17 Super Snacks "Not All Ray Peat Approved"

[peatarian]

peatarian-
Thank you for such a full response!
I haven't quite got the hang of making sure I click "subscribe this thread" or whatever it is,
so I kinda forgot about this thread for a bit.

I've gotta give what you say, so passionately, a powerful think!
If I sleep on it tonight with my new red light panel on my head,
I'm sure some answers will form spontaneously and be ready in the morning.
(Last night I put that LED panel over my thyroid and heart area
and...my heart began to beat more energetically--so why not my brain?!)

You know I think the world of you.
Ironically, one reason is because you are a bit of an authority in PeatWorld.
It is not a dirty word to me.
I mean it in a most respectful and grateful way. Truly.

And as with most authorities I respect and thank,
I also like to ask them questions sometimes.
So I hope you don't mind my impertinence too much. :)
More anon!

Impertinence? Wow. Am I really that frightening?

 

[narouz]

Impertinence? Wow. Am I really that frightening?

peatarian-
No, I don’t think you are.
But I guess sometimes I make you mad.
Sorry—I haven’t meant to.

I’d like to stress that I love reading your posts
and have nothing but admiration for the advice you give and contributions you make.
I do see us as being on the same team.
(I hope you feel likewise, but if you don’t that’s okay with me too.)

I do think you’ve misunderstood some of what I’ve said.
I’m sure it’s my fault because of a lack of clarity.
So let me see if I can straighten that out some.

You wrote:

“I refuse to be called elitist or occult....”

Actually, I don’t think I did call you “occult” or “elitist.”
What I thought I did, or at any rate what I meant to do,
was to ask if you think Peat’s wisdom should be treated
somewhat like other bodies of (purported) occult wisdom.
As I said, I don’t mean by “occult” the typical connotations like magic and witchcraft and such.
What I mean by the term is the idea that certain knowledge should contain
some element of “hiddenness.”
Because I can see how that term might be a source of confusion,
let me just drop it and explain what I mean another way.

It is common in, say, many martial arts forms
for there to be a certain threshold
of time, effort, patience, discipline, and learning required
before a pupil is granted the keys to knowledge, to power.

What I was asking you was if you think that Peat’s wisdom
should be treated a little bit as in the martial arts example.
In other words:
is it actually A Good Thing that Peat’s dietary views
are resistant to easy interpretation?
And, furthermore, does Peat perhaps even Want it that way,
Design it that way?

You wrote, for example, a while back, in another thread:

“I have to admit that I flinched when you mentioned the Ray Peat cookbook (although I know what you mean). I know that Ray Peat has little to no respect for people who write cookbooks with black and white sections for good and bad foods. There is a reason that his work explains a universe and doesn't plainly present you with a to-do and not-to-do-list.”

You would seem to believe that Peat expresses and communicates his ideas
in a way that is--intentionally, purposefully--resistant to easy interpretation or simplification.
Yes?
I mean, the quote of yours above is only one of many I could illustrate with.
The theme would seem to run through many of your posts
including and especially your most recent ones responding to me.

Perhaps I have misunderstood that “theme” in your posts.
But I hope you see that it was an honest
(if perhaps poorly communicated) query on my part,
and not meant to be wild or insulting.

As I said: it is a question I ask myself sometimes.
And sometimes I’m inclined to think maybe he did—
maybe, that is,
he did intentionally design his work to resist easy interpretation or simplification.
It is part of an internal debate I carry on with myself.
For the most part I lean towards other explanations.
But I don’t see anything disreputable or stupid about holding that view.

So it wasn’t intended as an insult.

This general issue or question lies at the heart of a lot of the conflicts
I run into with my exploration of the possibility of distilling a concise outline
of an accurately derived, basic Peat diet.
The issue is articulated in different ways,
but when distilled they come to much the same general notion.

You are one of the most experienced and thoughtful Peatians here.
I think it is a fundamental issue in interpreting Peat,
which we are all-about here,
so I simply wanted your take.
I didn’t mean to insult.

There are many other very interesting ideas embedded in your last replies,
and I would like to come back to them as I have time.
But for now I just wanted to try to untangle some of the things
I may’ve communicated badly. :)

 

[j.]

i bet chicks never picked up fights with narouz. they would have known he would put them to sleep with a long sermon that went over their heads! they would've actually run the risk of dying!


