Leave a Comment:
7 comments
A little off topic but with regards to supplements, including pills, powders, etc. (protein powders, creatine, etc.), it seems to me that *healthy* people need not be taking them.
Are bodies did not adapt to taking laboratory-made supplements but instead real foods available in nature. With this is mind I find it perplexing that so many in the ancestral health movement advocate supplements for healthy people, a part from the desire to make money. Although I can see how unhealthy people might benefit from them.
Thoughts? Great blog btw!
ReplyMore muscle = better health, *usually.* Certain people are susceptible to becoming too muscular; professional strongmen and offensive linemen die young, for example.
ReplyThanks, Shawn , glad you like the blog. I agree that we are adapted to eating real food, but the food available to us isn’t always of the best quality. For instance, at the moment I got my hands on some free range eggs, which I don’t usually buy due to cost (these came from a friend with a farm) and they are so superior in taste to regular eggs, and superior for health as well. But obviously we can’t all eat them. I have a coming post on magnesium, and this mineral is likely in deficiency even in many healthy people – the main source being hard water. So I believe even healthy people can benefit from supplementing it.
In general, you are probably right that except for a few choice items like magnesium, most healthy people will be fine without supplements. And I can’t speak for the motives of others in ancestral health for promoting them – other than financial anyway.
The thing is, so many of us have some sort of condition that could use some help, even if it is only as simple and uncomplicated as aging. I don’t know what the fraction of people is that are so healthy that they have no room for improvement, but I’d have to guess that it’s small.
Reply“Why Vitamins May Be Bad for Your Workout” http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/12/why-vitamins-may-be-bad-for-your-workout/
Replytricky subject…
Recently I stumbled upon this: “Low Protein Intake Is Associated with a Major Reduction in IGF-1, Cancer, and Overall Mortality in the 65 and Younger but Not Older Population” ( Cell Metabolism – http://www.cell.com/cell-metabolism/fulltext/S1550-4131(14)00062-X )
Reply