At 6/5/2002  04:16 PM, you wrote:
>While the fact that a food CAN be eaten raw is a big point in favor of
>that food, there is no advantage to eating food raw, and one big
>disadvantage in that it takes more physiological resources.

Really? Where did you get this idea? Any references? There are a lot of
people that bash raw food diets but raw food seems to be nature's plan. We
are the only species on this planet that usually eats cooked food.  Is our
physiology so different from other mammals that makes us require cooked
foods? Plant and animal bodies are usually greater than 50% water. Cooking
foods removes a lot of the water. This is fighting nature rather than
working with nature. Many people are afraid of raw foods but that does not
mean raw foods are inherently bad for one. Most of us here are trying to
avoid the so called diseases of civilization. We see a paleo diet as a
means of avoiding these diseases. For me, raw meat digests better than
cooked meat. I can look in the toilet to see the difference. The smell is
also much better. Each person gets to make their own food choices. Mine has
been raw for fifteen of the last seventeen years. The last seven have been
with raw animal foods. I don't think that I would be as healthy as I am if
I had been on a cooked food diet. During the the two years that I was
eating cooked, I developed vision problems (difficulty in focusing) which
went away when I went back on a raw food diet. The medical doctor, Michael
Klaper, that I spoke to about this said if the blood sugar is higher than
normal that water is drawn out of the cornea making it harder to focus the
eye.

I prefer the taste of raw food. I have no cooking facilities at home but
will eat some cooked food when I am out.
This amount of cooked food does not seem to affect my vision but it usually
does not digest as well. YMMV.

> >From what I've seen, the "raw food" theory is just a corruption of the
> >Paleo diet, that is promoted by people who seem to like the concept
> >(which, of course, is usually responsible for virtually all diet plans,
> >ie something in one's personal psychology "likes" the concept,
> >regardless of the effectiveness thereof).
>
>See:
>
>www.beyondveg.com
>
>for LOTS of details.

Excellent site. All of the authors have been on the raw-food list that I am
the listowner. A lot of the material there points out the craziness of some
of the raw food vegetarian zealots. Most of them are still eating a lot of
raw food.

>--
>Cheers,
>
>Ken
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