 but the what they call the right kinds of fats 0:15:34.040 --> 0:15:36.720 um oh make it three and o maga six fats mainly, 0:15:38.040 --> 0:15:42.000 so you want to get into that, Yeah, I think 0:15:42.040 --> 0:15:44.840 it's time. So this is a well before we do, man, 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:47.560 let's pull back from the precipice here and take a 0:15:47.600 --> 0:15:54.120 message breaks so quickly to recap things that you're gonna 0:15:54.160 --> 0:15:58.240 be eating on the paleo diet or lots of protein, 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:03.840 lots of protein, um to vegetables, slow burning carbohydrates, fruits, nuts, 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:06.880 things that you might have hunted and gathered, but not today. 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:11.360 Not beans, not legumes, not modern processed foods. Yeah, not 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:15.680 salt and refined sugar is a really big no no. Yeah, 0:16:15.680 --> 0:16:20.960 and we got too fat and um, this is extremely controversial. 0:16:21.080 --> 0:16:23.760 I thought this super interesting. The well, the paleo diet, 0:16:23.800 --> 0:16:27.960 like pretty much any any typical diet these days, recommends 0:16:28.000 --> 0:16:33.240 that you really take it easy on the animal fats um. 0:16:33.360 --> 0:16:37.720 And the idea that the reason why pretty much everybody 0:16:37.720 --> 0:16:40.880 recommends you take it easy on animal fats saturated fats, 0:16:41.320 --> 0:16:46.600 which are steeric acid, palmitic acid, and louric acid. Um. 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:50.920 Those are the three biggest saturated fats found in animal fats. 0:16:51.640 --> 0:16:55.840 The idea that that everybody has for um steering clear 0:16:55.840 --> 0:16:58.640 of them is because they will give you heart disease, 0:16:58.880 --> 0:17:03.040 heart attacks, coronary disease. Yeah, if you eat too many 0:17:03.160 --> 0:17:05.920 saturated fats, you're gonna die of a heart attack exactly. 0:17:06.280 --> 0:17:11.959 This idea gave rise to a complete change in diet 0:17:12.480 --> 0:17:17.720 among Americans and Westerners in general. The whole concept of 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:22.000 a low fat diet, which your is everywhere you go 0:17:22.040 --> 0:17:24.480 to any store. It's like fat free, low fat, fat free, 0:17:24.520 --> 0:17:27.000 low fat. Everything is low fat now there's a version 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:31.640 of its low fat came from an initial study from 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:35.560 the fifties by a guy named Ansel Keys who carried 0:17:35.560 --> 0:17:39.960 out what's called the Six Countries study, and he basically 0:17:40.400 --> 0:17:46.639 was the first to link animal fat intake too heart disease. Yeah, 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:48.679 and it's uh, what do they call it? The diet 0:17:48.720 --> 0:17:53.600 heart hypothesis, And um, what stinks about that whole scene 0:17:53.720 --> 0:17:58.920 is that he sort of did the elementary school science 0:17:58.920 --> 0:18:02.320 fair project approach, which is he kind of ignored the 0:18:02.440 --> 0:18:05.720 data that didn't support what he wanted and cherry picked 0:18:05.720 --> 0:18:08.440 out the data that did and went with it. And 0:18:08.800 --> 0:18:12.800 somehow like even though there was like some opposition to 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:16.920 it at the time, somehow it became the basis for 0:18:16.960 --> 0:18:19.840 how Americans were told to eat from now on, even 0:18:19.880 --> 0:18:24.400 though it was flawed. Uh. I mean, for instance, one 0:18:24.440 --> 0:18:26.560 of the countries he studied was the United States. One 0:18:26.560 --> 0:18:28.760 of them was Japan. And he kind of said, hey, 0:18:28.840 --> 0:18:30.800 they have way more heart attacks in the US than 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:33.560 in Japan. It's because he eat more fat. Yeah, they 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:36.080 eat more animal fat and they have more heart attacks. 0:18:36.560 --> 0:18:40.520 Eats less animal fat and has fewer heart attacks. If so. Fact, 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:44.680 though eating animal fat leads to heart attacks, and heart disease, right, 0:18:44.960 --> 0:18:47.560 not not considering the amount of sugar Americans aid, or 0:18:47.600 --> 0:18:50.840 bread or nothing, lifestyle or anything. Yes, no, he didn't. 