I went a month eating nothing but boiled rice, scallops and water. It was the highest energy/mood/libido diet I’ve ever tried, but I couldn’t maintain weight because it tasted gross.
My prior probability that any diet consisting solely of rice, water and any one X is a bad idea is very high. I’d want to see very strong evidence that scallops really do contain everything a human needs to remain healthy.
Many of the other extreme elimination diets I tried showed obvious signs of micronutrient deficiency. For example, I tried bread and water, lean meat and water, etc. It’s easy to recognize signs of deficiency—fatigue, cravings, etc.
But I wouldn’t say scallops have everything. I did lose weight. I think you’d have to add in some fish to get a complete diet. Not so much for vitamins or minerals, but for something related to satiety and macronutrient composition. It could be insufficient fats/oils, or maybe you can’t get enough protein because it triggers satiety too fast due to impending overdose of some micronutrient. Or maybe it’s just the taste.
I’ve been going for many months on a diet of solely rice, fish, scallops, rice and shrimp. Since I’m still healthy and productive, there can’t be any short or medium-term deficiency there.
In general, however, a meat-only elimination diet works. See the Stefansson trial, and his study from living with Eskimos. Meat with sufficient fat on it is all that is needed to sustain human life, and it can even come from a single animal, as long as that animal isn’t being grain fed from mineral depleted soil.
Thus it’s not so much surprising that rice, water, and any X meat is sufficient for health. Rather, the extreme positive biological reaction to micronutrient overload from high scallops intake is what’s surprising.
Why do you think it is that supplements are so much more toxic than food? Eat a dozen oysters, you’ll get 1200% of the RDA of zinc and feel great. Eat 12 zinc pills, and you’ll probably vomit within 5 minutes.
What about food buffers the effects of minerals? I’ve come to understand that the ratios of minerals is of supreme importance and of course food has much more complex ratios of minerals, but I’m sure there is something else going on here.
Why do you think it is that supplements are so much more toxic than food? Eat a dozen oysters, you’ll get 1200% of the RDA of zinc and feel great. Eat 12 zinc pills, and you’ll probably vomit within 5 minutes.
I’d like to test that theory. I’ll be back in five minutes.
If I was betting on it, I would have said within 20 minutes and on an empty stomach. You should get nauseous, at least, but the contents of your stomach might be enough to hold it down.
If I was betting on it, I would have said within 20 minutes and on an empty stomach. You should get nauseous, at least, but the contents of your stomach might be enough to hold it down.
I haven’t eaten anything in 4 hours. I had 12 pills in one swallow each of which apparently has two and a half times the RDI of zinc for males. I haven’t experienced any nausea. If I head eaten a dozen oysters on the other hand I am almost certain I’d have vomited. But that says a lot more about my aversion to oysters than their zinc content.
More generally I can confirm that taking vitamins on an empty stomach most certainly does produce more acute side effects. For example I tried a pharmacological dose of niacin (1g) on an empty stomach and apart from the intense pain and flushing over my entire body I was extremely nauseous and nearly passed out. The same dose with a meal only gives me a mild, almost pleasant tingling sensation—albeit one that lasted longer.
Surprising to me. A single pill of zinc causes nausea in me on an empty stomach. Any chance you were suffering from an acute zinc defiency?
Do you disagree with the hypothesis that food is better than supplements? Potassium is probably the best example as a supplement that can be quite dangerous. Doctors will warn you in fear about taking 100% of the RDA of potassium via supplements without using an extended release pill, but would happily encourage you to drink 4 cans of coconut water.
Surprising to me. A single pill of zinc causes nausea in me on an empty stomach.
I seem to have a fairly strong stomach with respect to anything that doesn’t squick me out.
Any chance you were suffering from an acute zinc defiency?
No, basically not. I’ve been supplementing zinc semi-regularly only because my hair tissue sample put my copper levels at somewhat elevated. Zinc helps with that.
Do you disagree with the hypothesis that food is better than supplements?
Until such time as someone provides a supplement with a sufficiently formula including both macro and micronutrients as well as sufficient filler to delay the digestion to desirable rates, yes. But then I suppose you would just call that “artificial food”.
Potassium is probably the best example as a supplement that can be quite dangerous. Doctors will warn you in fear about taking 100% of the RDA of potassium via supplements without using an extended release pill, but would happily encourage you to drink 4 cans of coconut water.
There are certainly things that really do need to be diluted or, better, taken with food. Given how important potassium balance is in the regulation of cell membranes and whatnot it is not surprising that putting a whole bunch in one place (ie. a tablet) can kill cells! Even 4 cans of water with potassium added would be fine—even though it would probably taste vile.