(kidding narouz, i enjoy your posts. also, peatarian, i didn't imply that narouz posts went over your head)

 

[charlie]

 

[narouz]

i bet chicks never picked up fights with narouz. they would have known he would put them to sleep with a long sermon that went over their heads! they would've actually run the risk of dying!

You interpret it as a sleeply ennui.
I prefer to think of it as swooning. :)

 

[j.]

You interpret it as a sleeply ennui.
I prefer to think of it as swooning. :)

all i want to know now is, really, if you're straight, if you argued with girls and how it went.

 

[narouz]

You interpret it as a sleeply ennui.
I prefer to think of it as swooning. :)

all i want to know now is, really, if you're straight, if you argued with girls and how it went.

Ah Grasshopper...
some knowledge must remain hidden.
For your own good!

 

[peatarian]

Dearest narouz,

I have to admit I am close to swooning. I really question if it's smart for me to answer your post again. I think it's more about my vanity than any believe that I might make myself clear this time. Let me say this first: I respect you, I like you and I agree with you on may things. Having said that: It drives me insane that you keep asking the same question, without recognizing my answer as an answer - and here comes the question again.

Your last post pretty much repeats many other posts I've read from you and I have told you twice now: I understand what you mean. I understood it the first time, the second time and all the other times. It didn't need new analogies and metaphors to explain yourself. You always explain yourself very well. I on the other hand obviously don't.

Thank you for quoting parts of my older posts. I can't help but wonder: Have you read my answers in this thread? I'll try one last time, narouz. But since you don't seem to mind if we are not on the same team, we might just need to agree that having balls doesn't mean you are supposed to win some kind of game.

I cannot see what is occult and hidden and hard to find about a knowledge that is displayed for the entire world on the internet and has been (as far as I know) for a very long time. You don't even have to sign in and give at least some fake e-mailaddress. It's just there - you click, you read. You have any idea what my university cost? And that's a place that didn't give me one percent of the knowledge I gathered from Ray Peats articles.

Ray Peat hates the idea of knowledge for sale. He says if knowledge is made a rare good, being ignorant becomes the norm. With every sentence he writes, he fights against an ignorant world in which knowledge is a privilege that must be bought. He loves to invoke the idea of medieval London when science was discussed in the streets and everybody going to university missed out on the really interesting debates between the coachman and the baker. That's why I like the idea of this forum so much. (Thank you again, Charlie for the tremendous work!) The old Roman 'forum' was the same as the Greek 'agora' - a place to come together and openly discuss matters of justice and politics and philosophy. Ray Peat would love that, that's just what he wants.

I think Ray Peat tries to be as clear and simple as he can. You must not forget that he has an IQ somewhere above 200, so breaking his knowledge down must be hard. I believe you can see and hear it in his interviews. How there are a million thoughts and he is like watching them happen and describing them as accurately as possible. But I think his writing is without embellishment, it is straight and it can be understood by everybody. I reckon your mother tongue is English? I know of a 68year old woman whose mother tongue is German and who learned French as a second language. She hasn't used her English in decades and never learned it properly in the first place - but she is now making her way through Ray Peats articles. It takes her days to read one. But that's no different for me. I always read his newsletters in stages. But then I don't watch TV and I don't read newspapers. I prioritize.

I have come across many sick people during the last years. They were always thrilled to hear about alternative methods for treating their diseases. But they were always waiting for some kind of fancy newly discovered jungle flower or some kind of newly developed drug. Even those who were lethally sick did not do one thing on the 'list' I gave them. They don't use ASA because it will make their stomachs bleeds. They have to eat PUFA because those are essential. They cannot eat butter because of cholesterol. They cannot eat sugar due to diabetes. They can't drink milk because they are allergic. They cannot drink coffee because of their hearts. They will not use vitamin E because their doctor tells them it's not good to use supplements. Carrots cannot be eaten because of their teeth and oysters are gross.
Some cannot bring themselves to eat liver but don't mind shooting hormones they don't understand three times a day. They think a little carcinogen in their foods will not kill them but believe stronger than in any other kind of religion in the little pills their doctors prescribe for every symptom.

