Ward Nicholson <[log in to unmask]>:
>However, in the reports I have seen, there are indications the test
>animals are not very happy with the forced regimen. If one has the type of
>personality or discipline to adhere to one of these regimens without
>feeling deprived, then it wouldn't be a drawback, but the animals do seem
>to feel deprived, so there is a trade-off here: happiness.<

I would be interested in these studies repeated with raw native foods
instead of purina rat chow pellets. I suspect that there would be different
results, but who knows.

>While I am somewhat emaciated-looking due to having a natural distance
>runner's build and I fit that aspect of the calorie-restricted picture, on
>the other hand my metabolism is very high, and so I eat quite a few
>calories. But I have also been on calorie-restricted diets (when I was
>eating almost 100% raw foods), and felt strung-out doing it. I wouldn't
>want to live my whole life that way, although I might be amenable to
>compressing all the suffering into a 14-day fast every few years, where I
>am also miserable but at least it's over with pretty quickly and you get
>deep, long-lasting results.<

I seem to be one of the few who have gained weight on a raw diet. From a
SAD high of over 240 lbs in college I ended up at 180lbs (but not
emancipated; I am 5'10") after a restricted calorie/exercise regime (not
raw at all) and then down to 165lbs on a Fit for Life 75% raw diet. Upon
begining instincto, 100% raw, (in Milw) I steadily gained to 175lbs. During
two years in Peru I was between 175 and 185 depending on the season (avos
mostly) and for four years in Bangkok I was between 180 and 170, again
depending on the season (durian mostly). In New Zealand (daily access to
seafood and meat and avos, I was up to 185 and have pretty much remained
there since we came back to the states. Salads have been pretty regular
since NZ as well, whereas before it was more one food at a time.

I have a fine musculature and a linebacker build, but there is no doubt
that at 185 I have a roll of fat, spare tire style. As I have mentioned
several times before, in general I eat my fill, and often more, for
"non-nutritional" reasons. I offer myself up here as an example of someone
who will follow his pleasure with raw foods, to the point of overeating
(the standard critique of instincto). I feel that 170-175 is my "true"
weight, and perhaps I will settle back down there after time (esp if I ever
get my fill of avos!) but it is intriguing to me that no matter how much I
eat raw I seem only to approach a 10% overweight (by poundage) mark.

Note that I pretty much eat my fill of fats and actively seek them (in
seafoods, specific cuts of meat, durian, avos for example). I'm wondering
if the "emancipated types" (esp frutarians and to a lessor degree vegans)
who generally consider half an avo or two ounces of nuts as a limit
consider themselves 10% _underweight_. More? Less?

The instincto lore is that fat is mostly a holding area for toxins, but I
think that is far too simplistic.

I expect to hear the admonishments about how I am eating too much fat, too
much food, etc.etc. but my question is to the emancipated folks: why do you
think you remain underweight on a raw diet? Are humans meant to be guant,
skeletal looking. I know they aren't meant to have a spare tire, small or
otherwise, but why are so many hygenists so frail?

Ward, your happiness talk is refreshing. Touch, food, sex, outdoor
activity, fine conversation, etc are among the joys in my life. If someone
said, "Hey, you'll live another twenty years if you never touch Melisa
again, or if you deprive yourself at every meal, or even of you don't lay
in the sun." My response would be, "So what? That's what makes life worth
living."

I sincerely doubt that anyone "up there" is keeping score of how few hours one
sleeps, or how many standard deviations past 82.4 years old you live. Any
one of the last seven years raw are worth ten of the previous years to me,
and if I died tomorrow, I know that I have "wailed with it" as Ken Kesey
might say.

Anyway, here's one vote for the pleasure principal as one of the ways to be
happy.

Cheers,
Kirt