How did you pick a hair testing lab? It does seem like hair testing should be the best way of testing for zinc, but reportedly there are wide variances between results at different labs, such that mainstream medicine seems to mostly discourage hair testing. Or skeptics can tear into it. http://www.quackwatch.com/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/hair.html
Just via a doctor. I’m not sure how much I trust it but there was little harm in playing along. I was mostly interested in checking for chronic metal poisoning—which I returned rather excessively positive for (Aluminium).
How much did it cost, were you able to get insurance to pay for it, and if so, how?
Cost $100 if I recall. It’s one of the few medical services I actually had to pay for here (Australia) - it’s not quite mainstream enough to be covered by medicare.
Doctors tell you not to take 100% RDA potassium via supplements, but you go around offering people 70% RDA in the form of 1 tsp KCl? Have you seen any adverse effects?
Green? That’s fascinating. And a little creepy. I usually expect excessive vitamin consumption to produce urine that looks pretty much like berocca—and give or take some urea probably has just about the same mineral concentration. I shall be on the lookout for greenish tinges.
You wrote elsewhere that increased zinc helps with excess copper. If that’s through increased excretion of the copper, it seems like that might contribute...
I asked him about this again and apparently you nailed it. He said he’d been worried that he might have excess copper (he felt tired all the time and had some other symptoms—he had been a vegetarian for a long time) and that’s why he was taking the zinc to begin with. When he saw the green tinge he figured the treatment was working and apparently his symptoms went away at the same time.
There might have been something else going on, I don’t know. It seems at least mildly surprising that you could excrete enough copper to visibly affect urine color.
Interesting thought. I didn’t have the impression that the competition between copper and zinc was quite that vigorous but who knows? I do know that if I had the amount of zinc I had today every day that I’d be guaranteed to wind up with a copper deficiency soon enough (and probably an iron deficiency too) - unless I supplemented with those too to keep a balance.
I went a month eating nothing but boiled rice, scallops and water.
That’s an impressive feat! Unfortunately it tells us only a little about whether scallops give you all the vitamins and minerals you need. From what I understand you will not experience much in the way of scurvy after just one month of being deprived of vitamin C, let alone get a clear picture of the long term results of any lack in the more subtle deficiencies!
I’d love to see some links too. I’d perhaps take for granted that scallops could give the basic minerals we require (seawater has most of the same salts that we need) but the vitamins I’d have expected to be a different story!
I was driven to it by necessity, I have intraheptic cholestasis.
You aren’t very familiar with the paleo literature. Conclusive evidence exists that human beings can consume just about any animal monotonically without suffering nutrient deficiency. Exceptions might be extremely simple animals like snails or maybe starfish that don’t share enough similarity. But most seafood and land animals will work.
The major exception to this rule is that some animals don’t have enough fat to sustain life, which leads to protein poisoning. The solution is to either eat more carbs or more fat from another source.
Vitamin C deficiency is impossible to contract while eating fresh meat. See polar expeditions for details. This is a problem with the “daily value” theory. Vitamin C is present in meat in far smaller amounts than in plants, but because of greater bioavailability, it is actually a better source than plant sources. As long as the meat is fresh.
I may put together all this at some point, with links etc. It’s buried in my notes.
Yes, although hunger decreased dramatically, so I didn’t eat nearly as much scallops as you would think. Scallops have a major impact on food satiety and cravings, I’ve found. I suspect we tend to overconsume food to compensate for low density of key micronutrients.
My long term stable diet is 1. scallops daily, one package; 2. unlimited white rice; 3. lean fish—cod, perch or pollock; 4. shrimp for flavor/texture.
Diluting the scallop content brings down cost. The enhancement effect isn’t quite as extreme, but it’s still very good.
This diet has almost no fat or any other difficult to digest substances due to my intraheptic cholestasis. If you are digestively normal, you could fill out the rest of the diet with any paleo ingredients, as long as you eat scallops daily.
I believe this delivers superior performance to the typical paleo grass-fed organ meat route, but I cannot personally test this due to my limitations. I think humans are well adapted to a shoreline diet due to bottleneck event(s) caused by some natural catastrophe that rendered extinct those humans without access to shorelines. If you’ve watched Survivor, you know that any bipedal idiot can gather shellfish on the beach. Ancient shellfish middens indicate that they were a major food source.
I think humans are well adapted to a shoreline diet due to bottleneck event(s) caused by some natural catastrophe that rendered extinct those humans without access to shorelines.
I think you’re overreaching the idea of adaptation there. Scallops and other bivalve molluscs contain a lot of dietary protein, and also a lot of nutrients we need; part of the reason we need many of those specific nutrients is that unlike even many of our closest relatives, we can’t synthesize them internally. So it shouldn’t be surprising that a food rich in those things, with very few “empty” calories and which is not too calorically dense would be beneficial...
