How To Build Deep Knowledge Of Physiology And Chemistry?

cats

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I've been reading Ray Peat and these forums for years and I want to go further. I'm looking for some guidance on the best way to build a deep, thorough understanding of physiology and all the relevant concepts in physics and chemistry. In addition to cell metabolism, endocrinology, etc. I aim to go all the way up to being able to understand the science of the association induction hypothesis and water structure. Can anyone who is undergoing or has undergone this kind of journey recommend a path?
 

S-VV

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If you want to understand, you have to read studies.
To read studies means that you have to learn the language they use.
To learn this language, you need to focus mostly on “mainstream” books: for biochem id recommend lehninger, and for physiology you can get constazo, tho guyton goes into more detail. Also the classic “molecular biology of the cell”. However you could start with organic chemistry if you dont know about it. User travis recommended a great free book, cant remember what it was.

After that you have a great base for expanding: pharmacology katzung, roitts essential immunology etc...

Basically you need to learn what the rules are before breaking them, if not, you will be stuck in sequentially adopting views purely by the fact that they oppose the mainstream, without understanding them.
 

S-VV

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After that, I would read and understand USMLE prep books, which have a more practical and dogmatic tone, but they will cement and test your mainstream understanding. Once thats done, you will have the vocabulary and knowledge necessary to challenge the system, and maybe even appreciate some of its positive aspects.
 
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cats

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Thanks for the detailed reply. The Lehninger book has multiple editions, any particular one you recommend? Ray, in an interview, and some of the other forum members recommended Constance R. Martin for physiology and Ray called the Guyton textbook "trash," but I suppose you recommend it because it reflects the current mainstream?
 

S-VV

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Thanks for the detailed reply. The Lehninger book has multiple editions, any particular one you recommend? Ray, in an interview, and some of the other forum members recommended Constance R. Martin for physiology and Ray called the Guyton textbook "trash," but I suppose you recommend it because it reflects the current mainstream?
Ray peat can be so extreme at times...

Guyton is not trash, it reflects established medical knowledge, which lags about 15 to 20 years behind biomedical research. This has always been so, and is not done in a malicious intent, but rather it is such a vast body of knowledge that things get assimilated slowly, and once they do, it is very difficult to remove them even if they are wrong.

constance endocrine physiology is fine, but it mostly deals in how hormones regulate the body. I would read a physiology book first to deeply understand what is being regulated. Be forewarned! Physiology is the area of medicine that has more graphs and formulas than any other. They are almost always simple, but I was surprised the first time I read one.

also constance endo.phys. has a rather anticuated discussion of second messengers, that wont translate well to reading a modern hyper-technical paper. On that note, you will imevitably have to learn a lot of abbreviations, and protein names that make no sense: hedhehog, disheveled, son of sevenless, mouse double minute II, MAP kinase kinase kinase etc...
 

S-VV

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Anothe warning: you will always feel that you dont know nearly enough, and that there is still so much more to learn. Get comfortable with that feeling, because its never leaving
 
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cats

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Anothe warning: you will always feel that you dont know nearly enough, and that there is still so much more to learn. Get comfortable with that feeling, because its never leaving
Oh, I know this well :sweatsmile:
 

yerrag

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There are many ways to skin a cat. I went about it with no clear path on how I was going to do it, but I started with reading Ray Peat's many articles on his website, as well as listen to interviews by good interviewers of his. Like Jodelle Fit and Patrick Timpone. His articles are long and heavy on the mind, so the lightness of the interviews give me a break. I listen to these interviews when I'm driving my car, where it's easier to not be distracted.

I'll encounter terms and topics that I'm not familiar with reading his articles and his newsletters, and I'll go more in-depth into them, usually using Youtube to learn. It's as if I'm going to college as these lectures are splendid, and the nice thing about lectures is that they don't have a tendency to speak over you.

