Anti-Peat Curious: What was Peat wrong about, in your view?

[chrstn4o]

Since we all have blind spots and omissions and no-one is infallible, what do you think Peat was wrong about? Any supporting literature or anecdotal experience would also be welcome.

 

[DKayJoe]

It's really easy to take Peats ideas out of context or apply them to an extreme that no longer makes them valid IMO (something I've done myself more than once) but one thing I think he missed the mark on was exercise. I think he erred on the side of caution a bit too much when people are hypothyroid etc, I've personally found the benefits of daily exercise such as weights/climbing/swimming/surfing to far outweigh the negatives of overtraining and on the whole helped me toward a journey of recovery from poor health by giving me something positive to focus on and alleviate boredom. As well as the physical side helping me gain strength and condition my body to take a little more punishment before crashing. To be clear I am not recommending anyone overtrains I just think Peat was a little too cautious of this happening from time to time where the odd period of overtraining for me was more beneficial than not exercising enough.

 

[Peatful]

Hx: I have been reading Peat since 2008 or thereabouts. I read his articles first. Then his books. Then the forum. Then podcasts.


Assessment:
I don’t think I’ve found him “wrong” thus far.
I have assumed things about myself or others- applied my weak understanding of said principles- and that didn’t work because I was wrong- not him.


When he personally was walking me through near death health (not hyperbole)-
He wasn’t my personal practitioner.
He didn’t have my full pmhx nor the current nuances of my daily struggle.
He simply suggested what should have worked if I was in a stronger place.
He had no idea.
But his advice was sound and certainly backed up with his studies and footnotes he attached.


Im sure there is something he is off on of course.
But I personally haven’t experienced that myself.

 

[Peatful]

It's really easy to take Peats ideas out of context or apply them to an extreme that no longer makes them valid IMO (something I've done myself more than once) but one thing I think he missed the mark on was exercise. I think he erred on the side of caution a bit too much when people are hypothyroid etc, I've personally found the benefits of daily exercise such as weights/climbing/swimming/surfing to far outweigh the negatives of overtraining and on the whole helped me toward a journey of recovery from poor health by giving me something positive to focus on and alleviate boredom. As well as the physical side helping me gain strength and condition my body to take a little more punishment before crashing. To be clear I am not recommending anyone overtrains I just think Peat was a little too cautious of this happening from time to time where the odd period of overtraining for me was more beneficial than not exercising enough.

Context. Yes.

 

[Eberhardt]

Exercise, vitamin A and maybe his preference of fruit over starch. I love his general ideas and approach to the bodys metabolic state and no stress

 

[reality]

It's really easy to take Peats ideas out of context or apply them to an extreme that no longer makes them valid IMO (something I've done myself more than once) but one thing I think he missed the mark on was exercise. I think he erred on the side of caution a bit too much when people are hypothyroid etc, I've personally found the benefits of daily exercise such as weights/climbing/swimming/surfing to far outweigh the negatives of overtraining and on the whole helped me toward a journey of recovery from poor health by giving me something positive to focus on and alleviate boredom. As well as the physical side helping me gain strength and condition my body to take a little more punishment before crashing. To be clear I am not recommending anyone overtrains I just think Peat was a little too cautious of this happening from time to time where the odd period of overtraining for me was more beneficial than not exercising enough.

I don’t think I’ve heard ray say negative things about “exercise”. He has endorsed weight training, walks and other focused activity that has meaning and is purposeful. Stressful activity like long running or too much eccentric muscle work (stretching muscle under load as opposed to concentric training) is what he did not recommend

 

[moa]

I think he may have been wrong on the following :

