Tom, many thanks for your great & sane posts & my acknowledgements for your great choice of ancestors. Anyone who could survive 8 years as fruitarian must have superior genes. That "diet" nailed me in 5 MONTHS when I lived it on Fry's advice in 90! Tom; > Some raw fooders are very idealistic - to the point of narrow dogmatism, while others are very pragmatic and open. Bob: >Again, definitions would help. If two folks are debating trunks while one's thinking of his suitcase & the other's visualizing the front of an elephant .... I don't equate realism with pragmatism. Didn't the pragmatists declare that there is no such thing as objective reality at all!?! Are "idealists" equated with "zealots" & defined as anyone having a strong Belief System (yep, B.S.) that differs from mine? & "realists" are those who appreciate my truth? Tom: >I: Nature is simple, nature's laws are simple (or simplistic), and nature is perfect. R: Nature is a highly complex system; it is a system of trade-offs. Our knowledge of nature's laws is limited. Nature is not perfect - some animals wage war against each other, they sometimes kill each other during mating, and there are many other natural events considered imperfect. (Note: nature is not interested in anyone's dogma: nature simply IS.) Bob: Any chance that nature IS simple & perfect & we just haven't yet understood it's simplicity & perfection? Tom: >I: Nature is your friend, nature wants to help you. R: Actually, nature is impersonal. One can personalize nature in positive or negative ways, both equally valid. Positive: nature wants to help you, via your birth. Negative: nature wants to help you die, via diseases, predation, starvation, natural disasters. Observe that wild animals rarely die of old age; does their "friend" nature want to help them live to a ripe old age? Bob: Yes, nature's neutral. But reality is "benevolent" in the sense that if you DO adapt to it, if you DO think, value & act rationally, then you can achieve your values. That's paraphrased from Leonard Peikoff 7 probably borrowed from Ayn Rand before that. Tom: >Perfect health cannot even be defined; ask anyone who makes such a claim to give an objective, comprehensive definition of perfect health. Bob: How bout "Optimum Health" as the greatest level of well being we can each achieve given the genetic & enviormental factors beyond our control? Probably not too objective, but it's been my goal for a couple decades & I believe I'm making progress. :-) Tom: >It is worth mentioning that idealism and realism are not a binary classification of raw fooders, as one can simultaneously hold some idealist, and some realist views. Years ago, when I was getting into raw foods, I was very naive and idealistic. I learned the hard way, that idealism is not a good approach. I now encourage others to try rawism, but to do so in a realistic way, and avoid the traps of dogma and idealism. The long-term outcome of your "raw experiment" may depend on which approach you choose, and your attitude. Bob: I don't suppose it's possible to become an idealist about your realism, eh? Someone: >100%rawOmni. Maybe we could use CF,CV, CO ( where C=100%, F=fruit, V=vegan, O=omni)? And this is only the beginning - the range of foods etc can make all the difference. Bob: & add "I" for "Instinctive", please! >Humans are extremely nutritionally flexible, Yeah, but at what cost? Tom: >We all are realists in some ways, idealists in others. That's life, or as the realist would say, that's reality.advice Bob: Or, as the idealist would say, that's ideal! ;-) Tom: >But if the cow doesn't want us to take her milk, she could resist. That she doesn't resist, and in fact comes (freely) to the milking shed to be milked at the appropriate time, suggests that it is not theft. Additionally, the cow produces excess milk - more than is needed by the calf. In Ayurvedic dairies in India, the calf remains with the mother, and only her surplus milk - over and above that needed by the calf - is taken for human use. Bob: The cow" ain't a real animal. It's a plastic hybrid creation of humans. Mammals in the wild don't carry around surplus milk. Kill a wild lactating boar or gazelle & try to make a lunch off it's milk -- there ain't none (at least every time I checked there was none -- one of the reasons dairy could bnever have been an original human food, why our instincts don't protect us from it. Tom: > The spiritual view is that we should identify with the spirit within, not the body. And a diet of animals hinders us from that process. The spiritual view is that the true self is the spirit within, not the body. So, identifying with the spirit is true self-identification, and identifying with the body is not. The body lasts a few years, the spirit is immortal. Bob: Why must we accept the dreaded binarism here? Why either identify with spirit or body. Why must there be a dichotomy. I prefer to identify with spirit AND body, idealism and realism. Can do? Your proof that the spirit is immortal? Received a postcard from great grandpappy lately? i TRIED UNSUBSCRIBING TO THIS LIST A COUPLA MONTHS AGO, FAILED AT IT & HAVE BEEN DEPRIVING MYSELF OF SLEEP FOR THE SAKE OF THIS VERY ENJOYABLE MENTAL MASTURBATION EVER SINCE. nOW, i MUST SLEEP & i'M MAKING TWO ATTEMPTXS TO UNSUBSCRIBE, THEN WILL REQUEST DAVID OR PETER TO RE-ISTRUCT ME IN THE ART OF UNSUBSCRIBING (REQUESTED BY AT LEAST TWO OTHER FOLKS IN THE LAST FEW DAYS AS WELL. BYE, Y'ALL, 'EALTH, 'APPINESS & FREEDOM TO YA BOB PS--JOIN US AT BOB AVERY'S nh m2m, IT ONLY DEPRIVES US OF ABOUT HALF THE SLEEP THAT THIS LIST COSTS!! ;-) BOB'S AT [log in to unmask]