On Sat, 20 Nov 1999, Troy Gilchrist wrote:

> The fact remains though that most of us who are trying to eat a
> paleo diet aren't doing so in the context of a traditional paleo lifestyle.
> Many of us are unaware of what a natural diet really consists. In this
> regard, it is very helpful to understand modern scientific findings about
> the nutritional requirements of the human organism when making paleo dietary
> choices. In the ancestral environment such considerations would obviously be
> unnecessary. Wild animals know inherently what they should eat.

I agree almost completely, except that I doubt that even animals
in the wild are infallible in their food choices.  That is, I
don't doubt that wild animals can and do eat things that make
them sick.  Likewise, we should not idealize paleolithic eating
to the point of thinking that paleo hunter-gatherers always ate
the healthiest food, always were in excellent health, never ate
foods with antinutrients, and so on.  There is no reason why we
shouldn't believe that some paleo populations got by on diets
that were nutritionally sub-optimal, and there is therefore no
reason why we shouldn't use knowledge available to us to make the
best choices.

Todd Moody
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