Nutrients for Better Mental Performace

Yves

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I ran across this video on youtube, it has some crossover with Peat's philosophy (importance of oxidative energy production, co2 benefits, danger of estrogen, etc.) but also departs significantly in other areas (pro-ketosis, anti-milk).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PA-buwI3q4

edit: looks like he endorsed peat at 49:50 so I don't know if this is the right forum. I find it odd he endorses Gary Taubes and Ray Peat in the same sentence :lol:
 

Dean

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Yeah...something tells me his glowing mention of Dr. Peat is a function of a fundamental ignorance or unfamiliarity with the whole scope of Dr. Peat's work. Perhaps given the guy's affection for coconut oil, I think his admiration of Dr. Peat has to do exclusively with Dr. Peat's early advocacy for coconut oil.

I mean the guy is about as anti-milk and pro-serotonin (he advocates taking SSRI's in tandem with 5 HTP or Tryptophan) as you can get. So, one would think that his praise for Dr. Peat would have been tempered or contained some sort of caveat. Of course, I myself recently lumped Dr. Peat and Taubes together as challengers of the nutritional status-quo. Perhaps that is all he meant.

Essentially though, this guy is Paleo. There was some overlap with Dr. Peat in terms of coconut oil (sat. fat), the dangers of estrogen dominance, and red light. Thanks for the link, Yves.
 
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Yves

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Dean said:
Yeah...something tells me his glowing mention of Dr. Peat is a function of a fundamental ignorance or unfamiliarity with the whole scope of Dr. Peat's work. Perhaps given the guy's affection for coconut oil, I think his admiration of Dr. Peat has to do exclusively with Dr. Peat's early advocacy for coconut oil.

I mean the guy is about as anti-milk and pro-serotonin (he advocates taking SSRI's in tandem with 5 HTP or Tryptophan) as you can get. So, one would think that his praise for Dr. Peat would have been tempered or contained some sort of caveat. Of course, I myself recently lumped Dr. Peat and Taubes together as challengers of the nutritional status-quo. Perhaps that is all he meant.

Essentially though, this guy is Paleo. There was some overlap with Dr. Peat in terms of coconut oil (sat. fat), the dangers of estrogen dominance, and red light. Thanks for the link, Yves.

Well he did say tryptophan was potentially dangerous and to take it with gelatin. He suggests doing so can allow you to get the "benefits" of serotonin with 1/10th the tryptophan.
 
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Yves

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Dorito Loyalist said:
I'm sorta questioning this guy's mental performance.

Yes, what confuses me is his acknowledgement of the importance of thyroid, oxidative metabolism and the protective effects of co2, and then he turns around and advocates a low calorie ketogenic diet. Gary Taubes incidently has very low co2: http://garytaubes.com/2011/04/before-su ... olesterol/

His talk was interesting on the whole nonetheless (I think he was 80% on target, with a couple big blunders). What I did like was his suggestion to do an n=1 experiment with supplements and cognitive performance by using computer games (like n-back) to benchmark a hard score while on and off a supplement. I know my own cognitive performance has very wide variance (from hardly functional to very high functioning) and given my line of work I can tell when I experience drops in cognitive ability. The effect of supplements can be difficult to measure concretly and in a controlled enviroment. I know Peat mentioned B1 in an interview for boosting brain energy- I've been meaning to try sulbutiamine.
 
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gretchen said:
His skin isn't great.
If I had a penny for every time Gretchen critiques someone's skin quality...

@Yves: this is from 4 years ago though. He's pretty ahead of his time considering that hardly anyone knew about Peat or used games to track cognitive performance back then.
 

John Eels

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Fascinating, you guys know about dual n-back. A year ago I played it pretty regularly and reached a high level. I supplemented high doses of fish oil, Piracetam, Creatine and was experimenting with Adrafinil. It was before I knew about Peat. What do you find helpful in boosting mental performance and is alignment with Peat's central ideas?
 
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Yves

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John Eels said:
Fascinating, you guys know about dual n-back. A year ago I played it pretty regularly and reached a high level. I supplemented high doses of fish oil, Piracetam, Creatine and was experimenting with Adrafinil. It was before I knew about Peat. What do you find helpful in boosting mental performance and is alignment with Peat's central ideas?

Consistent mental performance has proven very elusive for me. In terms of short term emergency measures - baking soda, red light, and high dose charcoal seem to have a quick stabilizing effect for me when my brain is fuzzy and I start to get panicky. If I need to get a lot of mental work done I start the day with a big steak (heavily salted), copper+eggshell, 1-2L of coffee, several aspirin, and plenty of candy. I've had many productive days like that. Weight training does a lot of good over the long term and I find if I go more than a week or two without working out I start feeling mentally slower. Cabergoline, bromocriptine, and T3 gave me a boost, but not enough for me to take them for that reason alone. I'd like to try co2; bag breathing doesn't seem to do anything for me.
 

Dean

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I wouldn't have thought of high dose charcoal for short term emergency, quick stabilizing effect on mental performance. How does that work?
 
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Yves

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Dean said:
I wouldn't have thought of high dose charcoal for short term emergency, quick stabilizing effect on mental performance. How does that work?