I have asked you before but never gotten an answer: Who would your list be for, narouz? For whom do you want to simplify and summarize Ray Peat? For people who do not know Ray Peat? They will not believe it. For those who know him a little? They will not trust it. For those who know him well? They will not need it. So who is it for? The ones too convenient to read some articles or the ones who are too stupid to understand them? I don't think the first will be helped with it and I don't believe the second exist.

I have seen people change dramatically, narouz. So much you wouldn't believe they are the same. Maybe they aren't. But none of them changed because of my list. They changed because they started reading Ray Peat and decided to change. I have told you that before and I can't think of another, clearer, better way to put it: I trusted Ray Peat because he was complex. Because he didn't tell me what to do. Because he didn't make me go anywhere. He provided me with a map.
You know this old saying: Give a man a fish and he will be fed for a day. Teach him how to fish and he will feed himself for the rest of his life?

After about 2 weeks of reading Ray Peat's articles I had an idea about what to eat, to drink, how to exercise, how to interpret the medical world (at that time) around me. This picture became more and more nuanced during the last years. But even after reading the first article (it was the one about coconut oil) I knew not to eat PUFA and that's a big step. I learned about drinking coffee the other day and the article on breast cancer (which is really an article on cancer) was a revelation to me. Because the knowledge behind it is infinite, the writing simple and exquisite. I wouldn't have believed any of it if I'd heard it in any other voice.

You should know. I remember you complaining in the thread about the 'terrible liquid diet' that people thought you were insane for eating the way you do.

I hang out with mostly modern, upper-class, educated, liberal, ex-hippie Americans, who have experimented with a lot of diets and who, generally, are very open-minded. When I talk to them about my Peat diet (which now is not very often) there is not a single one of them --l'll repeat that--not a single one of them who does not look at me with a kind of pity, as if I'd fallen under the spell of a cult. When I detail the kinds of food I eat, they laugh. Honestly: they laugh. They really think I'm joking. They couldn't even begin to consider attempting such a diet, just based sheerly upon the anti-sensual and anti-pleasure aspects.

So not even the people closest to you will believe you when you tell them what's healthy and what is not. They will not even consider it. Yet you changed your life according to a total stranger. It seems to me that Ray Peat is the only one who can explain things the way they are and write them in a manner that makes us understand and shows us the man behind all this is so smart and wise and kind and witty that you will listen to his words? They will not believe you, narouz. And they don't believe me. You know what makes most educated people believe Ray Peat? They check his references. It's something John R. Lee said in a speech once. When he first met Peat he was 'a boy genius' and talked to a room full of doctors about progesterone, telling them it was reckless to treat women with estrogen and to forget there was a second hormone produced by the ovaries. He offered a list with more than 100 references to check them. Lee said, it was normal to have 5 to 7 studies prepared and to draw conclusions from them. Lee was the only one who got those references from Ray Peat afterwards and he spent the next months checking them. They all worked out and John R. Lee spent the rest of his life treating women with progesterone (and sometimes a little estrogen but that's another story), writing plain and flawed books - very easy to read - and became known as the progesterone-pioneer. Women who read his book on progesterone (which is pretty much a summary of Lees ideas about Ray Peat's work) get the idea that one kind of estrogen is actually good for you, that drinking milk is deadly and will cause a heart attack (Lee died of a heart attack though he avoided milk his entire life) and that PUFA are essential.

Your question is (again): Should Ray Peat's knowledge only be open to those who put in work and time and effort?
That is asking: Should this door only open for those who turn the doorknob?
The door is not locked, narouz and everybody is able to catch his own fish (we know it should be cod or sole) and find his own way.

My being here in this forum has several reasons: The first is that I feel I owe it to Ray Peat to help others with what he taught me. The second is that I like to discuss his work. The third is more profound: I survived what I wouldn't have survived without Ray Peat and I have seen people healed by listening to him. And I have seen others die during the last years, people who really, really had that list, that summary, who had me in their ears (and I can be very convincing) and still didn't listen. It just didn't mean anything. Because (and I know I have told you that three times now but maybe it is clearer this time): A summary of Ray Peat's work means undoing it. Somebody who get's catch phrases only will never grasp what Ray Peat is about. When I tell somebody what to do and what not to do - they have to trust my authority. After a lifetime of internalizing that the guys in the white cloaks will heal them, that the guys in the suits will rule in their best interest and the guys in the uniforms are there to protect them -- I just don't have the authority to outweigh all that.