The importance of acetylcholine in vagus nerve health (eyes, sinuses, digestion, anti IBS-c, for mood, sleep, muscle force, etc) and maybe to lower brain serotonin i think. Mainstream science is also wrong on acetylcholine, cause high acetylcholine needs more GABA and enaught dopamine to counter the reduction in serotonin. Serotonin both calm down or mask a GABA deficiency and also mask any dopamine deficiency, that's who acetylcholine alone can cause either headache/migraine or depression respectively and it's not a cure all either until you fix dopamine and GABA and norepinephrine tolerance. Peat has said acetylcholine will "burn out" your vagus nerve, because of it's relationship with histamine but i don't understand how a nerve can burn out only because it's being stimulated, from my understanding it needs to have other factors to get damage like vitamin deficiency or something because of how many regulatory mechanism there are for normal function, bit I'm not an expert in nerves (neither Dr Peat was as a young researcher). Dr Peat approach was initially based on androgens and sex hormones research.

Secondly, i think he was not completely right regarding fiber intake. I already posted much about how fiber is maybe not as bad as we thought. Of course, taking huge amounts when your gut is not used to will cause problems. But normal gut produces each day enaught endotoxin to kill multiple times anyone if only a fraction was absorbed into bloodstream. So the gut permeability is more important and zinc/magnesium are cofactors required against LPS (intestinal alkaline phosphatase (IAP)). Carrots do have equal pectin as much as insoluble fiber, and i think long chain inulin, normal inulin, pectin, maybe some types of resistant starch but not sure witch ones, are good in the right amount as well as b. coagulans probiotic (Dr Peat has also said good things about some ancient practice containing b. coagulans, i think eating camel poo or something i don't remember). His view is that LPS triggers serotonin, but actually i think only if you don't raise histamine and acetylcholine. if your acetylcholine levels are ok and histamine, then you won't have as much serotonin cause without constipation, you'll quickly go to toilet as soon as peristalsis is triggered, long before it has time to trigger much serotonin. of course you need t3 and low lactate for muscles strength etc, but you also need acetylcholine for nerves to activate the muscles to contract. You don't need much serotonin on the other hand normally.

Endotoxin (from Low-grade Infection) As A Cause Of Crohn's, UC, And Other IBD

Not sure how many people on the forum know that Crohn's disease, which is a type of an inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), has recently been reclassified in some countries as infectious of origin and not as an autoimmune disease. The causative pathogen of Crohn's is thought to be a type of...

raypeatforum.com

Then, the role of magnesium and potassium in metabolic syndrome, especially in diabetes type 2. I think it was not much explored because of lack of scientific studies, but it does not necessarily go against Dr. Peat research. It's impossible to measure how much magnesium someone has inside the cells, but even more difficult for potassium. i think even nail analysis don't do it for potassium. It is possible that diabetes is caused by low potassium inside cells, especially as potassium is the real insulin like substance, much stronger than insulin itself. pufa and cortisol will block oxidation and will excrete magnesium, then if sodium intake is low, also will cause a loss of potassium from the body but not the blood levels. This means increasing carbs, reducing pufa and taking b's is not enaught without good potassium and magnesium intake, especially magnesium to start with. Romans were using magnesium baths a lot, it might help more than we think. there's no need to load on carbs if most of it will be transformed into lipids. I'm not sure about this one but should be researched more.

But overall, most of Peat work is pretty amazing, much above the mainstream or the other fad diets around.

 

[moa]

Exercise, vitamin A and maybe his preference of fruit over starch. I love his general ideas and approach to the bodys metabolic state and no stress

+1 for vitamin A and liver being dangerous in high amounts.

 

[chrstn4o]

I think he may have been wrong on the following :

The importance of acetylcholine in vagus nerve health (eyes, sinuses, digestion, anti IBS-c, for mood, sleep, muscle force, etc) and maybe to lower brain serotonin i think. Mainstream science is also wrong on acetylcholine, cause high acetylcholine needs more GABA and enaught dopamine to counter the reduction in serotonin. Serotonin both calm down or mask a GABA deficiency and also mask any dopamine deficiency, that's who acetylcholine alone can cause either headache/migraine or depression respectively and it's not a cure all either until you fix dopamine and GABA and norepinephrine tolerance. Peat has said acetylcholine will "burn out" your vagus nerve, because of it's relationship with histamine but i don't understand how a nerve can burn out only because it's being stimulated, from my understanding it needs to have other factors to get damage like vitamin deficiency or something because of how many regulatory mechanism there are for normal function, bit I'm not an expert in nerves (neither Dr Peat was as a young researcher). Dr Peat approach was initially based on androgens and sex hormones research.

