The Stone Age Rage
Another day, another diet advertisement. Are you fed up with the constant bombardment from advertisers claiming to have THE PERFECT DIET solution? I counted 21 different 'perfect solutions' in the grocery store, taken from magazine covers, while waiting in line at the check-out. I picked up one and briefly scanned the ingredients and noticing nothing breakthrough or novel, I instead looked at customer carts around me (something I tend to do as I find it interesting to see what the average American eats) and realized that most contained nothing suggested by the article I had just perused. No surprise there.
As I love to poke fun at things that advertisers do to try and lure the public into buying whatever they're selling (in this case-magazines), I decided to play with Paleo. Now, if you follow my blog and have visited my Diet/Recipes page, you may have noticed that I have a recipe for Paleo Persimmon Pudding. I don't follow a Paleo diet-I just love food and great recipes and it happens to be one of them. That's my little disclaimer so now let's get right down to the business of picking on Paleo!
*Advertisers exact wording appears in pink; my responses appear in black
The Ultimate Paleo Way to Get Lean, Strong and Sexy Did you know that for 2.5 MILLION years, our ancestors consumed a diet that kept them naturally slim, strong, and vibrant? A diet packed with juicy, satisfying proteins and healthy carbs? A diet that bulletproofed their bodies against chronic disease, because it's what the human body was designed to eat?
Yes, I'm sure sexy was a top priority for caveman! To say we know what an entire population ate that long ago when there is little evidence from a LARGE enough sampling is just guessing. Same can be said about their weight. Besides, for those that were slim, don't you think this had more to do with: running for your life on a regular basis, having to constantly forage for food, and lack of food with labels? As in, all natural, no preservatives, no added sugar, etc., most likely prompting a " Holy crap, this food tastes nasty!" response? Plus, there was no TV, so laying around snacking while watching soap operas wasn't an option. And juicy, satisfying proteins? I don't know...how good did pterodactyl taste? Maybe it was tough and rubbery but compared to eating pine cones, cattails and grass, it was probably pretty good. They were far from bulletproofed against disease-in fact, the average life span is considered to have been around 18 years! Far too short for chronic disease or cancer to occur. In fact, this may have been the only real happy player in terms of Paleo dieting (looks like he caught the runner, LOL!):
BTW-caveman did not really live alongside dinosaurs as is often portrayed as dinosaurs became extinct about 66 million years before the appearance of homo sapiens. What the heck happened? Let's just say, we probably didn't realize how good we had it. But now you can reclaim the protein-rich, fat-burning, health-boosting diet you were born to eat — and lose up to 15 pounds in one month! Your modern body has ancient needs, and today's engineered foods are far from what you were designed to eat. On the other hand, the Stone Age diet — known as Paleo eating — is perfectly suited to the human metabolism and digestive system.
Oh yes, they had it good. Good in terms of eating naturally but 'good' means something entirely different in today's world! Trying to interest someone in raw food is typically met with "Eww, I don't like it", said in a whiny little voice. Our modern bodies do have ancient needs and it's agreed-these needs have been met with highly-processed versions of what we should be eating, this much is true. However, if you plan on following the Paleo diet and are a vegan or vegetarian, expect it to present specific challenges. If you're a meat eater, you can break into your little happy dance now because as long as you choose free-range organic, it's all fair game. Literally-bear, emu, kangaroo and rattlesnake are all on the list of approved Paleo meats. Yum....And, now all animals can live in fear of humans.
You see, even 10,000 years isn't nearly enough time for our bodies to make the genetic changes necessary to adapt to the highly processed foods, additives, and preservatives stuffed into today's meals. That's why we're currently facing an epidemic of obesity, food intolerance ailments, and metabolic health problems (like diabetes and high blood pressure) that seem to have no medical solution.
I don't know what your view on evolution is but here I just have to insert 'The Ten Major Flaws of Evolution' because I believe we will never experience genetic changes necessary to survive the effects of the current state of our food supply; instead, we will only become sicker. I really can't poke fun at this Paleo-point as it is spot on yet this is not limited to just the Paleo perspective-anyone who eats should be concerned about what's going into their mouth. This may be a lengthy insert but I promise, it is a good and thought-provoking must-read:
Ten Major Flaws of Evolution - Revised By Randy Alcorn, Jim Darnall | October 3, 2010
I wrote the following article many years ago, and it has now been through two revisions. Thanks to Phil Gaskill for working on the latest revision and providing additional updated information.
1. The complexity of living systems could never evolve by chance—they had to be designed and created. A system that is irreducibly complex is one in which all the components work together and are essential to perform the system’s basic function. (A mousetrap is a simple example.) It is not possible to build such a system gradually, one component at a time, since it cannot function unless all components are present. Many living systems exhibit such irreducible complexity (e.g vision, blood clotting, etc.). When you look at a watch, you assume there was a watchmaker. A watch is too complex to “happen” by chance. Yet living systems are vastly more complex than a watch. Darwin considered this fact one of the most serious challenges to his theory of evolution. The magnitude of this challenge has increased exponentially since Darwin’s time as the details of living systems have been uncovered down to and below the level of the cell. The incredible machinery of life exists in networks so complex and interdependent that they could not have arisen gradually or through random chance – they simply had to be designed and created.