Ray Peat is not a martial arts instructor. He doesn't teach something that will ever be completed and mastered. He gives us knowledge and a way of seeing, of experiencing the world and ourselves in it. I see the world with other eyes, I think differently since I started reading him. That's a very, very big part of healing and being healthy. It's something you cannot place on a list. It's a process, not a goal.

Again, narouz: By all means go on making that list and try to find the perfect summary. That's a process, too. But please don't rely on the members of this forum to make it. Re-read Ray Peat's articles, read his newsletters, read his books, listen to his interviews. I think if you and I get to live until we are 150 we will still find something in there that will surprise us, that we haven't read or understood like that before.

You brought up this question in this thread because there was a list of snacks I criticized. That made you think we needed a list of allowed and forbidden fruit. The funny thing is: Even the woman who made the list and the woman who placed it in the forum knew that the list was flawed. They just thought it was 'close enough'. If that is a decision they make for themselves, that's fine. But if they tell others they should eat it, I dare to criticize. That's something I have been telling you, too: That the moment you make a list, it is no longer Ray Peat's list, but narouzes list. And it will be interpreted by others who will make it there list. For instance: You write 'potatoes' on the list and some people will use the most expensive, blue potato. Is that okay? Do you have to write down all kinds of allowed potatoes? There is a game in Germany called 'Stille Post' (silent message). One person thinks of a word and whispers it in another person's ear. This person tells another one what they've understood and so on. It's very funny to hear what comes out at the end.

To say it as plain as I can: To understand Ray Peat, read Ray Peat.

Doctors make us sick, politicians diminish our freedom, the religious start wars of unforgiveness, judges take away our rights and our hands' work belongs mostly to others, we agree to our every step being controlled and cry for even more rules out of pure fear. We live in a complicated, decadent, twisted and perverted world at interesting and desperate times and they are to become much more interesting and much more desperate during the next years. It takes a Ray Peat to face all that.

I can't help but wonder why you keep asking me about that idea of summarizing Ray Peat's work again and again. Is it possible that you want my permission or at least my blessing for doing so? That's easy: You have it. But then there are many threads about that issue and I told you there: I don't agree that there have to be rules. So it occurs to me that you want me to help you make this summary, this list. You tell me you consider me an authority so that would make sense. But, narouz, see, here is the catch: The only reason I became this authority is because I didn't do what you suggest.

 

[peatarian]

(kidding narouz, i enjoy your posts. also, peatarian, i didn't imply that narouz posts went over your head)

Well, I have to admit it's not easy making an argument in a foreign language. It's always a bit like doing embroidery using a sword instead of a needle.

 

[kiran]

(kidding narouz, i enjoy your posts. also, peatarian, i didn't imply that narouz posts went over your head)

Well, I have to admit it's not easy making an argument in a foreign language. It's always a bit like doing embroidery using a sword instead of a needle.

Your argument is all the more impressive for that very reason.

 

[narouz]

peatarian-

Thank you for your for very full and passionate response.
I admire your passion, but I've never meant to "drive you insane,"
so please don't trouble yourself to respond if it causes that kind of stress!
(And all these years I was thinking they were swooning.... )

As you say,"...our hands' work belongs mostly to others...."
I have to go to work soon
and won't have much time for a few days.
But I just wanted to toss out some things that struck me.

Here are a batch of snippets from your recent responses:

"That made you think we needed a list of allowed and forbidden fruit."

"Again, narouz: By all means go on making that list..."

"It's something you cannot place on a list."

"Who would your list be for, narouz?"

"If you understand Ray Peat's quote above as: 'Ask somebody else what I mean and let them make the list I refuse to make...'"

"So if I made up that list you want..."

"That the moment you make a list, it is no longer Ray Peat's list, but narouzes list. And it will be interpreted by others who will make it there list."

"And it will be interpreted by others who will make it there list."

"I don't agree that there have to be rules."

"...however much you write, I read the same: You want to have rules about what's good and what's not."

"Do you honestly believe it's a good thing to give people 10 Dos and 100 Don'ts and think that'll do?"

That is much ado about lists and rules!
But actually peatarian, I don't think I have ever asked you to produce for me a list.
Nor have I asked you to make me a set of rules.
I guess this is a shorthand you use,
but it is also a caricature of my interests in this regard,
and a kind of straw man.