Secondly, i think he was not completely right regarding fiber intake. I already posted much about how fiber is maybe not as bad as we thought. Of course, taking huge amounts when your gut is not used to will cause problems. But normal gut produces each day enaught endotoxin to kill multiple times anyone if only a fraction was absorbed into bloodstream. So the gut permeability is more important and zinc/magnesium are cofactors required against LPS (intestinal alkaline phosphatase (IAP)). Carrots do have equal pectin as much as insoluble fiber, and i think long chain inulin, normal inulin, pectin, maybe some types of resistant starch but not sure witch ones, are good in the right amount as well as b. coagulans probiotic (Dr Peat has also said good things about some ancient practice containing b. coagulans, i think eating camel poo or something i don't remember). His view is that LPS triggers serotonin, but actually i think only if you don't raise histamine and acetylcholine. if your acetylcholine levels are ok and histamine, then you won't have as much serotonin cause without constipation, you'll quickly go to toilet as soon as peristalsis is triggered, long before it has time to trigger much serotonin. of course you need t3 and low lactate for muscles strength etc, but you also need acetylcholine for nerves to activate the muscles to contract. You don't need much serotonin on the other hand normally.

Endotoxin (from Low-grade Infection) As A Cause Of Crohn's, UC, And Other IBD

Not sure how many people on the forum know that Crohn's disease, which is a type of an inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), has recently been reclassified in some countries as infectious of origin and not as an autoimmune disease. The causative pathogen of Crohn's is thought to be a type of...

raypeatforum.com

Then, the role of magnesium and potassium in metabolic syndrome, especially in diabetes type 2. I think it was not much explored because of lack of scientific studies, but it does not necessarily go against Dr. Peat research. It's impossible to measure how much magnesium someone has inside the cells, but even more difficult for potassium. i think even nail analysis don't do it for potassium. It is possible that diabetes is caused by low potassium inside cells, especially as potassium is the real insulin like substance, much stronger than insulin itself. pufa and cortisol will block oxidation and will excrete magnesium, then if sodium intake is low, also will cause a loss of potassium from the body but not the blood levels. This means increasing carbs, reducing pufa and taking b's is not enaught without good potassium and magnesium intake, especially magnesium to start with. Romans were using magnesium baths a lot, it might help more than we think. there's no need to load on carbs if most of it will be transformed into lipids. I'm not sure about this one but should be researched more.

But overall, most of Peat work is pretty amazing, much above the mainstream or the other fad diets around.

wow, gonna have to re-read that a few times... so are you saying if one is trying to boost acetylcholine production with nootropics they also need to support dopamine and gaba for best results? Because my protocol has been CDP-Choline or AlphaGPC during the day along with tyrosine in the morning, and GABA before bed... and that seems to work really well for me for cognitive function and such..

 

[Nick]

I could be wrong but it seems like later in his life Ray spent most of his time at home, where he had no wifi and it seems likely that he did not use a cell phone either (he called in to interviews on a landline phone). He also talked about using chicken wire on the walls to block radio waves from entering the home, although it's unclear if this was something he personally did, and he said the walls of his home were concrete. He even talked about the EMF from many alarm clocks as being too much exposure for during sleep. From this and other evidence in his interviews, I suspect that his exposure to electromagnetic pollution was well below that of 99% of people in industrialized nations by orders of magnitude.

