[Ghost of V]

Our ancestors had such good diets from all those freshly picked veggies that they lived to be about 30 if they were lucky.

30 years in their time was 200 years in our time.

I thought this was common knowledge.

[Rama Set]

In the past humans lived to 800 years old, disease was unknown and sunlight came out of their eyes. All because of dirt covered kale and raw liver.

[markjo]

I had no idea that eating dirt was healthy.

Where do you think plants get their nutrients?  Checkmate!!

[DuckDodgers]

Why do 3000 year old mummies show signs of cancer if diet prevents such disease?

[Tom Bishop]

I take multi-vitamins everyday because I have a terrible diet.

I wouldn't take multivitamin tablets. Multivitamin tablets are full of binding agents and magnesium stearate, an artificial flow agent used to keep the substances from sticking to the equipment while in processing. I wouldn't put that in my body. Magneseum stearate has been shown to inhibit the body's killer t-cells.

In addition, the majority of the vitamins you find in the stores are not a good quality, and are often derived from synthetically generated substances. Synthetically derived iron and vitamin E have been shown to cause a number of issues if taken long term. The best vitamin supplements are what are called whole foods vitamins.

Read this article: Why Synthetic Supplements Are Terrible And Whole Food Supplements Are Way Better

Tom, are you saying that if I take a handful of these multi-vitamins a day (isntead of just 3) that I'll have perfect health and could potentially live forever? Does Vitamin C counter aging as well? How many vitamins do I have to take per day to become immortal?

You won't live forever, but you will live the full term of your natural life, until your body gets so old and worn with age and shortened telomers that it can't function and repair itself properly and properly use vitamins.

Linus Pauling, megadose vitamin C advocate, died in 1994 from prostate cancer. Mayo Clinic cancer researcher Charles G. Moertel, M.D., critic of Pauling and vitamin C, also died in 1994, and also from cancer (lymphoma). Dr. Moertel was 66 years old. Dr. Pauling was 93 years old. One needs to make up ones own mind as to whether this does or does not indicate benefit from vitamin C.

[Tom Bishop]

Our ancestors had such good diets from all those freshly picked veggies that they lived to be about 30 if they were lucky.

[Tom Bishop]

Why do 3000 year old mummies show signs of cancer if diet prevents such disease?

If those mummies were elderly then their bodies were so broken down with the natural process of aging that their bodies could not process the vitamins needed to protect them. Vitamins do not stop cell death and telomere shortening which preprograms our death. Also, it is readily admitted that finding signs of cancer in mummies and ancient remains is exceedingly rare.

[Saddam Hussein]

That number is an average life expectancy, which is skewed by the infant mortality rate.

I watched about twenty seconds of this before turning it off.  Do you have a better source for this information?

[Tom Bishop]

I watched about twenty seconds of this before turning it off.  Do you have a better source for this information?

It's a common myth and bad math. Just google it: http://paleoleap.com/why-cavemen-didnt-die-young/

[garygreen]

Tom is actually correct on this point.Although life expectancy was much smaller for paleolithic peoples, this is largely due to infant mortality.  Those who survived childhood had similar lifespans to modern humans.

Of course, the truth of this fact actually undermines Tom's larger argument: their 'natural' diets didn't extend their lifespans beyond that of a modern human.  Eating whole foods didn't save them from disease or extend their lives beyond what one would expect from modern humans.

[Tom Bishop]

Tom is actually correct on this point.Although life expectancy was much smaller for paleolithic peoples, this is largely due to infant mortality.  Those who survived childhood had similar lifespans to modern humans.

Of course, the truth of this fact actually undermines Tom's larger argument: their 'natural' diets didn't extend their lifespans beyond that of a modern human.  Eating whole foods didn't save them from disease or extend their lives beyond what one would expect from modern humans.

Firstly, I never said that eating a good diet would allow you to live longer than your body's pre-programmed death. I claimed nothing of the sort. That's a fiction of your own imagination. A good diet simply allows you to live healthier with less disease.

