Geoff, maybe one might argue that G-d heard your prayers, and just pretended not to listen so that you would  be forced to figure out what you needed to in order to save your own life. Maybe G-d wants us to be in control of our fate at the same time that we acknowledge his existence.  Okay, don't roll your eyes... just keep reading.   Maybe you never would have grown in the direction you did, or found your dietary path if things came easier.  I could go on for hours with this, and I know that it would get tiresome to those who remind us that we shouldn't be discussing G-d on a Paleo forum, but I really think the completely scientific approach to being paleo is oxymoronic.   I am in complete agreement with this last post of yours up to a certain point.  I think when we feel abandoned and helpless, its easy to think there is no G-d.  But when we dodge a bullet by a hair's breath, we sometimes say, "Thank God". 
 
  When Paleo man wasn't hunting, sleeping, procreating or killing enemies, didn't he take a little bit of time to sit around a fire and just WONDER what was on the other side of the stars? Yes, man is a combination of reason, intellect, instinct and more.  But  isn't the common glue that binds most hunter gatherer tribes (besides the fact that they relish organ meat,) was  that they had totems,  had "creation" myths,  were guided by spirits,  or used mushrooms or other plant medicinals to reach esctatic states in order to transcend the physical limits of this world in order to vision quest, visit the spirit world, use shamanic healing, tap into other realms?   Or is that too magical to discuss here?  Isn't that quest to open onself to the spiritual realm just as much a part of being Paleo as what we choose to shove into our mouth?   When you are tripping on acid,  or communing with nature in a deeply transcendental state, do you want
 to be with the biochemist that gives you a play by play narrative of why your brain is doing what its doing, or do you want to just enjoy the colors, the smells, the quiet?   Am I missing something about being fully paleo?  The more I eat this way, and see the direct connection between animal as food, the more I feel an omnipresence that can't be spoken about without making me sound like a nut job. 
 
  I once had 5 visiting  astrophysicists at my kitchen table paying me for a well cooked meal when they were at a 3 day conference at a nearby university.  I am an English major. I can't talk science.   These guys were from Stanford, MIT, some foreign.  And they didn't want to talk science.  They were gigging on the food. Once was terminally ill, and he was hoping food would cure him.  He was very religous his whole life. It was a beautiful moment, where like music, food was the universal language between us.   It was humbling to be with these guys. And to me, that was a paleo moment I will remember to the day I die.   (   And no, I never took acid.   That comment was just to drive home a point about what it sometimes "feels" like being on this forum when a person sticks their toe into unchartered waters and gets kaboshed, or can't back up a statement without having to first get  a PHD to be taken seriously )  And yes, I've
 had lots of accupuncture and  used  some alternative healing modalities  that have saved me from the scalpel many times, and saved me from ever having to give my kids an antibiotic, an aspirin, etc.  I don't go to a voodoo doctor, by any means.  My accupuncturist is an expert in the field of liver diseases in her province in China as a medical doctor there.  In this country, she is considered unworthy of even being allowed to participate in health insurance billing.  
  
Geoff, I find your posts on some level really deep and interesting.   Like you, I fought my way tooth and nail back from a killing disease, praying, deal making with G-d.  Do I believe it was the doctors that saved me?  Yes.  Do I believe G-d wanted me to be earthside a bit longer?  Yes.  Can't both be right?   Can't creationism parallel evolution?   Hmmm, imagine that!!!  Why is this forum so dialectic in its thinking? Can't we just share thoughts that may appear peripherally related to paleo at times, and at other times trust that the pendulum of conversation will swing back to discussions of protein, zero carbing, types of fat to consume, etc?    Why are folks so uptight that the conversations here might get too religous, or too "unpaleo" whatever that means.    Its great that you are controversial, Geoff.  I'm all for stirring the pot.  .  I just think a few folks on this list  would be a lot more endearing if we all
  remembered the adage:  "You attract more bees with honey than you do vinegar".. That's all...
 
 Keep Posting!!!
Batsheva

________________________________
From: Geoffrey Purcell <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] 
Sent: Friday, February 24, 2012 11:19 AM
Subject: Re: R: [PALEOFOOD] Ages in Chaos re William

B, I have personally never tried acupuncture. I only know one relative who had one beneficial experience with it and one negative one. The impression I get also from scientific studies on that subject,  is that the evidence for it is mixed, with both positive and negative results, quite possibly implying that it is only partially effective, in the end. I naturally agree that there are some  factors within various other alternative medicine-fields that may well prove useful, given my own experience, but many others(eg:- crystal therapy) are somewhat dodgy and evidence-free. What I mean, is that in another few centuries/millenia of scientific advancement, we may well eventually find more data confirming the benefits or disadvantages of various alternative-medicine ideas.

In the case of religion, I can only speak from my own personal experience. When I was, years ago, at death's door from numerous health-problems, I realised that I had to control my own fate via diet and other ideas. So, my view is that either there is a God and he doesn't give a damn about us, in which case worship of God/belief in God is a waste of time, or there isn't any God and I am the master of my own personal destiny and therefore have to solve my own problems.

My point re Creationism though still stands. It is in direct opposition to the theory behind the Palaeolithic Diet, as the PD diet depends mainly  on evolution for its basic theories re evolutionary adaptation. Mentioning Creationism on a Palaeolithic Diet forum is very much like mentioning meat-consumption on a raw vegan diet forum or mentioning the positive contribution to Mankind of Thomas Edison on a forum devoted to Nikola Tesla.

As regards  the other comment re  my "bellicosity":- On a more cynical note, I should point out that, based on my own past experience, forums which are too polite/deferent and non-confrontational tend often to become extinct due to lack of posts. Some controversy is sometimes needed in order to generate interest/posts in online  forums. 
Geoff