2. The high information content of DNA could only have come from intelligence. According to information science, information can only be produced by intelligence. Highly complex information must originate from a highly intelligent source. DNA is by far the most compact and complex information storage/retrieval system known. A pinhead-sized amount of DNA has a billion times more information capacity than a 4-gigabit hard drive, can contain multiple copies of all the information necessary to build and maintain things as complex as the human brain and body, and is self-replicating. However, the proponents of evolution believe that random chance, not intelligence, gave rise to all of the information found in DNA. Ironically, evolutionary scientists involved in the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project search the sky with massive radio telescopes, hoping to detect even simple patterns in radio signals which might be a sign of otherworldly intelligence, all the while ignoring the clear evidence of intelligence built into the incredibly complex DNA patterns of every living creature right here on Earth.
3. Mutations do not increase information, as required by evolution. Mutations are thought to drive evolution, but they cannot increase information. Mutations can only change DNA by deleting, damaging, duplicating, or substituting already existing information. The vast majority of mutations are harmful or have no apparent effect. Over 100 years of fruit fly experiments have clearly demonstrated that mutations only result in normal, dead, or grotesquely deformed fruit flies – they are still fruit flies! Even mutations which are in some way beneficial (such as antibiotic resistance in bacteria or wingless beetles on windy islands) result from the loss of information. This is the opposite of the vast increase in information required to get from amoeba to man, as proposed in the theory of evolution.
4. Natural Selection is conservative, not creative. The concept of natural selection was originally developed by natural theologians, who thought that it worked to preserve distinct created types. Darwin argued that natural selection, if given enough time, could actually create new types. However, field and laboratory observations of natural selection in action confirm that it only changes the relative abundance of certain already-existing characteristics, and doesn’t create new ones. For example, Darwin observed that the average beak size of finches increased in dry years, but later observers noted that this trend reversed in wet years. This is very different than the kind of changes that would be required to transform a finch beak into some other structure or a finch into a completely different kind of animal. In other words, scientific studies of natural selection demonstrate, without exception, that Darwin was wrong.
5. There is a total lack of undisputed examples (fossilized or living) of the millions of transitional forms required for evolution to be true. If evolution were true, we should be surrounded by a zoo of transitional forms that cannot be categorized as one particular life form. But we don’t see this—there are different kinds of dogs, but all are clearly dogs. The fossils show different sizes of horses, but all are clearly horses. None is on the verge of being some other life form. The fossil record shows complex fossilized life suddenly appearing, and there are major gaps between every major “kind” of life. Darwin acknowledged that if his theory were true, it would require millions of transitional forms. He believed they would be found in fossil records. They haven’t been.
6. Pictures of ape-to-human “missing links” are extremely subjective and based on evolutionists’ already-formed assumptions. Often they are simply contrived. The series of pictures or models that show progressive development from a little monkey to modern man are an insult to scientific research. These are often based on fragmentary remains that can be “reconstructed” a hundred different ways. Many supposed “ape-men” are very clearly apes, and most fossils hailed with much fanfare as “missing links” are later quietly reclassified as simply extinct varieties of non-human primates. Evolutionists now admit that other so-called “ape-men” were fully human. The body hair and the blank expressions of the supposedly primitive humans in these models don’t come from the bones, but from the evolutionary assumptions of the artist. Virtually nothing can be determined about hair and the look in someone’s eyes based on a few old bones. The “missing links” are still missing.
7. The radioactive dating methods that evolutionists use to assign millions and billions of years to rocks are based on questionable assumptions and give unreliable results. Dating methods that use radioactive decay to determine a rock’s age assume that the original amounts of parent and daughter isotopes can be accurately estimated, that no isotopes moved into or out of the rock after its formation (closed system), and that radioactive decay rates have always been constant. However, the original amounts of parent and daughter isotopes can rarely be estimated with reasonable accuracy. In addition, it is commonly acknowledged that hydrothermal fluids (hot, mineral-rich water) often transport both parent and daughter isotopes from one rock to another, invalidating the closed system assumption. In fact, this process is often cited as a reason for rejecting dates that don’t fit the evolutionary timeline. What is not commonly known is that radioactive dating methods usually give a number of different results for the same formation and often even for the same rock! In practice, geologists choose the “correct” age from among these different results based on the age expected from the evolutionary timeline. This is a classic case of circular thinking! Also, different methods give different results, with heavier isotopes consistently giving older ages than lighter isotopes for the same rock. This pattern should not exist if radioactive decay rates have always been the same. Furthermore, lava flows with known historical ages often date as millions or even billions of years old. If radioactive dating methods can be off by so much for rocks of known age, how can they be considered reliable for rocks of unknown age?