Secondly, there are a lot of confounding factors when making direct comparisons between today and pre-society. War with other clans was probably a lot more common. Accidents, getting lost and injured, famine, cold winters, getting enslaved, and getting murdered for your pelts are things which would affect the life expectancy numbers. A lot of those people weren't living in peace, to the maximum possible they could. Averaging the average age of death for adults who survived childhood doesn't really tell us anything about the benefit of their diet.

Also, it was apparently common in very early times to send the elderly off to die.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senicide

Heruli

The Heruli were a Germanic tribe during the Migration Period (about 400 to 800 CE). Procopius states in his work The Wars, that the Heruli placed the sick and elderly on a tall stack of wood and stabbed them to death before setting the pyre alight.

India

Senicide is currently practiced in Tamil Nadu, a state of India. The traditional practice of senicide by the family members is called Thalaikoothal. In this custom, the elderly person is given an extensive oil-bath early in the morning and subsequently made to drink glasses of tender coconut water which results in renal failure, high fever, fits, and death within a day or two.

Inuit

A common belief is that the Inuit would leave their elderly on the ice to die

Japan

Ubasute (姥捨, abandoning an old woman), a custom allegedly performed in Japan in the distant past, whereby an infirm or elderly relative was carried to a mountain, or some other remote, desolate place, and left there to die. This custom has been vividly depicted in the The Ballad of Narayama (a 1956 novel by Shichirō Fukazawa, a 1958 film, and a 1983 film).

Serbia

Lapot [lapot] is the mythical practice of senicide in Serbia:[1][2][3] killing one's parents, or other elderly family members, once they become a financial burden on the family.

Sweden

Ättestupa (Swedish for: kin/clan precipice) is, according to tradition, a steep precipice where elderly people during Nordic prehistoric times are said to have thrown themselves, or were thrown, to their deaths. According to legend, this was done when the old people were unable to support themselves or assist in a household.

[markjo]

For those of you who watch what you eat... Here's the final word on nutrition and health. It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting medical studies.

1. The Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans.

2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans.

3. The Japanese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans.

4. The Italians drink excessive amounts of red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans.

5. The Germans drink a lot of beers and eat lots of sausages and fats and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans.

CONCLUSION: Eat and drink what you like. Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

[EnigmaZV]

It might be all the copypasta in their diet.

[Tom Bishop]

I had no idea that eating dirt was healthy. These are great tips, Tom. I'll make sure to eat a handful of dirt a day now.

Absolutely. Eating dirt every day is one of the best ways to stay healthy. It's a back to the basics approach to health where modern medicine is thrown out the window in favor of the solution nature has already provided us.

Dirt: The Superfood That Makes You Happier, Smarter & Healthier

According to studies conducted at Bristol University and Sage Colleges concluded that soil-based organisms make us happier and smarter, while other research shows they help regulate the immune system, reduce inflammation, break down our food for us,  assist us with detoxification, and even bring out the best in use by influencing our genetic expression.

Plus, in this double-blind, placebo controlled study researchers found that IBS patients who took a soil-based probiotic experienced a significant reduction in symptoms after two weeks. A follow-up study found that the patients were still experiencing these benefits 1 year after discontinuing the probiotic, presumably because the beneficial bacteria stays in the gut and continues to function.

[Rushy]

Tom, they're talking about the organisms in the dirt, not the dirt itself. Literally eating handfuls of dirt would be terrible for you.

[Tom Bishop]

Tom, they're talking about the organisms in the dirt, not the dirt itself. Literally eating handfuls of dirt would be terrible for you.

Eating dirt would only be bad for you if the land was contaminated. Children can play in dirt all day, with plenty of it ending up in their mouth, and end up just fine. The ones who ate dirt as children have better health in their lives than the ones who did not. It builds their immune system at a critical age and supplies them with healthy organisms.

But it's not just the organisms, the soil itself is also beneficial, and serves a purpose in the body. Soils and clays are absorbent materials which clean out the intestines of toxins, poisons, and undesirable substances.

http://wellnessmama.com/5915/benefits-of-healing-clays/

Though they have been largely forgotten in recent times, healing clays have been used by cultures throughout history for their nutrients and to help rid the body of toxins. Many animals will also turn to eating dirt and clay to help remove poisons from their systems or during times of illness or distress.

