Ray Peat Email Advice Depository Discussion/Comment Thread

[Birdie]

Thanks @meatbag for asking Ray about Ivermectin. I recall Ray's saying there were dangers with HCQ too. So, my take is that I might use one or the other as part of a treatment plan in an acute instance, but long term needs to be re-considered. Preventatively using I mean would be more questionable.

 

[Amazoniac]

Magnesium water

Stick figure:

"What makes the magnesium water preparation that you usually recommend special? Why not add the magnesium hydroxide to any meal, skipping the reaction in advance? Both should yield dissociated magnesium in the stomach without difficulty, similarly to calcium from eggshells."​

Raj:

"I don’t recall recommending that, I usually recommend getting it from food, along with vitamin D and calcium, and making sure that your thyroid function is good, so that your tissues can retain magnesium."​

Stick figure:

"In other words: what's the advantage of reacting magnesium hydroxide with carbonated water? It's surprising that people find magnesium bicarbonate more agreeable than hydroxide given that stomach acid being renewed should make the effect of a limited amount of carbonic acid on the powder weak in comparison.

Considering that magnesium is ionized in the stomach and the original ligand is lost at this stage, it must be something that occurs prior to reaching the intestine. I thought that it could be related to carbon dioxide since magnesium hydroxide reacting with stomach acid doesn't yield it, but magnesium carbonate does and it also seems inferior to the bicarbonate form. The solubility of magnesium bicarbonate is superior to carbonate, resulting in a faster reaction, but the amounts consumed aren't high, the systemic impact shouldn't be marked and not enough to explain the better tolerance.

I wonder if some of the powder can pass unreacted or partially reacted to forms that aren't useful when consumed as hydroxide or carbonate, sometimes it takes a while for their reaction with acids to complete. People may also be taking them in excess when supplementing their powders, whereas reacting in advance could avoid the precipitated surplus.

But once the stomach content combines with pancreatic juice, it's another factor that can modify the form and would tend to standardize the magnesium consumed, especially if ingested away from meals.

What do you think is going on?"​

Raj:

"I haven’t used it, but a possible reason that people like it could be that some manufacturing impurity is eliminated in reacting it slowly with carbon dioxide."​

---

Orange peels and pressure cooking

Stick figure:

"If you're not into highly fermentable foods, why not favor the yellow part of orange peel that concentrates the flavonoids and discard the white that's rich in pectins?

Marmalade would depend on the pectins for gelation, but it's possible to prepare thin, candied peel that avoids most of the white portion. Zests in recipes could also be an option.

Do you have something against pressure cooking? I can't remember an occasion where you mentioned it for preparation of foods that require extensive processing (such as the marmalade and collagen)."​

Raj:

"I discard most of the white material, my marmalade doesn’t gel. The high temperatures of pressure cookers cause tastes that I don’t like."​

It was a coincidence that he discussed it with Jorge and Daniel on a podcast. Another coincidence is that I was about to ask him something on his methods and they touched on this too.

---

Cobalamin for carotenemia

Stick figure:

"You have mentioned a few times that cobalamin helps in correcting carotenemia. How?

It's not directly involved in the metabolism of poison/"vitamin" A (such as in cleavage, conversion or storage) and I never came across anyone bringing this up.

Kevin Schalinske has some publications on methylation and the influence of poisonoids, is it related? Promoting it could call for more poison A, perhaps making cleavage a priority. But then, why focus on cobalamin when there are other factors that can limit methylation? A cobalamin supplement simplifying its elaborate digestion that might be compromised when the metabolism is sluggish?

Something to do with anemia and the iron-dependent carotene oxygenases that need (well..) oxygen?"​

Stick figure:

"[..]could you shed some light on this matter?

I'm insisting because it's a peculiar suggestion that has been repeated by many people without knowing the reasons. How did you arrive at it and what is the mechanism?"​

No responses to this one (must not be the vocabulary since he's aware of and never minded the humor). If someone has the opportunity to ask for clarification while on topic, it would be nice.

---

Copper as coprous and cupric

Stick figure:

"Do you find copper in its cupric state to be inferior or problematic in relation to cuprous?

A recurrent claim in health circles is that it is, which goes against researchers often pointing out that it's readily reduced in the gut and that a great portion of dietary copper occurs in the oxidized state. I'm not aware of anyone being able to discern which form they're consuming from foods, the responses are similar. Is it a real concern when copper is bound to a reliable ligand?

