* Paul Reynolds ([log in to unmask]) [990925 15:45]:
> Alan,
>
> > Perhaps Loren's diet is
> > working for him not only because he is genetically
> > different from Tom and Paul (and others), but it certainly
> > appears that he is being very careful about eating a
> > large variety of foods and is doing lots of other
> > healthful practices (fasting, sunshine, etc.).
>
> This is fine, but when he states the way things happen in an absolute
> way, for example how on his program hunger diminshes and you get by on
> less and less food, he seems to extrapolate this to a universal result.
> Many people have reported the opposite, that they start to feel they
> are starving.

I think you being very unfair to Loren here.  As I recall
someone asked how many 100% raw foodist there were on this
list, and Loren, among others, simply told his experience.
I didn't see any attempt to convert anyone.  However, very
quickly several rabid people jumped on his case in what I'd
call a very dogmatic and uncivilized manor, calling Loren
a liar.  I just think that we can and ought to behave a little
more dignified than that.

> As far as the other practices (exercise, sunshine), aren't they just
> obvious irregardless of the diet?  So here is a possible scenario -
> someone like Loren is doing well on a raw-vegan diet because they
> have a certain constitutional makeup and are doing all these other
> wonderful things as well, then, because they don't follow a rigid
> dogma, decide to experiment and feel even better with a few fertile
> raw eggs. How does that sound?

I personally have a diet that includes fertile raw eggs.
Does that mean that I should behave like a total jerk to
someone that doesn't?  I'm personally interested in hearing
what his experiences are.  If animal food has something essential,
how has Loren and his friends (and many others I've heard
about) survived?  Perhaps we can all learn something important
-- but not if we immediately castigate people that may have
experience a little different from our own!

> [ ... ]
> > I say that because I always keep the Hunza's of northern
> > Pakistan as my "sanity" check.  These people were able
> > to live very long lives (120 - 140 years were not uncommon)
> > in extremely good health (often claimed to be the world's
> > healthiest people), with a complete absence of nutritional
> > degenerative diseases.  Of all the diets/lifestyles I've run
> > acrossed, Loren's is about as close to the Hunza's as I've
> > seen.  I'm not saying that this can't be improved upon,
> > but I don't think anyone's diet has been shown to be even
> > close to the Hunza's yet in terms of health and longevity.
>
> We can use any number of the flesh-eating cultures Weston Price studied as
> points of reference too. There is definite dispute over the Hunza's
> reputed longevity, also.

While there are many peoples free from nutritional degenerative
diseases (and we can learn a lot from all of them, I'm sure),
few are noted for longevity like that seen of the Hunzas,
(as well as the Russian Georgians and the Tibetians).  I'm
more familiar with the Hunzas than the others because they are
very well documented.  [I've read that one of the favorite
jokes amoung the Hunzas is that the average family size in
Hunza is seven - one grandparent, two parents, three children,
and one anthropologist.]

I've never seen a dispute on the Hunza's longevity, though
I'll admit that over the last 2 decades since the Pakistani
government built a highway into the region, it appears that
the people have become more and more westernized and I've
read that the number of centenarians have dropped considerably
since.

Perhaps you are thinking of the Vilcabamba indians of Ecuador,
which were also reputed to have a large number of centenarians.
It seems that there was perhaps some fraud involved in the
initial work done by the National Geographic there.

> I can't see the Hunzas diet being way better than, for example,
> the Loenschental Swiss, since they also were essentially free of
> chronic disease.

To say this, you'd have to know what a good diet is.  I feel
fairly confident that no one knows that.  We are guessing,
and experimenting, and analyzing to try to discover what a
good diet is.  If the Loenschental Swiss enjoy the same
quality of health and longevity, then perhaps one might
postulate that the diets are equivalently good -- but of
course that also neglects non-dietary factors to health.
I'll admit that I don't know much about the Loenschental
Swiss, and would be delighted if someone would pass along
some good pointers to references.

> It should also be noted that the Hunzas were not 100%
> vegetarian (no native cultures were/are).

The Hunzas have never been 100% vegetarian, which is a
possibly important fact, but they are very close to 100%
vegetarian.  They rarely ate meat, dairy products, or eggs
-- they simply didn't have the resources to support enough
animals to eat.  Consequently, they ate meat and butter
pretty much only at a yearly festival.  The truth is that
we don't know how important this extremely low level of
animal food is to their health -- this is why I'm personally
intrigued by the experiences of people like Loren.

> > If Loren has hit upon something good, I'd like to hear
> > about it, and it looks like there are people on this
> > list that perhaps have an interest in trying to make him
> > go away.  It makes me wonder why.
> >
>
> I personally don't mind if Loren stays around at all.

Nice enthusiam.  With that sort of attitude, I'd be surprised
if Loren did stay around.

> I wish Wes Peterson was still on the list. But at the same time I
> can understand where Tom is coming from, having tried everything
> to make vegan-fruitarianism work for himself and failing, and not
> wanting someone else to go through what he has.

Ok, fine.  It's probably fair to say that some people may
not be able to enjoy the success that Loren has, but I
think it's quite a different matter to out-right call
someone a liar, when there isn't really any evidence that
the person is lying.  It just looks like the worst kind
of dogmatic practice.  There might even be some justification
for not wanting to hear about the successes of someone with
a fruitarian diet on the paleo list because it is off topic,
but this is a raw food list!

Loren has every right to here and to participate.  Loren has
also distinguished himself from the other participants in that
thread by being extremely tolerent and polite despite the
rudeness shown to him.  I wonder how many others there are that
might have had something interesting to share that will not post
now because the rudeness some here have exhibited?

--alan