This cannot be said when you're reading studies. Most researchers have lousy English -poor vocabulary, have a tendency to use gobbledygook which only their colleagues will understand, and have poor sentence construction. Hence reading studies can be quite difficult. They confuse more than they elucidate, and leave the reader to feel he is not at all capable of understanding anything. Sometimes, this is intentional on the part of the authors. A lot of their language is intended to have double meanings, and often you would get confused on what is really the cause and what is the effect.

Ray Peat's articles don't do these things. If you can read through a Ray Peat article, you pass the first test of schloarship, in my opinion. Ray Peat doesn't spoonfeed you, and he sometimes will speak over you, but then it's hard not to when you're a beginner. Ray won't break down to the basic some concepts, as it's assumed you have enough aptitude to learn these concepts on your own, especially with the easy availability of information on the internet. Don't be in a hurry to finish reading all the articles he's written over the years, as that's not going to help you much. Instead, pick an article that interests you (I usually do a search on a term to come up with a list of articles to choose from). Read to understand and not just to read to finish. If you come across a term you don't understand, don't go past it. Research it, and then continue reading. Of course, it helps that you're not distracted by social media. Otherwise, you're screwed.

Lastly, the forum helps a lot. Once in a while, someone will share with you an article that's gold. Be on the lookout for these nuggets. There are also a lot of other materials that's not related to your specific focus to health here. Indulge in them to break from the monotony, but still stay focused. As years go by, you'll just be amazed how much you've learned without being so much structured as much as being engaged. It will all tie together in the end. The subjects you amassed will be the ones that are more relevant and useful to your health, and the ones you missed, you were never going to find them useful anyway. What you don't miss you won't miss.

Aim for depth and not for breadth. With breadth, you get all the bad ideas that come along with mainstream medical education. You learn stuff like active pumps that are constructs of devious minds pretending to know science. You learn fictitious causes of diseases that lead you on a wild goose chase. You learn to use blood tests that are nowhere as useful as touted and not worth their weight in gold. Get your basics and concepts right, and you'll analyze data well and troubleshoot problems well. Don't be too smitten with the certainty of an endless round of blood tests, but learn to do with less and make up for it with good analysis using a good handle of probability and logic.

Your learn best when you apply what you learned in your daily lives. Whether you want to let your body do the heavy lifting for you or whether you want to let substances do them for you, or whether you want to decide to strike a balance between the two, you are the one in control of your decisions. You'll have your share of alternate opinions in the forum to help shake the confusion and clutter in your mind.
 

Recoen

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For physics the undergrad standard texts are:
Classical Mechanics:
Classical Mechanics by John Taylor
Or
Classical Dynamics of Particles and Systems by S. Thornton and J. Marion

Quantum Mechanics:
Introduction to Quantum Mechanics by David Griffiths

Electromagnetism:
Introduction to Electrodynamics by David Griffiths

Stat Mech and Thermo:
Introduction to thermal physics by Daniel Schroder

Math Methods:
Mary Boas
 

Recoen

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I personally have always gone the route of reading things way outside my comfort level. By doing so you may understand 20-maybe 40% of what you read but you learn a lot in the process. And eventually you start to understand 80+% of the material in the field. At that point it’s time to challenge yourself in a new one.
Also, realize that this is all theory. Even “physical laws”. And there are competing theories for example the electric universe model vs the standard model. Just because you find it in a textbook or a mainstream journal doesn’t mean it’s right.
 
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james2388

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So you're asking what's the best way to learn physiology, biochem and physics. In regards to other topics that are much easier to understand, Endocrinology is relatively basic to understand, it's a simple system of on & off switches & relays of 2 dozen factors.
Metabolism you already have more than the basic thus far, vitamin relationships, minerals/electrolytes, enzyme co factors, hormones/proteins etc, cholesterol synthesis and aerobic and anaerobic metabolism and by products. If you are not following the Danny and Georgi podcasts, that's pretty much all you need.