[Rushy]

The ones who ate dirt as children have better health in their lives than the ones who did not.

I would love to see a study on this one, Tom.

[Tom Bishop]

The ones who ate dirt as children have better health in their lives than the ones who did not.

I would love to see a study on this one, Tom.

Why You Should Let Kids Eat Dirt

Kids who are exposed to more germs before age one are less likely to have allergies and asthma a new study shows

Infants who are exposed to unsavory things like rodent and pet dander, roach allergens and household bacteria during their first year are actually less likely to suffer from allergies and asthma, Johns Hopkins researchers say.

A new study published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology shows that being exposed to allergens before a child turns one can benefit allergies. To reach these findings, the researchers studied 467 inner-city infants in Boston, New York and St. Louis. They tracked their health over three years, and visited their homes to calculate the levels of a variety of allergens. They also conducted allergy tests on the children and collected bacteria from dust gathered in their homes.

The kids who lived in homes with mouse and cat dander as well as cockroach droppings during their first year had lower rates of wheezing by age 3. The kids with a greater amount of bacteria in their homes were also less likely to wheeze and were less likely to have environmental allergies.

Kids who were completely free of allergies were also most likely to grow up in homes with the highest amount of allergens and bacteria in them. In contrast only 8% of kids with both allergies and asthma were exposed to the substances by the time they were 1.

It’s possible you’ve heard of the “hygiene hypothesis,” which is the speculation that the reason Americans have so many allergies is because we are, quite simply, too clean. Kids are kept in such sterile environments that they never build immunities to common allergens.

A significant amount of research has shown that kids who grow up living on farms with livestock, or with a pet are less likely to develop asthma or allergies. Prior research has also suggested that it’s not necessarily dust that provides a protective benefit, but the microbes that are in our guts that influence our immune system and ability to fight off infections.

NU study: Dirt's good for kids

Analyzing data collected from thousands of children over two decades in the Philippines, researchers have concluded that a healthy dose of germs and pathogens during infancy reduced cardiovascular inflammation in adulthood — a precursor to heart attacks and strokes.

"It raises the intriguing possibility that higher levels of exposure to infectious microbes early in life may, in some way, protect you against cardiovascular disease," said Thom McDade, 41, an associate professor of anthropology at Northwestern University who co-wrote the study.

Conducted in 2005, the study measured the level of C-reactive protein (CRP) in some 1,700 Filipinos, whose health history had been carefully charted from birth to 21 years of age. A byproduct of arterial inflammation, CRP is a predictive biomarker of cardiovascular heart disease and stroke.

Set for April publication in Proceedings of the Royal Society, a London-based scientific journal, the study draws a conclusion sure to confuse "germophobic" parents everywhere.

"We found that kids who had higher levels of exposure to infectious microbes — kids who had more diarrhea and higher levels of exposure to animal feces as an infant — those individuals had lower levels of CRP as young adults," he said.

[Rushy]

Once again, they're talking about the organisms in the dirt, not the dirt itself. Furthermore, it clearly demonstrates that eating dirt makes you sick, which is the literal opposite of healthy. Thus, dirt is unhealthy. Whether it strengthens the immune system or not is irrelevant.

[Tom Bishop]

The organisms are the primary benefit. But as I said, the dirt itself also serves a beneficial purpose. It keeps you healthy and protected.

Dirty Truth: Humans Eat Dirt to Shield the Stomach

If you crave a snack of dirt and clay, you may be pregnant. New research shows that eating dirt, also called geophagy, is most common during the early stages of pregnancy and in young children, where the clay has a soothing effect on the stomach and can protect the individual from viruses and bacteria.

"This clay can either bind to harmful things, like microbes, pathogens and viruses, that we are eating or can make a barrier, like a mud mask for our gut," said study researcher Sera Young, at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. "Contextualizing this, making it clear to people that its not such a weird behavior, will help women come forth and not feel so alone."