Also, what about copper cookware and having it leaching into foods? I know that you've tried to prepare eggs in a copper pan in the past, but what's your position now in terms of safety?"​

Raj:

"I haven’t cooked anything in copper that didn’t taste bad--that’s enough to discourage its use. A problem with inorganic copper supplements is that they degrade many nutrients in the stomach."​

Stick figure:

"I thought that an interaction with foods already in preparation was enough to stabilize it, but now that I think of it, it's possible to detect the metallic taste in a meal. With time it tends to disappear, as in the case of some candies or cheeses prepared in copperware.

Is there validity in the claim that ingesting purified copper in its oxidized state is a cause of concern, even when bound to reliable (and organic) ligands?"​

Raj:

"In the form of copper chlorophyllin it doesn’t produce that metallic taste (which is peroxidizing fatty acids)."​

If you want a memorable association, cuprick (Cu2+) is the state that people deplore.

 

[yerrag]

Nice shtick!

 

[S-VV]

“ Your sentences "progesterone can apparently convert to cortisol and aldosterone especially in stressed organisms. apparently people have gained weight and had issues with it” wouldn’t be acceptable even in an English composition class, unless “apparently” could be backed up in some way with evidence. ”

God Ray can be so savage sometimes...

 

[Peatness]

“ Your sentences "progesterone can apparently convert to cortisol and aldosterone especially in stressed organisms. apparently people have gained weight and had issues with it” wouldn’t be acceptable even in an English composition class, unless “apparently” could be backed up in some way with evidence. ”

God Ray can be so savage sometimes...

That’s the kind of linguistic genius that seduced me when I first read his work. His writing is impeccable.

 

[Lollipop2]

“ Your sentences "progesterone can apparently convert to cortisol and aldosterone especially in stressed organisms. apparently people have gained weight and had issues with it” wouldn’t be acceptable even in an English composition class, unless “apparently” could be backed up in some way with evidence. ”

God Ray can be so savage sometimes...

Actually I thought the guy asking the questions showed no respect for Ray’s work and he misrepresented the info found on the forum. Had he thoroughly done his research, he would not have asked half the questions and reduced wasting Ray’s time.

In all fairness some of his questions were good. Wish he had stuck only to those.

 

[Birdie]

Actually I thought the guy asking the questions showed no respect for Ray’s work and he misrepresented the info found on the forum. Had he thoroughly done his research, he would not have asked half the questions and reduced wasting Ray’s time.

In all fairness some of his questions were good. Wish he had stuck only to those.

Strange to continually and exclusively address Ray as Mr. Peat rather than Dr. Peat. Perhaps commenter is from a country that doesn't use "Dr". It's possible. It was very interesting to see Ray's responses never acknowledged the put downs. A lesson there.

 

[Lollipop2]

Strange to continually and exclusively address Ray as Mr. Peat rather than Dr. Peat. Perhaps commenter is from a country that doesn't use "Dr". It's possible. It was very interesting to see Ray's responses never acknowledged the put downs. A lesson there.

I so agree! Ray is one of the most ethical, moral, and simultaneously giving persons I know.

 

[Dr. B]

Actually I thought the guy asking the questions showed no respect for Ray’s work and he misrepresented the info found on the forum. Had he thoroughly done his research, he would not have asked half the questions and reduced wasting Ray’s time.

In all fairness some of his questions were good. Wish he had stuck only to those.

How did I disrespect Ray's work? i have a lot of respect for his stuff especially on PUFA. I also have to go by my own experience and what ive heard from others. if people are ballooning and getting hair loss from pregnenolone for instance, somethings obviously up . im not sure youre referring to my post but i had a big post of stuff
i dont think i misrepresented anything on the forum either... besides Rays comments on things, you can find things in support of anything. theres pro pufa, anti vitamin a threads on here

Strange to continually and exclusively address Ray as Mr. Peat rather than Dr. Peat. Perhaps commenter is from a country that doesn't use "Dr". It's possible. It was very interesting to see Ray's responses never acknowledged the put downs. A lesson there.

i have referred to him as mr Peat sometimes... i dont see it as a putdown, more of formal vs informal. depends on personal opinion some think anyone with a phd is a doctor ive usually just used that term with medical doctors. i dont think dr Peat saw it as an insult either...

