Fruit Might Be Responsible For Our Bigger Brains

[tygertgr]

This "myth" is itself a myth, fostered by paleo followers: Wild and Ancient Fruit: Is it Really Small, Bitter, and Low in Sugar?

Why ignore the exception of bananas? Even the wild seedy ones had a good amount of flesh on them. And a lot of current limited availability is due to our huge populations, which wouldn't have been around in paleolithic times.

Northern peoples have lower capabilities of sugar digestion, with the trait peaking in Inuits at 10%. This wouldn't be the case if all climates were equally capable of producing fruit.

In addition, fruit is not the only source of sugar: honey is effectively the same, and honey also comes from flower nectar, which is abundant in sunny places. Not to mention that insects are more active in warm climates, compounding the effect.

The Hadza literally live off of nothing but honey for months at a time. Sugar was abundant in hotter climes; that is a fact. Of course starch is the real engine that powered humanity into the neolithic age and beyond.

You can render better quality sugar from tree sap, and preserve it fairly easily. As was clearly done for many thousands of years in north america. The "tropical fruit" thing is just ridiculous. There is as much accessible sugar and starch in northern climes as in the south, the concentration per acre is just lower.

Maybe the hadza have eaten a lot of honey when they could find it. Generally speaking, they can't count to twenty. Not a lot of evidence there that being in a hot sunny place makes your brain big. You can talk about inuit aging and cancer and lifespan from high fat consumption, fair point, but to this day they are known as skilled engineers. They devised ingenious watercraft, hunting traps, and big game hunting tactics.

 

[lvysaur]

There is as much accessible sugar and starch in northern climes as in the south, the concentration per acre is just lower.

So you finally admit it too. Glad we've come to an agreement.

Maybe the hadza have eaten a lot of honey when they could find it. Generally speaking, they can't count to twenty.

Source? Seems like an outrageous and probably false claim. Not to mention that you literally can't understand the concept of "per capita", so you've got no right to be talking here.

Not a lot of evidence there that being in a hot sunny place makes your brain big.

What does this have to do with anything? It is true that people from western and southern regions tend to have smaller brains than their eastern/northern cousins.

But to bring that up for no reason reeks of defensiveness and insecurity.

 

[tygertgr]

It is true that people from western and southern regions tend to have smaller brains than their eastern/northern cousins.

Very definitively yes. Cranial volume is larger in more northerly peoples all over the world. This is unassailable fact.

 

[Luann]

I tried a fruit based diet (granted for only 24 hours), and felt my teeth get sensitive, my strength go way down, my muscles went flat, hard to satiate myself, and overall didn’t feel optimal, as my body was asking for dense fatty nutrition but I was sending it bananas instead.

I love my fruits...but eating that way is not right.

I've felt pretty similar when eating mostly fruit. It also bothers my teeth.

 

[Runenight201]

I've felt pretty similar when eating mostly fruit. It also bothers my teeth.

Things which make my teeth rock hard are eggs, meat fat, and dairy.

Things which worsen my teeth are starch, meat, and fruit.

Each food has its own problems when consumed in excess of what my body needs, and I have found proper health to a balancing act of all these different foods.

 

[Luann]

Each food has its own problems when consumed in excess of what my body needs, and I have found proper health to a balancing act of all these different foods.

WONDERFUL advice and very wise...
re:fats for teeth, I've been adding more coconut oil to meals, I'll keep going with that then!

 

[Runenight201]

WONDERFUL advice and very wise...
re:fats for teeth, I've been adding more coconut oil to meals, I'll keep going with that then!

Very nice. I have had most success with pork fat so far. Theoretically it’s not ideal because it has higher amounts of PUFA compared to beef fat, but in terms of muscle strength, satiation, taste, and bone/tooth density, I haven’t found a better fat. I make a tasty gravy out of it by using equal parts flour and lard, and then pour broth and salt over it to season into a delectable sauce. I may try this gravy with different animal fats, but so far lard has been my favorite. I may try duck fat also.

 

[Luann]

Very nice. I have had most success with pork fat so far. Theoretically it’s not ideal because it has higher amounts of PUFA compared to beef fat, but in terms of muscle strength, satiation, taste, and bone/tooth density, I haven’t found a better fat.

You're definitely a rebel! I am wary of the PUFA's of duck fat and lard at my grocery store, but I can't argue with stronger teeth!

 

[Rinse & rePeat]

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/03/eating-fruit-fuels-bigger-brains-primates

I have suspected this for a while.

Also, our inability to produce vitamin C is strong evidence that humans evolved eating massive amounts of fruit. To lose the ability to produce vitamin C, we had to be consuming large amounts of it in our diet. The most concentrated source of it is in fruit. This would mean that we evolved to eat lots of fruit sugar. This might explain why sugar eaten in the proper context actually helps diabetics. It is very healthy.

It never made any sense to me that foods that are good for you taste bad and foods that are bad for you taste good. If that were true, we would have gone extinct because we would have sought out the very foods that reduced our fitness and avoided the ones that would have increased it. Obviously, our tastes can be fooled like when we drown bitter vegetables in dressing and other stuff that masks the bitter flavor which is supposed to warn us not to consume that substance again.

There is a reason kids don't like to eat their vegetables. They instinctively know that they are not entirely healthy.

I am not sure about the “massive amounts”, but I agree with you otherwise. @stargazer1111 . For many years my New Years resolution was to try to eat more vegetables and salads, and after many attempts I found ways to enjoy them with lots of butter and other sauces on the cooked vegetables and amazing salad dressings to get down the raw stuff. Funny now that I am avoiding PUFA’s I miss those salads. A lot of our likes and dislikes are just from what one is trained to do, whether it be from parents or acclimating oneself to a diet, for whatever the purpose.