8. “Leftover” body structures are not evidence for evolution. Evolutionists point to vestigial organs (supposedly “leftover” body structures with no know function) as evidence of evolution. However, it’s impossible to prove that an organ is useless, because there’s always the possibility that a use may be discovered in the future. In fact, over 100 organs formerly thought of as vestigial are now known to perform essential functions. Scientists continue to discover uses for such organs and only a small number are still considered vestigial. It is increasingly clear that vestigial organs are not the result of evolution but simply examples of scientific ignorance. It’s also worth noting that even if an organ were no longer needed (e.g., eyes of blind creatures in caves), it would prove devolution not evolution. Proponents of evolution need to provide examples of developing organs that are not yet fully functional but can be shown to be increasing in complexity with each succeeding generation. No such examples exist.
9. Evolution is said to have begun by spontaneous generation—a concept ridiculed by biology. When I was a sophomore in high school, and a brand new Christian, my biology class spent the first semester discussing how ignorant people used to believe that garbage gave rise to rats, and raw meat produced maggots. This now disproven concept was called “spontaneous generation.” Louis Pasteur proved that life only comes from life—this is the law of biogenesis. The next semester we studied evolution, where we learned that the first living cell came from a freak combination of nonliving material (where that nonliving material came from we were not told). “Chemical Evolution” is just another way of saying “spontaneous generation”—life comes from nonlife. Evolution is therefore built on a fallacy science long ago proved to be impossible. Evolutionists admit that the chances of evolutionary progress are extremely low. Yet, they believe that given enough time, the apparently impossible becomes possible. If I flip a coin, I have a 50/50 chance of getting heads. To get five “heads” in a row is unlikely but possible. If I flipped the coin long enough, I would eventually get five in a row. If I flipped it for years nonstop, I might get 50 or even 100 in a row. But this is only because getting heads is an inherent possibility. What are the chances of me flipping a coin, and then seeing it sprout arms and legs, and go sit in a corner and read a magazine? No chance. Given billions of years, the chances would never increase. Great periods of time make the possible likely but never make the impossible possible. No matter how long it’s given, non-life will not become alive.
10. The scientific method can only test existing data—it cannot draw conclusions about origins. There are two types of science. Operational science deals with the present, and arrives at conclusions based on repeated observations of existing phenomena. Historical science deals with the past, which is not repeatable. Investigations of origins clearly fall within the scope of historical science, and therefore cannot draw definitive conclusions. Since no man was there to record or even witness the beginning, conclusions must be made only on the basis of interpreting presently available information. This interpretation is greatly influenced by one’s prior beliefs. If I put on rose-colored glasses, I will always see red. I accept the Bible’s teaching on creation, and see the evidence as being consistently supportive of that belief. When dealing with origins, everyone who believes anything does so by faith, whether faith in God, the Bible, themselves, modern science, or the dependability of his own subjective interpretations of existing data. I would rather put my faith in God’s revealed Word.
Now, back to Paleo.
So are you ready to get back to basics? Are you ready to rediscover the deliciously satisfying, high-protein, healthy-carb diet that your body naturally craves? Developed by Loren Cordain, PhD, the world's leading expert on the Paleolithic life and diet and the founder of the Paleo movement, The Ultimate Paleo Diet delivers THE definitive science and a simple-to-follow plan to help you lose weight and get healthier at the same time, without hunger or cravings. With The Ultimate Paleo Diet, there's no guesswork or hype — just a straightforward, science-backed plan built around eating the delicious whole foods your body naturally craves. It's the world's healthiest diet and the perfect way to uncover the primal you — lean, strong, sexy, and healthy for life!
• Uncover toned, tight muscle • Lose weight fast — many see results in as little as 3 days! • Ignite all-day energy! • Tune your metabolism for nonstop fat burning • Fortify your immune system and stay healthy for life Thousands of people are losing weight, getting lean, and loving their bodies, simply by switching to the “perfect human diet.” Isn't it time you reclaimed the svelte, sexy, healthy body you were designed to have? I am ready to get back to basics! That's what my entire blog has been about for the last 9 months! It has worked for me and it has been deliciously satisfying. I credit that to cutting out the bad crap-for the most part-and eating primarily unprocessed foods. My body has become far more quiet-you know, that inner angst due to the devil on one shoulder whispering in your ear while the other has the angel trying to whisper louder that you shouldn't listen to that pesky little varmint trying to pull you to the dark side, causing so much turmoil that you can barely think of anything but junk food calling your name? Pretty much gone now. Maybe Paleo will do it for you. But I think you know by now my thoughts on DIETS. The best diet, the perfect diet, will always be the one that works for you and that you can stick with. It must come down to feeding your body for vitality, longevity, health and well-being. If you get your sexy on by doing this, that's a bonus!