It is perhaps for this reason that I think he may have, to my knowledge, overlooked the possibility that I have personally observed and also found evidence for in the literature: many pro-metabolic strategies can, at least in some people, increase sensitivity to electromagnetic pollition or have seemingly paradoxical damaging effects in the presence of non-native EMF. There are multiple possible mechanisms for this effect, one of the most fundamental of which is that nn-EMF interfere with the movement of electrons in the electron transport chain, and because this is an electrical effect and a matter of physics, it's not clear that this problem can be addressed at the root with chemical intervention, although some of the downstream damage can be chemically mitigated. I don't think this is a small issue confined to a few sensitive people, I think it is at the root of many chronic diseases. To give one example, this would be a factor in why progesterone can "cause" diabetes in pregnancy.

Mainstream medicine and calorie restriction, low carb etc. people unknowingly address this problem in one of the few chemical ways possible: suppress reduce aerobic respiration and therefore the activity of the electron transport chain, reducing the opportunity for nn-EMF to interfere with it. I'm not suggesting that this is a good approach.

 

[DKayJoe]

I don’t think I’ve heard ray say negative things about “exercise”. He has endorsed weight training, walks and other focused activity that has meaning and is purposeful. Stressful activity like long running or too much eccentric muscle work (stretching muscle under load as opposed to concentric training) is what he did not recommend

I'm not saying he has said negative things above exercise per say but it's more that personally when I have overtrained from time to time whilst in a weakened state I still received a net benefit from a consistent exercise regime over backing off for a few days to recover and falling out of the habit. Consistently overtraining or doing this without a good diet and sleep pattern would probably not be the case. Never really worried about the concentric/eccentric stuff either and have never injured myself or felt any real stress or less of flexibility from whatever I do to work out.
I remember reading somewhere that peat lifted weight only once in a blue moon (I cannot remember the time period stated but it was a long time) and only to see if he still could, it's my understanding that this was in his later life and I can't relate to being that old but it just doesn't seem enough in my mind. I suppose I feel that peat maybe emphasized the avoidance of all forms of stress more than I have found needed in my life, sometimes a light touch of it from time to time helps you acclimatise to healing and regeneration and kind of flex those skills in your body. Just my opinion, and don't ask me to back it up with science heh.

 

[kimbriel]

Since we all have blind spots and omissions and no-one is infallible, what do you think Peat was wrong about? Any supporting literature or anecdotal experience would also be welcome.

He was wrong about T3 causing RT3 - T4 is what does that. He was wrong about needing to take small amounts of T3 very often to have a better effect - that isn't true for people with thyroid disease. Disappointingly, his work doesn't really discuss thyroid disease in general, especially Hashimoto's. And a lot of what he said just doesn't work for people with Hashimoto's.

I'm still so grateful I found his work, especially the work on PUFAs and progesterone. Those two things have changed my life forever.

 

[Nokoni]

Melatonin helps me sleep with no noticeable affect on my metabolism.
In my case, soluble fiber (psyllium husks) acts as a colon conditioner, whereas insoluble fiber (cellulose) acts as a colon irritant.
I think supplements are generally safe, and that I'm not getting the equivalent of 1,000 chest x-rays (or whatever it was) every time I take them.

But that's just picking around the edges. Nobody is right about everything. He was massively right about his major theses (pufa bad, satfat good, carbs good, inflammation bad, etc.).

 

[baron]

He was wrong about T3 causing RT3 - T4 is what does that. He was wrong about needing to take small amounts of T3 very often to have a better effect - that isn't true for people with thyroid disease. Disappointingly, his work doesn't really discuss thyroid disease in general, especially Hashimoto's. And a lot of what he said just doesn't work for people with Hashimoto's.

I'm still so grateful I found his work, especially the work on PUFAs and progesterone. Those two things have changed my life forever.

Where did he say that T3 increases reverse T3? Or are you saying it's false that T4 increases reverse T3 when it's not able to be converted to T3?

 

[kimbriel]

Where did he say that T3 increases reverse T3? Or are you saying it's false that T4 increases reverse T3 when it's not able to be converted to T3?

I've seen in a few places where he mentions taking too much T3 at once leads to RT3. Unless he was misquoted, he is mistaken and that is false. Your second statement is correct - it's T4 that increases RT3 when it's improperly converted by the body into RT3 instead of T3. This is very common, especially for women, and I saw it happen in myself.