also I have a couple more questions I asked, i saved them in a draft somewhere, cant remember which thread

 

[Dr. B]

and yet even after all that, for many people it's still better than the alternatives of relying on meat for protein (unless you genuinely feel much worse drinking milk). all supermarket meats pretty much go through various chemical treatments to kill bacteria, they're soaked in trisodium polyphosphate to increase water retention, high in iron, high in phosphate. at least junk milk still provides relatively large amounts of nutrients and calcium and good quality protein. of course there's levels of ideal ness, and small farm raw would be best, but you have to make due the best you can in your given environment. Just like ray, he himself drinks pasteurized store bought non organic, fortified milk along with canned frozen orange juice concentrate.

when did ray say this? a few months back he said he gets it from farmers and skims it himself, heats it a bit too

milk is a strange word when one considers what milk really is and what it has become:

Ideal: small family farm cow eats grass and local fauna, produce milk for people/ babys to drink.

Current situation: cow is vaccinated, given antibiotics and hormones, cow is fed mystery quality "food" in addition to sprayed grass, humane impregnation/treatment of animal varies widely, machine milks cow, sanitary conditions contaminate milk with sanitation byproducts, milk becomes pasteurized/ homogenized, vitamins get magically emulsified into the milk, milk is packaged in plastic, sits on store shelves in fluorescent light.

im curious of this, usda milk is apparently pesticide, hormone, antibiotics free...
but no mention of vaccines. are vaccines allowed in organic animals/milk/meat

 

[Dr. B]

Ray:
I think the way to interpret it is that the real left, starting in the 1940s, has been disappeared, and in its absence, the antiwar, anti-imperialist humane issues of the paleoconservatives have become more conspicuous, but without any foundation for effectiveness. In place of the union-based left, the “new left” was created by the agencies that neutered the unions. In the late 1960s there were people like Martin L. King who were reconnecting unionism with antiimperialism, but the outcome was to intensify the promotion of the pseudo-left, new left, issues. Racial “equality," disconnected from the class system and from reality, became a tool of the CIA-FBI. The Democratic party cooperates in keeping potential left activists completely out of the system.

The Pied Piper: Allard K. Lowenstein and the Liberal Dream by Richard Cummings

im curious where Ray leans politically, it seems like he is more pro trump than pro biden, as months back, maybe even like november 2020, in his podcast with danny, Ray was saying how Biden is going to or is hiring all the warmongers into positions in his cabinet. Also even Georgi and Danny, both to me seem like they are more pro Trump than Biden, I think it has to do with many conservative people being more fearful of the vaccine and government, iirc the media often puts trump supporters, anti vaxxers, conspiracy theorists, white supremacists, etc in the same group and there is a lot of overlap with these groups especially when it comes to being against the vaccines and conspiracy related subjects. I think someone posted in another thread or it was on a podcast Ray said much of what we were taught about the holocaust was soviet propaganda or something.

 

[Birdie]

How did I disrespect Ray's work? i have a lot of respect for his stuff especially on PUFA. I also have to go by my own experience and what ive heard from others. if people are ballooning and getting hair loss from pregnenolone for instance, somethings obviously up . im not sure youre referring to my post but i had a big post of stuff
i dont think i misrepresented anything on the forum either... besides Rays comments on things, you can find things in support of anything. theres pro pufa, anti vitamin a threads on here


i have referred to him as mr Peat sometimes... i dont see it as a putdown, more of formal vs informal. depends on personal opinion some think anyone with a phd is a doctor ive usually just used that term with medical doctors. i dont think dr Peat saw it as an insult either...

also I have a couple more questions I asked, i saved them in a draft somewhere, cant remember which thread

No offense intended for sure. I tried to say that referring to a person with the Dr. varied with country. And with thought processes I think. It's very old world (my roots) to only refer to MDs as Doctor. Years ago, in class, at Harvard at least, PhD Professors were called Mister, not Doctor.

You asked some valuable questions which I had to wonder why nobody had thought of before you.

 

[Birdie]

Re: pregnenolone, I was surprised at his answer that it's just about all contaminated, not pure. He hasn't used it since the 90s. Shock to me. I started using it in 2011. Stopped it about 2 days ago ! Thank you Mr. Bollox.