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:53.720 Nothing else was controlled for. So that was part one. 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:56.520 Part two is, like you said, he cherry picks six 0:18:56.560 --> 0:19:00.520 countries that supported his hypothesis. Uh. And at the time 0:19:00.960 --> 0:19:05.040 some other people pointed out, uh, countries. Yeah, we've got 0:19:05.040 --> 0:19:07.720 a data for twenty two countries. And when you take 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:10.359 all that data and do it a survey across the 0:19:10.359 --> 0:19:14.240 twenty two countries of a correlation between animal fat intake 0:19:14.520 --> 0:19:18.720 and heart disease, it goes away that correlation dissolves, not 0:19:18.760 --> 0:19:22.959 only dissolves, but like disproves it in some cases. Uh. 0:19:23.400 --> 0:19:26.120 The death rate from heart disease in Finland, for instance, 0:19:26.520 --> 0:19:29.199 was twenty four times that of Mexico, even though in 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:32.840 Mexico the fat consumption rate was uh twice as much 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:36.159 as Finland. That's right. So that's complete opposite finding. So 0:19:36.280 --> 0:19:39.520 Keys does the six country study in the fifties, and 0:19:39.560 --> 0:19:44.280 then in nine he follows up with the seven country study. Uh. 0:19:44.280 --> 0:19:47.120 Well he this to this time he did Japan, Italy, 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:51.040 the US, Greece, Yugoslavia, Finland, and the Netherlands. And he 0:19:51.080 --> 0:19:53.400 found the animal fat was a strong predictor of heart 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:58.520 attacks over a five year period. Again, Um, they basically said, dude, 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:01.600 what are you doing, Like you're you're not doing good 0:20:01.640 --> 0:20:04.280 science here. And it's unclear, I should say, it's unclear 0:20:04.640 --> 0:20:10.680 whether keys misrepresented his data. Um, he published his findings 0:20:10.720 --> 0:20:13.280 like all that's fine. He wasn't like, I'm just not 0:20:13.320 --> 0:20:15.480 going to publish this. It was more like in his 0:20:15.560 --> 0:20:19.199 discussion at the end of the studies, they he was 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:22.320 saying like, yeah, this kind of came up, but we're 0:20:22.320 --> 0:20:24.960 not paying attention to that. It doesn't matter, So he 0:20:25.040 --> 0:20:29.080 doesn't necessarily misrepresent the facts. He It seems like he 0:20:29.160 --> 0:20:34.119 was more a victim of the media saying, yes, there's 0:20:34.160 --> 0:20:37.560 the answer. We've been wondering why Americans die more heart attacks. 0:20:37.760 --> 0:20:40.040 This guy just figured it out. It's animal fat and 0:20:40.119 --> 0:20:43.159 takes saturated fats, and it took off like a rocket 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:45.200 from there. In the seventies. Well, it's sort of I mean, 0:20:45.200 --> 0:20:47.840 it makes sense to the ear. When you hear saturated fats, 0:20:48.160 --> 0:20:51.320 it sounds like, well, that's gotta clog your arteries and 0:20:51.359 --> 0:20:53.440 give you a heart attack. Saturated well, you know it's 0:20:53.480 --> 0:20:57.320 saturated with the word saturated means that there's no double 0:20:57.400 --> 0:21:02.160 bonds of carbon in these atty change these fatty acid chains. 0:21:02.200 --> 0:21:05.480 So unsaturated means that there's at least one atom of 0:21:05.520 --> 0:21:08.160 carbon linked to another atom of carbon in the chain. 0:21:08.560 --> 0:21:12.879 In a saturated fat, there's hydrogen carbons linking all of 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:16.600 the carbon atoms together. That's it. It's saturated with hydrogen carbon. 