Please:
I have zero interest in setting up a bunch of Rules
with which to police people and punish them if found in non-compliance.
Likewise with this supposed List you say I'm eternally seeking to make you produce,
and with which my malign motive would be, it seems,
to argue that Peat is only that complicated,
and that any Peat reading is unnecessary.

More fairly, I think, you use the word "summary" to describe my interests.
Work, sadly, beckons
and I will have to leave it there for now,
but I would just ask as a starting point:
Do not many wonderful, wise, and complex books
begin with a Table of Contents?
And when authors make one of those outlines,
do they mean to suggest that that Table is all that need be read?
And do readers construe it that way?

 

[peatarian]

In that case, narouz - you have done a good job fooling me.

Mightn't it be more effective to put forth--
even if only as a starting point
and strongly qualified as not intended as "one-size-fits-all
--our best estimate or generalization about what an accurate, faithful Peat diet might be?

But...don't you think it would be possible
to provide some pretty clear outlines,
some rough approximations at least,
some valid generalizations
about the shape of a good, accurate, Peat-derived diet?
If we don't,
don't we invite anyone to feel authorized to make up their own interpretation of a Peat diet?
Is that really a beautiful thing?

We could make our Peat writings less clotted and tortuous, and our meanings clearer, if we agreed to a concept or designation called (something like) an Optimal Peat Diet
But he does make some fairly clear general statements or guidelines.
-Spelling out a Peat-Derived Diet (or somesuch)...we could hammer that out over time here.
The designation is intended simply as a generalization.

Proposed food chart and food list recommendations, rough draft. Please help critique.

If you look at just about any other theory of nutrition, most try to give some kind of clear template. "The Perfect Health Diet" or "Protein Power," for instance, give you a pretty clear idea of what should and should not be eaten, and give also guidance about amounts.
I don't think it is unreasonable for us to try to arrive at some starting point like that.

That said, can we agree that context is important, but still try to articulate a working definition of something like a "BPD"?
I don't see why not.
In fact, I think it would be very helpful and clarifying.

While noting that "context in everything" (above) Stevensmith also returns to his point and qualifies it by acknowledging that starches should, for most, be limited.
So I would simply point out
that, in my view,
Context is Not Everything--
at least not if we're trying to work toward a definition of a "BPD."
I would state it more like this:
Context is Important.

After all, if we are trying to derive or extrapolate such a thing from Peat's ideas,
would we not be very interested in his expressions about what would be
"generally,"
for most people,
"simple"
and
"safe"...?

I think, even here in its infant stage, there is a lot of guidance toward the goal.
So newcomers and wonderers (like myself) can take some encouragement, I would think,
from even these initial efforts to provide some outlines.

I'm kinda liking the last. It would seem useful to me to define a "strict" Peat diet, because, for one thing, it would leave a lot of room for others to define other non-strict (but still legitimate) Peat diets. Also, this might be possible, because sometimes Peat does seem to speak strictly.

A person could come to Peat's work and to various interpreters of his work
and come away with radically different notions of what "Peat diet" would most accurately be.
(Hell, we can't even allow ourselves to speak the work "diet" in connection with Peat!)

 

[peatarian]

peatarian- Here are a batch of snippets from your recent responses:

Back to you:

That is much ado about lists and rules!
But actually peatarian, I don't think I have ever asked you to produce for me a list.
Nor have I asked you to make me a set of rules.
I guess this is a shorthand you use,
but it is also a caricature of my interests in this regard,
and a kind of straw man.

*** No, narouz, you haven't asked me to make the list. You just keep asking me if I think it's a good idea. I wondered why that would be, not accused you of asking me that. I think you can see that if you read what I wrote. And you have asked others to help you make that list. You called it a list then.

Please:
I have zero interest in setting up a bunch of Rules
with which to police people and punish them if found in non-compliance.

*** You wrote that you don't think it's a beautiful thing if everybody feels 'authorized' to make up their own Peat-diet.

Likewise with this supposed List you say I'm eternally seeking to make you produce,
and with which my malign motive would be, it seems,
to argue that Peat is only that complicated,
and that any Peat reading is unnecessary.

*** You called Peat's writing 'clotted' and 'torturous'. Two words I don't use to describe meaningful activities I enjoy.


