At 9:39 +1000 16/4/1999, Todd Moody wrote:

>Neanderthin allows the use of olive oil

Olive oil is only available in small quantities to a person equipped
with sticks and stones, and the oil thus obtained would not look
much like commercial olive oil (i.e. clear and sparkling).


>and fruit juices, which in nature are restricted to whole fruits

I make my own fruit juice by putting whole fruit in a blender. I peel
fruit with an inedible rind (bananas, citrus) and core fruit with
unappetising cores. Most peel (peach, apple, apricot) goes in too though.
I add water to make it runny enough to drink, and to dilute the sugars.


>I don't doubt for a moment that overconsumption of sugar can be
>problematic, just as overconsumption of vitamin A can be
>problematic.  But sugar itself is quite natural and is found in
>moderate amounts in many natural foods.

Indeed. In its natural state, sugar comes packaged with fibre,
protein, fat, enzymes, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients.
In its refined form it's really just a chemical compound.

The situation here may be similar to the Scandinavian heart attack
trials (sorry, can't find the reference), where some heart attack
victims were given advice to add extra fish to their diet. The decrease
in the rate of repeat heart attacks was statistically significant.

But who can say that the fish was responsible for the decrease in
heart attack? Perhaps by eating more fish, these people naturally
ate less of some other food (flour, perhaps), and it was this
decrease in flour consumption that resulted in the positive outcome.

The point I'm not making very well is that by eating refined products,
you are necessarily reducing the amount of natural foods you eat, and
the amount of nutrients you obtain from those foods.


Sorry this posting is not very lucid. I went out for dinner with
friends to a vegetarian restaurant last night, and carbo-loaded
in a major way (mock chicken... who knows what it was... probably
pure gluten flour!). I'm in a major brain-fog today.

 ...Richard.