I’m wrong, you’re wrong, we’re all wrong; and we’ve never been right.
Hopefully though, you’re just a smidgen less wrong now than you were a minute ago. A tad less than an hour ago. An inch less than yesterday. A foot less than last week, and a yard away from a month ago. Perhaps counting a year’s passing, you’ve added another dimension, such that you’re a football field less wrong. And considering where you first began your curious quest, another dimension still—a voluminous world less wrong. But there remains other worlds. And by the time you have all those other worlds nailed, we’ll perhaps know whether other universes really exist.
So you’ll always be wrong. You can call that unbridled skepticism all you want. I call it a curious quest for knowledge, combined with an awareness that there’s always more to know, and even more that we don’t even know we don’t know.
Every now & then I like to post up a particularly insightful and hopefully, motivational comment. So here’s Tim Maitski in our recent, revolutionary post in terms of Paleo Diet knowledge, The Hormesis Files: Who’s Afraid of Unrefined Sugar?
Richard,
Thank you.
You continue to spur me on to keep looking into so many things. I’ve seen stalks of sugarcane at my farmer’s market and always wondered who would use that and how would you go about eating it? What could possibly be good about sugarcane? Now I find out that it’s a superfood and fresh squeezed sugarcane juice is a popular drink with health benefits in many places around the world. I can’t wait until juice bars offer it.
I always thought of honey as just sugar and should be avoided. I thought whatever extras that it had in it would be insignificant. Now I did a search and stumbled upon the Hibernation Diet where you eat a couple tablespoons of honey before bed. Found a discussion that reminded me of some of your first potato starch discussions. People taking honey at night were reporting sound sleep, vivid dreams and even some weight loss.
http://www.mothering.com/forum/365-traditional-foods/932971-hibernation-diet.html
Here’s a good description of the honey diet. Basically a whole foods diet with resistance training and honey at night.
Also, my farmer’s market started carrying Tiger Nuts, the same ones that you recommend. I had bought some from another place because they were cheaper, but I have to say that the peeled Tiger Nuts are so much better. I don’t even have to soak them to have them be a very great snack without tiring out my jaw like the other ones did.
Thanks again. It’s funny. I started my nutritional journey three years ago when I read Loren Cordain’s paleo Answer book. I blacklisted lentils, potatoes, honey—along with processed foods and sugar. I was amazed how much I didn’t know about all of the antinutrients in these foods. Now I’ve come full circle on some of these things. I continue to test everything out on myself and sooner or later I will have the perfect diet that works for me. This blog, especially with the great commenters, keeps me filled with new ideas to try out. Unfortunately, I’ll probably be dead before I work it all out. But it keeps life interesting.
See?
The one good thing about the paleosphere (4-5 years ago) was the fact that it was built upon the idea: Question what you put in your body. It also had some pretty good answers and not everyone involved was dead set on a prescribed eating pattern. Literally a year later LC and VLC was all the rage. I fell for it as well. The most respected preachers started stumping for it so I should follow along… Like a lemming. But I was fixed of that after a few months.
As Richard here has blogged and spoken about (to paraphrase): eat what you like, do what you like. If it helps or hurts you please spread that info so the rest of us can learn as well.
But most important:
*Do not stop learning
*The only thing you should be 100% sure about is that you do not know anything
*Question, even your most steadfast beliefs
*Think for yourself
And experiment! All the best things I’ve learned have come through self-experimentation.
Just reading people argue their different points and ideas is not the same as just trying something and getting the experience on your own.
How we used to eat sugarcane in Trinidad: peel it, cut up the inside into 2 inch long pieces, slice in half or quarters, depending on how thick it is, put it in the fridge to cool it down, then chew it up and spit out the fibres.
Sugar cane juice is okay just the way it’s ‘stored’ in buckets on the street here makes me kind of wonder what else dirt is in the bucket….. now it’s probably good or okay. Just it looks real dirty. I know, I know, dirt is good for us.
It’s sold frozen in vacuum pack from Philippines in Chinese supermarkets.
Sorry, not clear: the cane is stored in buckets of water on the sidewalk. Dude has a crusher machine, puts the juice and ice into a big cup and you get a straw. I’ve had it a couple of times (2) and survived.
I have to say, I read that in your comments section on the Hormesis Files, and thought how well that describes me too. So much change in 2014.
I have an issue, however, with this honey thing.
What we access as “honey” at Costco, etc, is just processed sugar, I think devoid of the other nutrients – I wouldn’t want to see people encouraged to down that stuff in any large quantities.
“What we access as “honey” at Costco, etc, is just processed sugar, I think devoid of the other nutrients – I wouldn’t want to see people encouraged to down that stuff in any large quantities.”
I’m nobodies mother nor do I want to be. If they’re so stupid as to go drink pints of glucose syrup flavored to be like honey, well I hope they grow to 600 pounds, die, and help the genome.
I loathe ass-covering disclosures and I refuse to engage in them.
Richard, I’m glad you liked my comment.
Again, thank you for a great blog. Between you, Mark Sisson and Tim Ferriss, I keep learning great stuff. This internet thing is wonderful.
Tim:
Thanks for hitting me in just the right spot at just the right time.
R
Well said.
When I first started Paleo I was very strict. Now I’m more relaxed, I eat a bit of white rice, potatoes, dairy and sometimes supplement with… starch! It’s no way to live always stressing about following dietary “rules”.
That being said I’ve always grown green beans and peas (legumes) and tomatoes (nightshades) in the summertime, because I love the taste straight off the vine. I never noticed any extra inflammation, so they stuck in my diet. Plus it brought back memories of my Grandma… something Cordain could never compete with.
We were all wrong all along:
http://www.xkcd.com/1471/
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000Y3ZECM/ref=redir_mdp_mobile?pc_redir=T1
I’m going to order that if I can’t find it locally. Anyone got word on any good honey? I’ve got tons of “raw unfiltered” from various local sources, but none of it has the “capping” or other particulate advertised in the one I linked above.
Maybe I’ll ask some farmers if I can get the stuff with bee parts still in it.