Kirt:
> If the time comes that most of the food you do eat is irradiated, I assume
> it might then concern you more, no? But arguing that you hardly eat any
> irradiated food, so then it is of little concern, sidesteps the issue of
> what exactly happens during irradiation and what the health effects might
> be on the consumer. Practically, I'm with you: I eat no irradiated food
> that I am aware of. But as a matter of discourse, whether or not irradiated
> food is healthy, and whether or not it is widely distributed, and whether
> or not it is clearly labeled--all are issues that I am concerned about as
> time goes on...

Let me clarify:
1) I would like irradiated food to be clearly labeled, and information to be
more widespread. Almost everyone has heard about pesticides, but very few know
what irradiation consists of.
2) I consider that irradiated food shouldn't deserve the label "organic".
3) I avoid irradiated food as much as possible, but within reasonable limits (as
I do with organic vs. non-organic): if it costs to much time or money, I won't
try to find un-irradiated food.

> _I_ don't care much about parasites, and am not eating rare steaks as a
> method of germ protection. I equate irradiated foods with totally cooked
> foods--very denatured. Anything that 1] more or less stops all enzymatic
> actions in a food and 2] kills any living mocrobe/parasite (harmful or
> harmless) has effectively denatured a food in my book. The premise of a
> paleo-diet is to approximate the food intake of our paleo-ancestors. While
> this will always be a best-guess game, we can readily assume they had ZERO
> consumption of irradiated food.

Unless extensive studies are made, comparisons between cooked and irradiated
food will always be speculative. FWIW, a lot of energy is brought during
cooking, and very little during irradiation. I suffices to strike the enzymes at
one (or a few) points, by gamma radiations or by some free radicals which have
been formed, to inhibit enzymatic activity. Irradiated and non-irradiated foods
taste (almost) the same, only a small part is denatured. That's why I compare
irradiation with pesticides: in both cases, a small concentration of "abnormal"
molecules are present.

Cooking is another unknown. I know someone who has allergic reactions to cooked
food, but not to non-organic or irradiated food. Humans have certainly been
using fire for some time, but I can't imagine how we could have accumulated
enough information to recognize the thousands of chemical species which appear.
I suppose the body can tolerate a small amount of "toxicity" without having
specific defenses to each non-usable molecule. I don't know if cooked food is
more or less "toxic" than irradiated food. Despite the fact that our
paleo-ancestors didn't use irradiation or pesticides, I would rather eat a raw,
irradiated or non-organic yam, than (cooked) organic non-irradiated potato
chips. But that's a matter of "taste".


> One can imagine a time when only health food stores will carry certified
> non-irradiated produce/meat/seafood, and I can assure you that the prices
> will be higher than they are now for non-irradiated foods. Besides, how
> cheap is food supposed to get? 69 cent/lb grapes isn't cheap enough? We get
> six-packs of romaine from Costco here in Hawaii for under 3
> dollars--definitely not organic, but do I really need a twelve-pack of
> irradiated romaine at the same price?

I don't think it would be profitable or useful to irradiate grapes or romaine
lettuce. Classical pesticides, anti-fungals or whatever do their job well
enough :(


Best wishes,

Jean-Louis
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