>The main thesis is that obesity is caused by unnatural hunger,
>which in turn is caused by a nutrient deficit of some sort.

Impulses like hunger ask for a satisfying response , when needs are not met
desires are born

 The
>author (anonymous) maintains, however, that we typically have
>only the vaguest sense of what that deficit is, so we tend to eat
>randomly to try to make it up.

That what a sin mean ( missing the target )

  This results in excess calorie
>consumption, so we gain fat.  The cure, then, is to *avoid* any
>nutrient deficit, and thereby avoid "waking the Beast" of
>unnatural hunger.

That is a wrong aproach , avoiding sining send you to hell , rather seek for
the really fulfilling nutrient rich foods and just forget about what is not.
The difference in attitude  might seem subtil but in fact it is huge.
A guy survivor of a concentration camp said he learned two things there.
That what you try to avoid ,you are going to get it, and what you want to
get ,you are sure to not get it.( i hope you got the idea despite my bad
english version of it )

There is many reason that i see , why , what is called food by the
merchants,  is nutrients poor.

The big one is farming crops ( paleo peoples ate only wild )
 Tilling the earth ,  slowly but surely thru time  , compromise the
avalability of minerals and their uptake by the plants .
Fertilising To compensate the problem , just further create unbalances in
the uptake of minerals by plants and animals who eat the plants.
chemical farming pushed the trend very far but organic farming is part of
that trend too.

The 2nd one is denaturing the food thru any kind of processing before eating
it.
The worse of that is in the industrialisation of food processsing, but every
kitchen allready is a chemical plant compromising the proper release and
assimility of nutrients that occur when the body is fed the  food in the
form genetically expected.( whole , raw)

  If one simultaneously wishes to lose fat,
>however, then a caloric deficit is necessary, which makes it more
>challenging to avoid a nutrient deficit.  So the key is to get a
>maximum of nutrients with a minimum of calories.

This kind of no exit situation is the symbol of how much we like to hit our
head on the walls.A better choice is not enter there in the first place .
I have never seen an obese animal in the wild (  domestic ones yes, wild
animals feeding on human food yes,  ) .they don't try to reduce their
caloric intake
why?
they eat the food that is designed for their species ( as long their
environment is their original one)
And more important they eat it as it is presented naturally to them
I never seen an obese condition last very long on a raw food diet ( even
when it is rich in calories).
The caloric intake ( if it ever make any sens ) is regulated naturally when
the food is raw. I challenge anyone to overeat animal fat in its raw state
 easy to do once cooked and part of a dish .
I challenge any one to gain weight on raw ,  fruits  seeds nuts and
vegetable even if is calorie rich ( easy to do with the same items  same
amount of calories ,cooked)

>
>We would argue that the best way to do this is to follow a paleo
>diet.

a truely paleo,  wild , diverse and with little transformation of the foods
certainly!


 Even so, it is easy enough to have a nutrient deficit,
>even on paleo.

On paleo "a la sauce " neanderthin or other timid questionning of the whole
thing, yes.

  We've discussed this sort of thing many times.
>If one doesn't eat much liver or *lots* of colored vegetables, a
>vitamin A deficit is likely.  If one doesn't eat much brains or
>cold-water fish, an omega-3 deficit is likely.  And so on.  The
>author advises supplementation, because of the conflict between
>the goal of caloric deficit and avoidance of nutrient deficit.
>People not interested in weight loss could presumably have a
>better chance of doing without supplements and getting nutrients
>from food.

With suplements we come back to our first viscious cycle Or sin . we are
stating our unfulfillement and carving it on stone.
One suplementation will further unbalance the otimum ratio and create a
deficiency with an other nutrient.
it is like trying to fertilise a depleted field , it is just whipping an
exhausted horse..
Whipping a horse may be the good thing to do in extreme situations to save
it's life , but i will not expect making it a way of life.

>What I found most interesting about this is the author's humorous
>but accurate description of the phenomenology of dieting: the
>initial "honeymoon" phase, followed by a sense of decreasing
>satisfaction and eventually a feeling of being increasingly taxed
>by the whole thing.  This is how it generally is for me --
>initial success and enthusiasm followed by slowly increasing
>restlessness and preoccupation with food.  Paleo has been no
>exception; neither has the Anchell diet.  >

I think we will have to live with that kind of cyclic unperfection .
As i tried to point it out the solution for a fulfilling diet is   beyond
the individual level  and is not going to happen in few days or even  years
.
If the trend that i am denoncing here ( changing what IS, wishing
better )took over 10 000 years to reach the insane point where we are at,
it might require more than a timid change to expect a different result than
what we got.
It is like being an adult trying to learn to walk not only because  you
didn't have a chance as a toddler but because for generations your parents ,
generation after generation ended up on their knees and knuckles.
It is how i see where we are at now trying to feed ourselves in an" health
food " store ( you know those stores who sale more pills than real
foods).What a joke!

jean-claude