 

[baron]

I've seen in a few places where he mentions taking too much T3 at once leads to RT3. Unless he was misquoted, he is mistaken and that is false. Your second statement is correct - it's T4 that increases RT3 when it's improperly converted by the body into RT3 instead of T3. This is very common, especially for women, and I saw it happen in myself.

I think he explicitly said T4 and T4 monotherapy causes increased reverse T3 if the liver is sluggish.

 

[moa]

wow, gonna have to re-read that a few times... so are you saying if one is trying to boost acetylcholine production with nootropics they also need to support dopamine and gaba for best results? Because my protocol has been CDP-Choline or AlphaGPC during the day along with tyrosine in the morning, and GABA before bed... and that seems to work really well for me for cognitive function and such..

I come from a severe gut pain caused by what could be called IBS-C by mainstream medicine excepting that i fixed my constipation and the pain was still there, with probably inflamed lymph nodes.

My goal was not too have better memory, but to fix my gut. after i experienced all symptoms of low acetylcholine, really all of them (sinus infection, dry eyes, bad sleep, no dreams ever, bad memory, poor concentration, skipping words while speaking, muscle weakness in my legs, fainting easily because of vagus nerve crisis, etc).

I increased my egg intake, and zinc, to increase acetylcholine, as well as b1, b5, without any nootropics.

then, i experienced good results on my gut and overall all other symptoms, excepting i experienced migraines and then low dopamine.

this is the conclusion i came after reading many studies with my new symptoms, that they are caused by high glutamate/GABA ratio and by low dopamine.

of course i was not doing any nootropics, only the RDA for choline and normal zinc intake for many months, cause i was deficient in both i think.

Regarding the GABA, i think, the body of a healthy person is supposed to adjust the glutamate/GABA ratio in a few weeks without any need to take extra GABA after it has adapted to the "new normal".

There are studies that nitric oxide is upregulating the GABA production, so nitric oxide may be the bad guy, causing headache but maybe you cannot raise you GABA without it, do maybe not a good idea to suppress NO and take extra GABA.

If NO is not working and GABA stay low then i tried various substances back then, and GABA agonists never fixed the cause only the symptoms. i think when i took coq10 it fixed the migraines and headache and kind of fixed the cause, in the sense i didn't need as much GABA like substances the next days. it's just an anecdotal evidence. also i think coq10 can sometimes cause problems elsewhere in the body if low on magnesium, i take it with topical magnesium.

maybe try coq10 and see if it lowers your need for GABA, and maybe don't take NO inhibitors (excepting natural like CO2). i don't remember the studies, but NO was signaling the increase in GABA.

Regarding dopamine, intresting you take tyrosine, cause back then i did felt depressed also, and since i didn't wanted to reduce my zinc or choline intakei tried tyrosine with bcaa (the gut pain before supplementing was much worse than the depression caused by normal acetylcholine levels).

Actually i tried quite a big dose to start with, and i felt.... amaizing the first 1h or 2h. i went outside and i remember how good it felt. but it only lasted that much, and then i had a push of anxiety, i felt horrible the next 6h.

so that's because of low GABA, high glutamate, and dopamine converting to norepinephrine after some time.

i never got to fix completely (yet) my high glutamate/GABA ratio yet. Headache and migraines improved, but i think it's a magnesium deficiency that is blocking further progress.

So i think coq10 is doing something against migraines caused by NO, but maybe raising magnesium is even more important long term (for the GABA needs).

i don't dare to try again tyrosine until i fix all my anxiety problems, but that one experience i know it's low dopamine that make me depressed and not as much normal to high acetylcholine.

i have the half worrior gene, meaning impared MAO-A, meaning i build up serotonin fast, all my life i was serotonin driven and low acetylcholine, with overmaethylation like symptoms.