Any citations or links?
I went a month eating nothing but boiled rice, scallops and water. It was the highest energy/mood/libido diet I’ve ever tried, but I couldn’t maintain weight because it tasted gross.
My prior probability that any diet consisting solely of rice, water and any one X is a bad idea is very high. I’d want to see very strong evidence that scallops really do contain everything a human needs to remain healthy.
Many of the other extreme elimination diets I tried showed obvious signs of micronutrient deficiency. For example, I tried bread and water, lean meat and water, etc. It’s easy to recognize signs of deficiency—fatigue, cravings, etc.
But I wouldn’t say scallops have everything. I did lose weight. I think you’d have to add in some fish to get a complete diet. Not so much for vitamins or minerals, but for something related to satiety and macronutrient composition. It could be insufficient fats/oils, or maybe you can’t get enough protein because it triggers satiety too fast due to impending overdose of some micronutrient. Or maybe it’s just the taste.
I’ve been going for many months on a diet of solely rice, fish, scallops, rice and shrimp. Since I’m still healthy and productive, there can’t be any short or medium-term deficiency there.
In general, however, a meat-only elimination diet works. See the Stefansson trial, and his study from living with Eskimos. Meat with sufficient fat on it is all that is needed to sustain human life, and it can even come from a single animal, as long as that animal isn’t being grain fed from mineral depleted soil.
Thus it’s not so much surprising that rice, water, and any X meat is sufficient for health. Rather, the extreme positive biological reaction to micronutrient overload from high scallops intake is what’s surprising.
Why do you think it is that supplements are so much more toxic than food? Eat a dozen oysters, you’ll get 1200% of the RDA of zinc and feel great. Eat 12 zinc pills, and you’ll probably vomit within 5 minutes.
What about food buffers the effects of minerals? I’ve come to understand that the ratios of minerals is of supreme importance and of course food has much more complex ratios of minerals, but I’m sure there is something else going on here.
I’d like to test that theory. I’ll be back in five minutes.
facepalm
If I was betting on it, I would have said within 20 minutes and on an empty stomach. You should get nauseous, at least, but the contents of your stomach might be enough to hold it down.
I haven’t eaten anything in 4 hours. I had 12 pills in one swallow each of which apparently has two and a half times the RDI of zinc for males. I haven’t experienced any nausea. If I head eaten a dozen oysters on the other hand I am almost certain I’d have vomited. But that says a lot more about my aversion to oysters than their zinc content.
More generally I can confirm that taking vitamins on an empty stomach most certainly does produce more acute side effects. For example I tried a pharmacological dose of niacin (1g) on an empty stomach and apart from the intense pain and flushing over my entire body I was extremely nauseous and nearly passed out. The same dose with a meal only gives me a mild, almost pleasant tingling sensation—albeit one that lasted longer.
Now… no more zinc for me for a couple of weeks.
Surprising to me. A single pill of zinc causes nausea in me on an empty stomach. Any chance you were suffering from an acute zinc defiency?
Do you disagree with the hypothesis that food is better than supplements? Potassium is probably the best example as a supplement that can be quite dangerous. Doctors will warn you in fear about taking 100% of the RDA of potassium via supplements without using an extended release pill, but would happily encourage you to drink 4 cans of coconut water.
I seem to have a fairly strong stomach with respect to anything that doesn’t squick me out.
No, basically not. I’ve been supplementing zinc semi-regularly only because my hair tissue sample put my copper levels at somewhat elevated. Zinc helps with that.
Until such time as someone provides a supplement with a sufficiently formula including both macro and micronutrients as well as sufficient filler to delay the digestion to desirable rates, yes. But then I suppose you would just call that “artificial food”.
There are certainly things that really do need to be diluted or, better, taken with food. Given how important potassium balance is in the regulation of cell membranes and whatnot it is not surprising that putting a whole bunch in one place (ie. a tablet) can kill cells! Even 4 cans of water with potassium added would be fine—even though it would probably taste vile.
How did you pick a hair testing lab? It does seem like hair testing should be the best way of testing for zinc, but reportedly there are wide variances between results at different labs, such that mainstream medicine seems to mostly discourage hair testing. Or skeptics can tear into it. http://www.quackwatch.com/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/hair.html
Just via a doctor. I’m not sure how much I trust it but there was little harm in playing along. I was mostly interested in checking for chronic metal poisoning—which I returned rather excessively positive for (Aluminium).
How much did it cost, were you able to get insurance to pay for it, and if so, how?
