by Nikitas » Wed Jul 14, 2010 8:56 pm
"an overly long intestine (best suited for vegetables), " not according to the biologists I read. They seem to concur that the length of the human intestine is indicative of an omnivore, as is dentition.
It is also interesting to see that the cholesterol levels of hunter-fishermen gatherer communities are lower than in western vegetarians while diabetes is an almost non existent condition.
In the Trobriand islands where eating a mixed diet of fish, meat and various vegetables is the norm, blood pressure drops with advancing age and obesity is unknown. In almost every instance where the carbohydrate rich western diet was introduced to formely meat eating communities the results have been catastrophic- native Americans, Masai, Innuit and so on.
THe Houston cardiology center had an interesing comparative study in the survival of recovering heart patients a while back. IT compared those on a paleolithic diet with those on a low cholesterol carb rich one, the results are enlightening, long gut or not the paleo dieters did much better.