Dr. Clement on proteins

So what do you guys say about these teachings? Some pretty bold statements.

[Rant Warning]
I understand why these guys think the way they do, and I appreciate the end they're after, but a great deal of what he said is utter nonsense.

Firstly, there is no evidence that advanced glycation end products are the primary source of aging and disease. Granted, if we look at aging from the SENS perspective, cellular waste buildup is a contributor to aging, but AGEs are not the only source of this waste. We could find ways to demonize fats as well if we want to do that. Certain oxidized fats promote chain reactions of oxidation at the cellular level, that doesn't mean we don't need fat in our diet. The way we prepare animal products has a huge impact on the number of AGEs produced, grilling and broiling meats until charred obviously produces more, while braising a meat in stews, soups, etc. produces considerably fewer. Charring vegetables can produce AGEs as well. But he's using one possible negative aspect of cooking foods, particularly animal foods, and using it to demonize an entire process that has been pivotal to our evolution as a species.

Secondly, he makes the claim that we are being brainwashed to believe that we require animal proteins, that we truly don't require them. To be fair, he's absolutely right. The body doesn't care where we get the required amino acids, but it does feel the effects of how easily assimilated they are from various foods. Plants for the most part don't contain a full spectrum of the necessary amino acids (some do), so you have to compliment them. In addition to this, plants contain a variety of anti-nutritive compounds that not only disturb digestion, but also promote indigestion and result in more undigested food entering the lower parts of the bowels (a bad thing). Everybody is different, but a big part of the population is better adapted to utilizing the proteins form animal foods above plant foods. Take a look at the bioavailability of proteins from something like an egg, which is pretty much the highest there is. Keep adaptation in mind, why would it be that we are so much better at using the protein in animal meats or eggs? Its probably because we have adapted to this type of behavior, which means consumption of animal products provided some sort of survival advantage. Evolutionary history also seems to corroborate that our diets, which were once predominantly fruits, came to include meats from scavenged carcasses and later from hunting and fishing once tools came along.

He makes the claim that "heavy" proteins are indigestible. This is the worst kind of misleading in my opinion. He's trying to convince people that their digestive systems operate based on heaviness of foods. The fact that a piece of chicken weighs more than a piece of broccoli the same size has almost no impact on how these are digested. That's just pure bullshit. Ever found a piece of chicken in your stool? Ever found a piece of undigested plant material? Ask yourself what you are digesting more efficiently.

Lastly, the way he uses the sun and photosynthesis to paint this picture is infuriating. Yes, initially all energy does come from the sun. Yes this energy is used by plants and converted in carbohydrate. Plants are considered "primary producers". But this does NOT SUGGEST that every living thing on earth should be consuming plants. Its ignoring hard principles of basic biology, i.e Food Chains. The web of life relies on conversion of energy. Plants convert the solar energy, primary consumers come along and eat them and convert the energy into something new, and then secondary consumers eat that animal and convert it into something else useful. Each of these animals evolved to getting its energy that way because it was the MOST SURVIVABLE way of doing so, meaning they benefit the most from getting their energy that way. You wouldn't tell a lion: "Hey Lion, you know all the energy starts in plants. Why not just cut out the middle man and just eat plants?" because that doesn't take into account his digestive system. There is a reason for that, they are best suited to obtaining their nutrition from animal foods. Its a flow of energy up the chain. Rather beautiful actually.

This is the case for human beings. As omnivores we can extract nutrients from plant and animal food, and we extract certain nutrients better from each. I wouldn't try to get my vitamin C from chicken or beef. Certain things are better extracted from plants. Likewise, I wouldn't be trying to get my protein needs from plant food alone. It makes absolutely zero sense to do it this way when we are better adapted to getting PROTEIN from animal products. Do I agree with him we should be eating more raw fruits, perhaps some (but fewer) raw vegetables. Absolutely. But using protein as a means to convert somebody to eating ONLY plants is misleading.

Not to mention, where the hell are his eyebrows?

Another way to look at it would be from the perspective of ecology. Every species evolves and survives only because it can fill a particular niche. Going back to the lion, granted it (like any other species) had the potential to evolve to eat only plants. But it didn't, probably because there were already a number of primary consumers in the habitat, and it evolved adaptations to eating those species and filled an unoccupied niche.

But omnivores are an odd case. You have a species that's evolved to consume both plant and animal food efficiently, meaning they prefer both and don't just supplement their animal food diet with berries when famine time comes. Why would this ever be the case? I mean if you think about it, procuring plant food is considerably easier than procuring animal food. If you've seen any nature show, you know that hunting down prey isn't easy and predator species often experience famine.

So taking humans and their omnivorous nature: why would we move away from a primarily frugivorous diet to one that included animal foods? It could be said it made us more survivable being able to rely on both sources, and that would be true. But it also suggests that we were getting something from the animal food that we weren't getting (or weren't getting as efficiently) from plant food. Something about eating the animal foods made us more survivable, and it was likely protein and/or fat soluble vitamins.

I'm sorry for the huge post/s, but I get fired up when I see the information presented in such a false way. If someone wants to go vegan or vegetarian to protest the treatment of animals, that's great. I get that. But I hate it when these people try to say that a vegan/vegetarian diet is healthier.

anthonyspencer54 wrote:Another way to look at it would be from the perspective of ecology. Every species evolves and survives only because it can fill a particular niche. Going back to the lion, granted it (like any other species) had the potential to evolve to eat only plants. But it didn't, probably because there were already a number of primary consumers in the habitat, and it evolved adaptations to eating those species and filled an unoccupied niche.