Serotonin is blocking everything : acetylcholine, glutamate, dopamine, meaning if you have high serotonin you won't need as much GABA to calm the brain and dopamine will go down too, that's why i think SSRI work because serotonin will calm down everything but without the good feeling of motivation when you have high dopamine.

i think mainstream is afraid of the psychotic cases of people who are psychotic, because of high dopamine, but that's not everybody. they are afraid, if they raised dopamine, a small amount of people could develop psychotic or even madness and they cannot take that risk because of how bad the psychiatric cases are seen, they rather would have everybody like a zombie than have 0.1% of patients develop psychotic behaviour. but that doesn't means they are in good mental health, only less problematic for the authoritarian society, like sedated patients in hospitals, more easy to "manage".

and maybe it's something else is in play, not only dopamine, I'm not sure what, but maybe something else is causing mental psychotic problems, not yet well understood by science.

in order to increase dopamine i think i need, as i said, increase first magnesium to fix further my anxiety problems, then lower estrogen.

i don't risk to take high dose p5p or vitamin e (blood thinner).

maybe I'll try again tyrosine if my anxiety gets better.

hope this is more clear now what i mean, nice to see someone else having the same experience as me coming from a different background (nootropics use instead of fixing deficiency).

SSRI industry is really not here to help, and we can't blame Dr. Peat, he states in one of his interviews how much he didn't like at all the people working in brain research, that's why he went on the opposite side, sex hormones research. he was never very interested in neurotransmitters in the brain excepting when they were linked with steroids like in the gut. He really didn't liked that field of research (the brain) and he said that multiple times.

 

[moa]

i mean serotonin will not lower glutamate, it will make high glutamate and mask the side effects of high glutamate/GABA ratio. and it will lower acetylcholine and dopamine in some people to some degree, I'm not sure how much.

meaning when you lower serotonin you are left with high glutamate/GABA ratio and low dopamine, low acetylcholine.

maybe I'm wrong on the details, i didn't had time to research the science in details, i think much worry is needed to understand correctly the mechanisms here.

there are also other neurotransmitters involved here, maybe even histamine ? I've read low histamine is also a cause of high norepinephrine ? maybe overmaethylation/low histamine is not good for anxiety ? I'm not sure, but i surely had overmaethylation symptoms all my life and low histamine.

 

[mostlylurking]

Hx: I have been reading Peat since 2008 or thereabouts. I read his articles first. Then his books. Then the forum. Then podcasts.


Assessment:
I don’t think I’ve found him “wrong” thus far.
I have assumed things about myself or others- applied my weak understanding of said principles- and that didn’t work because I was wrong- not him.


When he personally was walking me through near death health (not hyperbole)-
He wasn’t my personal practitioner.
He didn’t have my full pmhx nor the current nuances of my daily struggle.
He simply suggested what should have worked if I was in a stronger place.
He had no idea.
But his advice was sound and certainly backed up with his studies and footnotes he attached.


Im sure there is something he is off on of course.
But I personally haven’t experienced that myself.

I have the same opinion of Ray Peat and a very similar journey as yours learning Ray's ideas via his articles, then books, then audio shows, lastly this forum which would have been a mine field had I not spent so much time studying Peat's work beforehand.

That said, my own health journey is complicated by heavy metal poisoning (mainly mercury) so there have been things that simply did not work for me. Heavy metal poisoning caused me to have a thiamine deficiency which some Peaty things made much worse; sugar, coffee, methylene blue, mainly.

I believe that my most valued benefit from reading Ray Peat's writings is my honed ability to sleuth out solutions for my own unique set of health challenges. Reading Ray's work taught me to think and gave me a better ability to identify helpful information that hides within the mountain of gobbledegook available on line. I've gotten much better at standing my ground with physicians too, which has saved my life on more than one occasion.

 

[ecstatichamster]

He was wrong about eccentric exercises being harmful. They are very protective actually.

He was wrong about low dose naltrexone being only good to take once or twice. LDN is actually extremely helpful and more people here should be looking into it.