Binding endotoxin I assume, or binding to bile. . I dunno if it would have the same effect for other people, but I thought I'd mention it. I have/had an h pylori infection (bacteria that infects the stomach). H pylori induces an Il-8 immune response which increases the permeability of the blood-brain barrier and probably decreases energy production in general. It's likely bad for the brain - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-13469716
 

Dean

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That's interesting. I've always been exasperated by my lack of ability to funcion at a cognitive level I feel myself capable of, and have had fleeting glimpses of. I've been coming around to relating that to the gut issues I've had since childhood. In discovering Peat, the whole endoxin, estrogen, excess serotonin vicious cycle has really resonated with me. I've been working on getting the diet end of all this in order first, but am starting to think more along the lines of what I need in terms of supplementation to get my gut cleaned/healed.

How do you take the charcoal? In what amounts? Is it a daily thing or just something you reserve exclusively for the high dose emergencies?
 
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Yves

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Dean said:
That's interesting. I've always been exasperated by my lack of ability to funcion at a cognitive level I feel myself capable of, and have had fleeting glimpses of. I've been coming around to relating that to the gut issues I've had since childhood. In discovering Peat, the whole endoxin, estrogen, excess serotonin vicious cycle has really resonated with me. I've been working on getting the diet end of all this in order first, but am starting to think more along the lines of what I need in terms of supplementation to get my gut cleaned/healed.

How do you take the charcoal? In what amounts? Is it a daily thing or just something you reserve exclusively for the high dose emergencies?

I take it infrequently. Usually I'll take a small handful of charcoal capsules on an empty stomach with a glass of water. Lately I've been experimenting with doing so before bed, but I seem to wake up really early in the morning as a result.

I would definitely stay focused on the gut if you have a history of gut and mental problems.
 

Dean

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Yes, I am coming around to the view that if I am going to get the benefits of Peating I am looking for, I am going to have to be more proactive on the gut front.

When you say taking the charcoal before bed results in waking up early, do you mean that you are awoken with an urgency to have a bowel movement?
 
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Yves

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Dean said:
Yes, I am coming around to the view that if I am going to get the benefits of Peating I am looking for, I am going to have to be more proactive on the gut front.

When you say taking the charcoal before bed results in waking up early, do you mean that you are awoken with an urgency to have a bowel movement?

No, I usually wake up in the middle of the night alert, sometimes with cold sweats. It may be due to low blood sugar caused by an increase in metabolism? Or maybe the charcoal somehow disrupts biofilms? I don't know to be honest :)
 

kiran

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Binding bile will also prevent reabsorption of estrogen.

Have you tried taking Aspirin and OJ which are both mild aromatase inhibitors?
 

coatue

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Yves said:
John Eels said:
Fascinating, you guys know about dual n-back. A year ago I played it pretty regularly and reached a high level. I supplemented high doses of fish oil, Piracetam, Creatine and was experimenting with Adrafinil. It was before I knew about Peat. What do you find helpful in boosting mental performance and is alignment with Peat's central ideas?

Consistent mental performance has proven very elusive for me. In terms of short term emergency measures - baking soda, red light, and high dose charcoal seem to have a quick stabilizing effect for me when my brain is fuzzy and I start to get panicky. If I need to get a lot of mental work done I start the day with a big steak (heavily salted), copper+eggshell, 1-2L of coffee, several aspirin, and plenty of candy. I've had many productive days like that. Weight training does a lot of good over the long term and I find if I go more than a week or two without working out I start feeling mentally slower. Cabergoline, bromocriptine, and T3 gave me a boost, but not enough for me to take them for that reason alone. I'd like to try co2; bag breathing doesn't seem to do anything for me.

Hey Yves, I know where to get bromo but where did you get cabergoline? Is it any safer than bromo? I'm looking to take either to lower prolactin. How did you dose yourself? Thanks!
 
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Yves

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coatue said:
Yves said:
John Eels said:
Fascinating, you guys know about dual n-back. A year ago I played it pretty regularly and reached a high level. I supplemented high doses of fish oil, Piracetam, Creatine and was experimenting with Adrafinil. It was before I knew about Peat. What do you find helpful in boosting mental performance and is alignment with Peat's central ideas?

Consistent mental performance has proven very elusive for me. In terms of short term emergency measures - baking soda, red light, and high dose charcoal seem to have a quick stabilizing effect for me when my brain is fuzzy and I start to get panicky. If I need to get a lot of mental work done I start the day with a big steak (heavily salted), copper+eggshell, 1-2L of coffee, several aspirin, and plenty of candy. I've had many productive days like that. Weight training does a lot of good over the long term and I find if I go more than a week or two without working out I start feeling mentally slower. Cabergoline, bromocriptine, and T3 gave me a boost, but not enough for me to take them for that reason alone. I'd like to try co2; bag breathing doesn't seem to do anything for me.

Hey Yves, I know where to get bromo but where did you get cabergoline? Is it any safer than bromo? I'm looking to take either to lower prolactin. How did you dose yourself? Thanks!

PM me for links, not sure the policy regarding that on this forum. I took 0.25mg every 3-4 days.
 

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