On Fri, 31 May 2002 06:14:20 -0500, Jo Webb <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

>2. Green tea does contain some caffeine, I believe. So is the objection to
>coffee (apart from it not being paleo) that it contains a lot more
>caffeine, or is there more to it?

The Paleo "diet" consists of merely removing from the diet anything that
could not have been eaten in the paleo era, due to the lack of
technology back then.

And, while there are theories as to why non-paleo foods are harmful - in
terms of specific physiological processes - nothing has been
conclusively proved.

So, the Paleo diet depends solely on the "paleo" or "non-paleo"
designation of foods, and no other factors.   It revolves around the
intuitive "rightness" of the concept, and the overall health improvement
demonstrated by those who apply the principle to their lives.

Thus, the Paleo diet does not analyze the health benefits or harm from
any particular food.

However, one is free to consider all information in formulating your own
personal diet plan, and in fact, Drs Eades' book "Protein Power Life
Plan" takes the Paleo Diet and adds to it all that the Eades know about
physiology and the health benefits and risks of various foods.

And, the Atkins and Zone Diets accept the Paleo concept as the
fundamental underlying principle as to why many/most people are
unhealthy, but those plans use clinical and physiological understanding
(respectively) as the primary basis for their recommendations.

Other sources of information can be used, but great care needs to be
exercised due to surprisingly low standards employed by those designing
and evaluating nutritional research, especially "clinical studies".
(In fact, a friend of mine who is a holistic M.D. and author, is writing
a book that critiques and dissects those studies, and shows why most of
them are meaningless.)


--
Cheers,

Ken
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