More fairly, I think, you use the word "summary" to describe my interests.

*** And (for the forth time) I ask you: for whom? This whole forum is about discussing Peat's ideas. Why make a summary? I have told you (four times now) that I think a summary is a shortcoming and that understanding Peat means reading Peat. I told you I think it would be good for you to put effort into making that list but that it shouldn't be made as a guideline. Because: For whom? I feel you are insecure and always wondering if you're doing something wrong. Well, I can tell you: you are doing something wrong. So am I. So is everybody. But that's not important as long as you keep wondering and keep reading and learning. It is the process that counts. It is the thinking about what's good for you which starts the healing process, the accepting of responsibility. That's the opposite of sticking to rules others agree upon for you.

Do not many wonderful, wise, and complex books
begin with a Table of Contents?
And when authors make one of those outlines,
do they mean to suggest that that Table is all that need be read?
And do readers construe it that way?

*** First: Those table of contents is made by the authors. If they refuse to make it, there is no table of contents. There is a table of contents on Ray Peats homepage, section 'articles'. Every single one of this headlines tells you accurately what the article is about. You are not talking about making a table of contents, narouz - you opened many threads to make a list of things allowed in a 'basic Peat diet'. You are not talking about the book itself but about secondary literature and that's usually interpretative, speculative, artificial nonsense. You feel that not everybody should be authorized to make up his own list and pretend it's Peat. I keep telling you: It's just what you do. And the reason I don't need a list is that I have read and keep reading Ray Peat. I don't find reading him torturous. I don't find eating and drinking and thinking and moving and living according to what I have learned painful and hard as you obviously do. I am sorry you do. But the list will not make it easier, it would make it simpler. You think that's good. I think it is not.
Why do you keep asking me to agree with you and tell me at the same time it doesn't matter if I don't?
I. Do. Not. Let's move on and agree on other things.

There was a German philosopher, Castaneda, who once said: I could give you all the answers to all your questions right now - but they would be as meaningful to you as a pile of bricks would be to somebody who isn't building anything.

 

[peatarian]

(kidding narouz, i enjoy your posts. also, peatarian, i didn't imply that narouz posts went over your head)

Well, I have to admit it's not easy making an argument in a foreign language. It's always a bit like doing embroidery using a sword instead of a needle.

Your argument is all the more impressive for that very reason.

Thank you so much, kiran. I still feel I wasn't able to make myself clear. Your post means a lot!

 

[narouz]

see redo with your post quoted for clarity. :)

 

[narouz]

In that case, narouz - you have done a good job fooling me.

Mightn't it be more effective to put forth--
even if only as a starting point
and strongly qualified as not intended as "one-size-fits-all
--our best estimate or generalization about what an accurate, faithful Peat diet might be?

But...don't you think it would be possible
to provide some pretty clear outlines,
some rough approximations at least,
some valid generalizations
about the shape of a good, accurate, Peat-derived diet?
If we don't,
don't we invite anyone to feel authorized to make up their own interpretation of a Peat diet?
Is that really a beautiful thing?

We could make our Peat writings less clotted and tortuous, and our meanings clearer, if we agreed to a concept or designation called (something like) an Optimal Peat Diet
But he does make some fairly clear general statements or guidelines.
-Spelling out a Peat-Derived Diet (or somesuch)...we could hammer that out over time here.
The designation is intended simply as a generalization.

Proposed food chart and food list recommendations, rough draft. Please help critique.

If you look at just about any other theory of nutrition, most try to give some kind of clear template. "The Perfect Health Diet" or "Protein Power," for instance, give you a pretty clear idea of what should and should not be eaten, and give also guidance about amounts.
I don't think it is unreasonable for us to try to arrive at some starting point like that.

That said, can we agree that context is important, but still try to articulate a working definition of something like a "BPD"?
I don't see why not.
In fact, I think it would be very helpful and clarifying.

While noting that "context in everything" (above) Stevensmith also returns to his point and qualifies it by acknowledging that starches should, for most, be limited.
So I would simply point out
that, in my view,
Context is Not Everything--
at least not if we're trying to work toward a definition of a "BPD."
I would state it more like this:
Context is Important.

After all, if we are trying to derive or extrapolate such a thing from Peat's ideas,
would we not be very interested in his expressions about what would be
"generally,"
for most people,
"simple"
and
"safe"...?