But omnivores are an odd case. You have a species that's evolved to consume both plant and animal food efficiently, meaning they prefer both and don't just supplement their animal food diet with berries when famine time comes. Why would this ever be the case? I mean if you think about it, procuring plant food is considerably easier than procuring animal food. If you've seen any nature show, you know that hunting down prey isn't easy and predator species often experience famine.

So taking humans and their omnivorous nature: why would we move away from a primarily frugivorous diet to one that included animal foods? It could be said it made us more survivable being able to rely on both sources, and that would be true. But it also suggests that we were getting something from the animal food that we weren't getting (or weren't getting as efficiently) from plant food. Something about eating the animal foods made us more survivable, and it was likely protein and/or fat soluble vitamins.

I'm sorry for the huge post/s, but I get fired up when I see the information presented in such a false way. If someone wants to go vegan or vegetarian to protest the treatment of animals, that's great. I get that. But I hate it when these people try to say that a vegan/vegetarian diet is healthier.

Hi AS,

Personally, I'm on the fence about whether or not animal protein is bad for our health. There just isn't enough evidence at this point for me to believe that.

In regards to looking at this from an ecology standpoint, do you think that eating lots of animal protein is sustainable for our environment? I have been quietly researching this topic for many months now. Here are some of my findings:

It takes over 10 times the amount of energy from fossil fuel to produce a calorie of animal-based food than it does to produce a calorie of plant food.

Since the 1970's, over 20% of the Amazon's rainforest has been destroyed. That's an area the size of California. 80% of this cleared land is now occupied by livestock. The world's cattle ALONE eat enough grain to feed 8.7 billion people. With almost a billion malnourished people across the globe, redirecting even a portion of the grain used to fatten cattle could feed every hungry mouth on the planet.

The demand for animal foods is getting higher and higher every year. But producing them is extremely inefficient and polluting. According to reports from the United Nations and the World Health Organization, farm animals contributes more to global warming than the entire transportation sector.

How can this be?

For one thing, animal protein production releases MUCH more Carbon Dioxide than plant production. First, you have to grow and harvest the feed grains, then transport them to the farms where the animals are. You need energy to operate those farms, then to transport the animals to the slaughter houses. Then you have to operate the slaughter houses and finally you have to process and store the animal flesh.

On top of that, farm animals also produce methane when they burp, fart and breathe. Methane is 23 times stronger than Carbon Dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere, according to the EPA.

Never have we had less clean water than we have today. In order to get 1 lb of beef, you have to feed a steer 6-10 lbs of grain. Which also means that much more water is used because you have to irrigate all that grain. Cows drink 50 gallons of water or more PER DAY. Additionally, its not just what goes into the farm animals that is a problem, its what comes out. For example, hogs in North Carolina produce 10 times more fecal waste than people do in North Carolina each day. And all the fecal waste has to go somewhere, often it is stored in huge open air sewage pits called lagoons, which sometimes leaks into our lakes and pollute our water supply.

Right now, the world's population is over 7 billion people. By 2050, the population will reach over 9 billion, according to the U.N.

If everyone were to adopt a vegetarian diet and no food were wasted, current food production would theoretically feed 10 billion people.

Unfortunately, the trend in the developing world where most of our population growth comes from is to eat more like Americans. That means, more meat and more dairy. If the whole world lived at the consumption levels of Americans, we would need 3-5 more planet earths.

The food choices we make have a profound global effect. By demanding so many animal foods, we are destroying the planet.

Jared,

You make some really interesting points, and I wasn't aware of a lot of that. Thanks for the post.

Its definitely looking at it from a different angle, but an important one. The thing is, both you and I can be correct. It might very well be that we are most adapted to utilizing protein from animal foods. It may also be true that given our population level, and outlook for growth, that it is less sustainable to continue farming animal foods. The population factor is changing the environment, insofar as its limiting the amount of available resources per capita, so we will certainly have to adapt to this. The funny thing is, the whole debate about what we are adapted to eat becomes moot in the face of the problem of whether or not its feasible for everyone to eat it. In that sense, it probably is a matter of we need the population to be reduced or naturally level off while at the same time innovating our methods of raising animals in some way that is sustainable. I also agree the problem of waste is just ridiculous. But yeah, great point overall. If we wanted to take it back to a simple animal example, there isn't always enough meat to go around and the lowest pack animal on the totem pole probably goes without. In the grand scheme, as a consequence of our higher thinking and ability to consider these impacts of our lifestyles, maybe it will become the ethical thing to do to not eat meat. I sure as hell hope it doesn't come to that.

It's definitely not efficient or natural for cows to eat grain food. If they ate grass it would be a different matter.
Some people just cannot handle a healthy existence without animal foods.

When it comes to population overgrowth, yes, it seems as if we often neglect the fact that "cutting out the middle man" would save us a lot on the energy account.
But perhaps we need to start eating insects (approx. 50% protein plus plenty of minerals and vitamins), some researchers argue. I wonder how rich in amino acids caterpillas protein is

Our current philosophy concerning animal farming needs to be changed. Frankly, most of our foods today are produced only for profit with little to no care about animals or nature. The industrial revolution is still to this day poisoning our planet, our bodies and our minds.