Cost $100 if I recall. It’s one of the few medical services I actually had to pay for here (Australia) - it’s not quite mainstream enough to be covered by medicare.
Doctors tell you not to take 100% RDA potassium via supplements, but you go around offering people 70% RDA in the form of 1 tsp KCl? Have you seen any adverse effects?
My friend mentioned having a greenish tinge to his urine after taking high dozes of zinc for some time. Do you observe anything like that?
Green? That’s fascinating. And a little creepy. I usually expect excessive vitamin consumption to produce urine that looks pretty much like berocca—and give or take some urea probably has just about the same mineral concentration. I shall be on the lookout for greenish tinges.
You wrote elsewhere that increased zinc helps with excess copper. If that’s through increased excretion of the copper, it seems like that might contribute...
I asked him about this again and apparently you nailed it. He said he’d been worried that he might have excess copper (he felt tired all the time and had some other symptoms—he had been a vegetarian for a long time) and that’s why he was taking the zinc to begin with. When he saw the green tinge he figured the treatment was working and apparently his symptoms went away at the same time.
There might have been something else going on, I don’t know. It seems at least mildly surprising that you could excrete enough copper to visibly affect urine color.
Interesting thought. I didn’t have the impression that the competition between copper and zinc was quite that vigorous but who knows? I do know that if I had the amount of zinc I had today every day that I’d be guaranteed to wind up with a copper deficiency soon enough (and probably an iron deficiency too) - unless I supplemented with those too to keep a balance.
Pictures or it didn’t happen.
That’s an impressive feat! Unfortunately it tells us only a little about whether scallops give you all the vitamins and minerals you need. From what I understand you will not experience much in the way of scurvy after just one month of being deprived of vitamin C, let alone get a clear picture of the long term results of any lack in the more subtle deficiencies!
I’d love to see some links too. I’d perhaps take for granted that scallops could give the basic minerals we require (seawater has most of the same salts that we need) but the vitamins I’d have expected to be a different story!
I was driven to it by necessity, I have intraheptic cholestasis.
You aren’t very familiar with the paleo literature. Conclusive evidence exists that human beings can consume just about any animal monotonically without suffering nutrient deficiency. Exceptions might be extremely simple animals like snails or maybe starfish that don’t share enough similarity. But most seafood and land animals will work.
The major exception to this rule is that some animals don’t have enough fat to sustain life, which leads to protein poisoning. The solution is to either eat more carbs or more fat from another source.
Vitamin C deficiency is impossible to contract while eating fresh meat. See polar expeditions for details. This is a problem with the “daily value” theory. Vitamin C is present in meat in far smaller amounts than in plants, but because of greater bioavailability, it is actually a better source than plant sources. As long as the meat is fresh.
I may put together all this at some point, with links etc. It’s buried in my notes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit_starvation
That sounds extremely expensive. (And I know where to get cheap frozen scallops.) What’s the next best cheap diet?
Yes, although hunger decreased dramatically, so I didn’t eat nearly as much scallops as you would think. Scallops have a major impact on food satiety and cravings, I’ve found. I suspect we tend to overconsume food to compensate for low density of key micronutrients.
My long term stable diet is 1. scallops daily, one package; 2. unlimited white rice; 3. lean fish—cod, perch or pollock; 4. shrimp for flavor/texture.
Diluting the scallop content brings down cost. The enhancement effect isn’t quite as extreme, but it’s still very good.
This diet has almost no fat or any other difficult to digest substances due to my intraheptic cholestasis. If you are digestively normal, you could fill out the rest of the diet with any paleo ingredients, as long as you eat scallops daily.
I believe this delivers superior performance to the typical paleo grass-fed organ meat route, but I cannot personally test this due to my limitations. I think humans are well adapted to a shoreline diet due to bottleneck event(s) caused by some natural catastrophe that rendered extinct those humans without access to shorelines. If you’ve watched Survivor, you know that any bipedal idiot can gather shellfish on the beach. Ancient shellfish middens indicate that they were a major food source.
I think you’re overreaching the idea of adaptation there. Scallops and other bivalve molluscs contain a lot of dietary protein, and also a lot of nutrients we need; part of the reason we need many of those specific nutrients is that unlike even many of our closest relatives, we can’t synthesize them internally. So it shouldn’t be surprising that a food rich in those things, with very few “empty” calories and which is not too calorically dense would be beneficial...
Sometimes it’s better to ask than to assume someone has already exhausted his case.
http://eatingoffthefoodgrid.blogspot.com/2009/10/pleistocene-diet.html http://www.ted.com/talks/elaine_morgan_says_we_evolved_from_aquatic_apes.html
.
Yes, unfortunately