I think, even here in its infant stage, there is a lot of guidance toward the goal.
So newcomers and wonderers (like myself) can take some encouragement, I would think,
from even these initial efforts to provide some outlines.

I'm kinda liking the last. It would seem useful to me to define a "strict" Peat diet, because, for one thing, it would leave a lot of room for others to define other non-strict (but still legitimate) Peat diets. Also, this might be possible, because sometimes Peat does seem to speak strictly.

A person could come to Peat's work and to various interpreters of his work
and come away with radically different notions of what "Peat diet" would most accurately be.
(Hell, we can't even allow ourselves to speak the work "diet" in connection with Peat!)

peatarian-

I would think you are making my point with those quotes of mine.
(I feel my head swelling. Be careful! :) )

You will see as a theme in those quotes that I am at pains to qualify:

-not a one-size-fits-all
-starting-point: not final or definitive
-a generalization: not meant in any way to imply there is no need for more detailed reading
-Peat-Derived: not putting words in Peat's mouth or claiming his endorsement
-"pretty clear idea": not absolute, an admission that some ambiguity is unavoidable
-"guidance about amounts": vs. "rules"
-"would leave a lot of room for others to define other non-strict (but still legitimate) Peat diets": not authoritartian

And now I grasp your devilish ploy, peatarian:
you are trying to make me late for work,
I lose my job,
can't afford internet,
and therefore can not pester you any more!
I'm not falling for it!

 

[narouz]

*** You called Peat's writing 'clotted' and 'torturous'. Two words I don't use to describe meaningful activities I enjoy. /b]

Many fascinating points to address,
but only the one above I have time for now.
You will see that what I wrote was:

"Proposed:
We could make our Peat writings less clotted and tortuous, and our meanings clearer, if we agreed to a concept or designation called (something like) an Optimal Peat Diet."

By "...our Peat writings less clotted and tortuous..."
I meant our posts about Peat,
not Peat's writing.
Peat's writing is anything but clotted and tortuous, IMO.
It is probably the first thing that attracted me to him.
Beautiful, clear, fluid, elegant.
He was a student of literature and linguistics before (Masters degree)
his science degree.
I know you know this...not insinuating that you don't. :)

 

[peatarian]

Okay, narouz, that's a relief to me but I still see that you asked for that list.
And I have to say: I don't see you changing your opinion and I can guarantee you that I will not and this discussion is not helpful to anybody. So why not agree to disagree and move on.
There are people here who discuss Peat's latest newsletter, people asking for help ... and you have that list to make ...
There is better use of our time, don't you think?
I will be gone again for at least two weeks starting on friday so I really don't feel this is leading anywhere. Do you?

 

[charlie]

I will be gone again for at least two weeks starting on friday so I really don't feel this is leading anywhere. Do you?

 

[peatarian]

Narouz, I realized the many, many things you said about that list that's not supposed to be a list and the diet which is not a diet and the rules which are not rules and the generalization which is really not general at all. Every one of your posts is about that: Refusing to call your list a list. That's the reason you haven't found a title yet: Because you don't want to admit to what's in it you can't name it.

I recently saw a comedy show with a boy who kept insulting people, always starting with: I don't mean to insult you, but -
He was shocked to hear that people were still insulted because he had said he didn't mean to....

I don't mean that you insult anybody. You just do something you don't really do and want something you don't really want and say something you don't really mean like that. It's lawyer's language you use there. And I feel I am caught in a spiral when I talk to you about this. There are no new arguments, just repeating the old ones and refusing to accept my answers. You haven't said anything to change my mind and I don't think you can. There are so many points in my replies to you, essential points in my opinion you haven't answered and I don't think you can. You are like a dog with a bone and you will not let go of that bone. That's fine: I don't want it. But please don't go on asking me if I want it. Why does it matter if I think it's good to make a summary of Ray Peat's work? You don't need my permission. If you did, I'd give it to you.

I will make it real easy for you: You go make a list which is not a list and sum up what is not meant to be a summary and make general rules which are no rules. But please leave me out of this. I don't want you to pop up like Jack in the box every time I say anything about eating with the question: "Should we make an effort to have general guidelines?"
Please, please, please accept my answer is: No. And it doesn't have to effect you at all.