To the level that you are describing as 'deep', well Ray is already underground enough, and you want to go deeper? My friend, to the level that I think you are describing, and the time and effort to understand physics and biochem. I'd say it would be a waste if you do not have or do not plan to get a biology/biochem degree. And since you are asking here, I'm assuming you don't have an academic degree, and are not planning to get one. In regards to physics, leave that on the back burner. You're not going to be using electron microscopes or working with complex algorithms. Physics is too deep, too abstract. It takes an obsessive compulsive to be able to categorize a mile in 360 degrees regarding any topic. Pick a specialty and focus on it for as long as you can. And if you don't know how to categorize these basic systems of the body in the above paragraph you're going to have some problems.

My best advice is to focus on your relative career now and improve that or switch careers and stick to the more simpler recreational pursuits of these topics like the podcast and not make this an academic hobby, because in the end if you love this, you will want to do this, and the thing that will be in the way is your education and work history, it's going to be hard to do this without an accredited degree. At the end of the day time is money and we all want to be rewarded for the effort we put forth into learning, and finding ways to express what we have learned.

So if you're really interested in this, and want to be at an academic level, don't sell yourself short by trying to go your own path. There's only one industry where you can do that, and that's working in Information Technology where you can go as deep as you want and be validated by proof of work although it's harder when you want to work in the sciences, there's a difference between knowledge and skill. I'd reflect on practicality for a moment.
 

yerrag

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. I aim to go all the way up to being able to understand the science of the association induction hypothesis and water structure.
I bought Gerald Pollock's 2 books and I'm not sure I understood half of what he's saying. I stopped there and didn't want to venture much further into Gilbert Ling. I probably could if I were that determined, but the time and effort I would have to take to accomplish that I'd rather spend on matters that impact my own health more, and my cup is full already just dealing with research on imroving my own health and experimenting as I go along. If I went more deeper into it, I'd be in a rabbit hole already.
 
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james2388

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I bought Gerald Pollock's 2 books and I'm not sure I understood half of what he's saying. I stopped there and didn't want to venture much further into Gilbert Ling. I probably could if I were that determined, but the time and effort I would have to take to accomplish that I'd rather spend on matters that impact my own health more, and my cup is full already just dealing with research on imroving my own health and experimenting as I go along. If I went more deeper into it, I'd be in a rabbit hole already.

exactly this is what my post was referring too, it's absolutely fine to pursue these things recreationally and see how far someone can go, but from the way OP is describing it, is he wants to be on an academic level which will take a tremendous amount of time and effort, and it pretty much will be worthless without a degree. No one needs to be an academic either to understand ray peat philosophies and experiment with their own health and read a few studies here and there. There's thousand mile gap between being a health coach and implementing ray peat philosophies to understanding the complexity of biochem, physics, water structure.
 

Sefton10

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I’ve found re-listening to The Generative Energy podcasts since Danny uploaded them to Spotify has been great for consolidating my knowledge. There’s something about listening to them while walking (as opposed to watching them on a screen). I think Georgi is phenomenal at explaining the core chemistry/physiology and using analogy etc. to help it sink in. I will make notes on my phone for anything I feel I need to go into deeper or cross reference with further reading/investigation at another time. I find it’s easy to get lost in the weeds if I’m not careful though, so it’s always good to zoom out a bit and not get too caught up in the minutiae, this stuff has to be practicable for me.
 

S-VV

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There's thousand mile gap between being a health coach and implementing ray peat philosophies to understanding the complexity of biochem, physics, water structure.
Exactly. Thats why health coaches are worthless.
 

S-VV

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Op, dont be discouraged. The path to knowledge is hard, but you will gain a lot. I leave you some books to start
Biochem:
 

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S-VV

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Physiology
 

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S-VV

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Molecular biology of the cell
 

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S-VV

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This one is a much easier read, with great watercolor illustrations of biomolecules, I would start with this to get comfortable:
 

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