In Part Three of the “Get Ripped Guide”, I made the point that you should “eat what you were designed to eat.”
This seems fairly obvious. You should NOT eat a steady diet of broken glass and motor oil because this is NOT what humans were designed to consume.
Of course, that’s an extreme example of straying from what you were designed to eat. You wouldn’t eat a broken bottle… but how about a bag of potato chips?
Neither one is ideal for human consumption. Eating a broken bottle may kill you instantly. Eating potato chips won’t kill you instantly. But what actually happens when you stray from eating what you as a human being were designed to eat?
In this article, we’ll take a look at an interesting study done almost 75 years ago that clearly illustrates what happens when we stray from our nutritional roots.
The Story Of Pottenger’s Cats
Between 1932 and 1942, Dr. Francis Pottenger conducted nutritional studies using over 900 cats as his test subjects.
In one of his studies, he fed two different diets to two groups of cats. The first group of cats received a diet of two-thirds raw meat, one-third raw milk and cod liver oil. The second group of cats received the same rations but their meat was cooked rather than raw.
Here’s what happened:
The cats that received the raw meat were healthy. But the cats that received the cooked meat developed medical problems.
• They were lazy and started to develop degenerative diseases.
• The second generation of cats (ie: the kittens born to the cats fed the cooked meat) developed degenerative diseases by mid-life and suffered from partial loss of coordination at about the same time.
• The third generation of cats (ie: The “grand kittens”) developed diseases at a young age. Many were born blind. Facial features were altered. Bones were soft. Temperaments were altered. Females were aggressive and males were passive. Over 90% developed skin disorders. All kittens died before reaching six months of age.
• All cats died by the fourth generation. This represents total extinction of the test subjects in this group.
So What Does This Prove?
Many people will get caught up in the fact that one group of cats was fed raw meat while the other was fed cooked meat.
Some will even point to this study as proof that everyone should eat a raw food diet.
But that is not what this study is about. This study is about what happens when you consume foods you were not meant to eat.
Cats for example, were designed to eat raw meat. Even today, a wild tiger will kill it’s prey and eat the flesh raw.
Humans were NOT designed to eat chips, drink soda pop and smoke cigarettes. And if you continually subject your body to these unnatural choices, it will eventually catch up with you.
(Interesting theory: The term Hardgainers - or those who have difficulty gaining muscle - is applied to someone with certain genetic disadvantage such as long arms and legs or short muscle bellies. This is passed on from your parents.
So… is it possible that you are hardgainer because of the food choices your ancestors made? Like I said, just a theory but interesting still.)
So whether you are trying to gain muscle or burn off body fat, stick with the foods you were designed to eat and you’ll enjoy greater health and vitality.
(HINT: Meat, fish, fowl, eggs, vegetables, fruits and nuts. If you can’t kill it, catch it, pick it or grow it, don’t eat it. And don’t forget to eat some liver too.)
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Great post! I definitely agree with you on this. I myself advocate eating a “Caveman’s diet.” Just seems to make sense that if that’s what we evolved to eat , than we should continue to stick with it. Plus, if a caveman can do it… how hard could it be? haha.. a lil Geico humor there!
I wonder then, should we be eating raw meat? I remember reading about some bodybuilder who did so. I don’t think I could stomach it personally, but it poses an interesting question… especially after reading about what happened to the poor lil kitties.
Have a great day!
Brandon
http://www.hardgainermusclebuilding.com
There’s people on both sides of the fence for the raw meat issue.
One thing to remember is raw meat is part of the natural diet - for cats. This cannot necessarily be translated to humans.
Scientists estimate that humans have been using fire to cook food for over a million years so perhaps at this point it’s more natural for us as a species to eat cooked food.
No matter which way you decide to go (raw or cooked) you can probably find evidence to support your decision.
There was an article recently at NYTimes I think that dealt specifically with humans eating cooked meat. It is almost a sure bet that humans would not survive long on a diet of raw meat. Cooking meat may have actually provided us with a huge advantage over other species we were competing with.
Our bodies have evolved to take advantage of the surplus of energy that we gain by not having to break down raw meat. We don’t expend near the energy a large cat does just digesting the meat. We can divert that energy to run our power hungry brains and muscles.
Our immune systems have taken for granted that we will not consume bacteria laden raw meat regularly. It has been theorized that our appendices exist only as a remnant of an organ designed to store and release friendly bacteria to aid in the digestion of raw meat.
From an evolutionary standpoint, on a large scale, the humans who ate cooked meat had an advantage over those who didn’t. It digests quicker and yields more usable calories, it’s safer, and it keeps longer. It doesn’t necessarily mean it’s better for you as an individual, but for our species, it was one of the factors that put us where we’re at on the food chain.
Be that as it may, raw meat might actually prove a better food than potato chips, soda pop, and cigarettes.
Jeff:
Great comment. I’d love to see the article if you’ve got a link.
I had always heard (again, nothing scientific to back this up just what I’ve heard over the years) that raw meat is easier to digest than cooked meat. But it sounds like the NY times article might refute that.
Thanks again for your comment.
Matt,
I think the article is now blocked behind their pay-for-content wall. However, I was able to dig up a similar article here: http://scienceblogs.com/purepedantry/2007/06/did_cooking_allow_for_the_incr.php
It’s more from an archaeological perspective, but raises some interesting points.
Jeff.
smoked/dried meat aka. jerky if you don’t like raw meat is just as good. But not out of the store! Make your own, easy to do. fish just the same, even better. I like the post up above, simple rule: If you didn’t make it or grow it, it’s not good for you.
this is probably the best diet advice you can give to people. keep up the good work.
I would take this with a pinch of salt. Domestic cats have been eating cat food for the past 50 years or more, and somehow they still manage to survive, although they were definitely not meant to eat dried-up chemicals. There are very few things the animal (and by extenstion human) body won’t adapt to, I don’ty think we were “programmed” for a certain type of food, or lifestyle - we were simply programmed for survival. Some things are worse than other, but ultimately everything e eat will end up killing us. Just my $0.02…
The issue is NOT survival.
And I think you’re confusing “surviving” with “thriving”.
Many humans “survive” by eating fast food 3 times a day. Just because this diet does not kill them within a month does NOT mean that this is ideal or that we as a species have adapted to this kind of diet.
Most of us are fortunate enough to choose what kinds of foods we eat. So survival is not the crux of the issue anymore. But rather — what should we eat for optimal health and performance?