0:21:16.640 --> 0:21:19.280 It doesn't mean it saturates your arteries right and clogs 0:21:19.280 --> 0:21:21.600 it up, which is what it sounds like exactly. And 0:21:21.640 --> 0:21:24.439 so Keys comes up with this, It takes off like 0:21:24.480 --> 0:21:28.120 a rocket. It becomes adopted officially by the federal government 0:21:28.119 --> 0:21:33.359 to encourage a low fat diet, and study after study 0:21:33.359 --> 0:21:36.640 after study just kind of follows and Keys footsteps. The 0:21:36.640 --> 0:21:38.879 thing is is if you really kind of look at 0:21:38.880 --> 0:21:41.480 these studies, especially ones that are just pointed to, is 0:21:41.560 --> 0:21:47.480 like these are definitive proof that the that that animal fat, 0:21:47.520 --> 0:21:51.680 that saturated fat intake uh produces heart attacks. They kind 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:55.320 of all fall apart, and you realize that for decades now, 0:21:55.640 --> 0:21:59.800 we've just been taken as gospel a first of all, 0:21:59.840 --> 0:22:07.200 an unproven correlation as causation, like completely unproven as far 0:22:07.240 --> 0:22:11.680 as like you know, unarguable evidence goes yeah, And there 0:22:11.800 --> 0:22:14.720 is definitely a dogma that's evolved around this that's been 0:22:14.760 --> 0:22:17.280 tough to crack. But a lot of scientists have been 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:21.920 creating research and publishing research that says, look, man, we 0:22:22.160 --> 0:22:24.639 don't understand fat like you think. It's not black and 0:22:24.720 --> 0:22:28.240 white and as simple as that, Like, for example, there's 0:22:28.359 --> 0:22:31.480 l d L fat and there's HDL fat, and people 0:22:31.520 --> 0:22:34.720 typically think that HDL is good fat. L d L 0:22:34.840 --> 0:22:39.159 is bad fat. Yes, right, So if you have and 0:22:39.240 --> 0:22:42.040 your body uses cholesterol to do things that produce hormones, 0:22:42.160 --> 0:22:46.080 especially sex hormones, so you need cholesterol, right, But it's 0:22:46.119 --> 0:22:51.200 the idea that you're that animal fats raise your l 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:55.840 d L, which is the bad cholesterol. Uh, that that 0:22:55.920 --> 0:22:58.200 gave them this bad rap. But even if you look 0:22:58.240 --> 0:23:01.359 at LDL cholesterol, not all the L cholesterol is the same. 0:23:01.920 --> 0:23:06.360 There's different things called subfractions, and depending on the subfraction, 0:23:07.000 --> 0:23:12.400 these start to correlate to heart disease finally, right, right, 0:23:12.800 --> 0:23:15.879 So some are small dns types of l d L 0:23:16.160 --> 0:23:19.440 and some are puffy and right exactly, and the pillowy 0:23:19.520 --> 0:23:22.560 ones are fine. They seem to be totally fine. And 0:23:22.600 --> 0:23:27.040 what they found also is that the overall ratio of 0:23:27.840 --> 0:23:34.080 pillowy to dnse L d L is what finally you 0:23:34.119 --> 0:23:39.520 can get a good predictor of heart disease risk, not 0:23:39.680 --> 0:23:44.040 just L d L cholesterol, but the ratio. Like you 0:23:44.080 --> 0:23:46.159 can't even say, well, this guy's got a ton of 0:23:46.520 --> 0:23:50.600 small dense ld L particles in his bloodstream, so he's 0:23:50.640 --> 0:23:52.919 going to die of a heart attack. That's not necessarily 0:23:52.920 --> 0:23:56.119 true because you haven't taken into account the fluffiness. And 0:23:56.160 --> 0:24:01.520 if you have more fluffiness then dense articles, then it's 0:24:01.520 --> 0:24:05.560 gonna even out. Yeah. Well, I like Ronald Krauss. He's 0:24:05.600 --> 0:24:08.880 a doctor out at UC Berkeley. He seems to kind 0:24:08.880 --> 0:24:10.520 of be hitting it on the head with at least 0:24:10.840 --> 0:24:14.800 how he's characterizing some of this stuff. Uh Like, one 0:24:14.800 --> 0:24:16.720 of his statements that struck me was he said it 0:24:16.800 --> 0:24:22.000 may these findings may simply suggest that unsaturated fats are 0:24:22.119 --> 0:24:25.800 are a healthier option, but not necessarily that saturated fats 0:24:25.800 --> 0:24:29.280 are killing you. And that's just a very like reasonable 0:24:29.320 --> 0:24:32.439 thing to say to me. Yeah, he seemed like a 0:24:32.520 --> 0:24:36.719 very reasonable guy when he came in the other day. Well, 0:24:36.760 --> 0:24:38.200 in this article, and we should say this is the 0:24:38.400 --> 0:24:42.080 NBC um really exhaustive NBC news article called what if 0:24:42.240 --> 0:24:45.000 bad fat isn't so bad? It's really worth reading? Well, 0:24:45.040 --> 0:24:47.080 it is, and one of the lead how the article 0:24:47.200 --> 0:24:50.360 leads in is super interesting. Um. They have found tribes 0:24:50.800 --> 0:24:54.560 in Africa, one called the mess ay Uh nomadic tribe 0:24:54.560 --> 0:24:57.840