 

[Mauritio]

On progesterone:

Q:
Hello Mr. Peat
I just read a study where a single intramuscular injection of 50 mg progesterone decreases Testosterone from 21 to 8 (nnmol/l) in human males .
I know the dosage is on the higher side for males, but I didn't expect to see such big drop. LH and FSH also went down.
Do you think the drop in T is worrying?
Is it just a momentary snapshot of the hormonal pattern or maybe it was the intramuscular administration?
Thank you !

A:Intramuscular administration of anything can cause unexpected systemic effects. What was the progesterone dissolved in? If that experiment was done in recent years, the experimenters should have known better.

Q:
The study doesn't say what it's dissolved in . Only :

"Progesterone (Ferring Pharmaceuticals Ltd, Langley, UK) 50 mg in 1 ml i.m.was administered daily by the investigator."

I looked up the company, but I couldn't find any good information.

The study is from 2003 . Why should they have known better ?

A: The introduction of intravenous progesterone resulted from pharmaceutical industry fraud, late 1940s, that claimed it wouldn’t be active otherwise. The direct influence of intramuscular injections on the brain, via retrograde axonal transport, had been known since the 1950s. When the solvent contains benzyl alcohol, the progesterone precipitates as insoluble crystals, while the soluble alcohol has powerful effects.


Q:
Do you know if progesterone declines with age ? I read several studies that showed there was no such thing. Eventhough I expected the opposite.

This is from a review on progesterone in males:
" We analyzed
serum samples from 1015 men aged 20–90 years and serum samples from 330 postmenopausal
women aged 50–90 years by a radioimmunoassay
for progesterone. We found 1.21+ 0.41 SD
nmol/l (0.38+0.13 ng/ml) for men and
1.24+1.18 SD nmol/l (0.38+0.37 ng/ml) for
women, i.e. there were no differences between
men and women. As shown in Figure 1, there
were no age-dependent changes in serum pro-
gesterone levels in both men and postmenopausal
women."


A:Because progesterone is fat soluble, the intracellular content is always higher than the serum. The rate of production is the important thing. When they analyze the serum, they separate it from the red cells and the lipids, which contain most of the circulating progesterone.

 

[Dave Clark]

Peat often claims that things are contaminated, but he sites studies that are 30, 40, 50 years old. I am not saying things can't be or aren't contaminated. But, where is his science to back up that the current supplements are contaminated? He never shows any, it's just, I said so, so it seems like the Peat followers do not hold his feet to the fire about proof, like they do other scientists and researchers. He often talks about that vitamin C study that had all these free radicals in it, etc., but that was done years ago. It is reasonable to think manufacturing and purity standards may be much better now. Where are his 'current' studies to show that all this vitamin c is contaminated and produces free radicals? I'm not anti-Peat, but he gets a lot of waivers when it comes to proving the claims he makes, I never see the science that back them up. He is so concerned about contaminants in supplements, yet I often hear him say on podcasts that he has no problems with some commercial foods, a big source of contaminants. Let's face it, in today's world, just about everything is contaminated to some degree, but when you totally disregard something useful because of contamination, you need to have tests to show the level of contamination, otherwise it becomes a Peat urban myth.

 

[Birdie]

If anybody knows more about this remark of Ray's, please let me know:

Intramuscular administration of anything can cause unexpected systemic effects. What was the progesterone dissolved in? If that experiment was done in recent years, the experimenters should have known better.

 

[Birdie]

Peat often claims that things are contaminated, but he sites studies that are 30, 40, 50 years old. I am not saying things can't be or aren't contaminated. But, where is his science to back up that the current supplements are contaminated? He never shows any, it's just, I said so, so it seems like the Peat followers do not hold his feet to the fire about proof, like they do other scientists and researchers. He often talks about that vitamin C study that had all these free radicals in it, etc., but that was done years ago. It is reasonable to think manufacturing and purity standards may be much better now. Where are his 'current' studies to show that all this vitamin c is contaminated and produces free radicals? I'm not anti-Peat, but he gets a lot of waivers when it comes to proving the claims he makes, I never see the science that back them up. He is so concerned about contaminants in supplements, yet I often hear him say on podcasts that he has no problems with some commercial foods, a big source of contaminants. Let's face it, in today's world, just about everything is contaminated to some degree, but when you totally disregard something useful because of contamination, you need to have tests to show the level of contamination, otherwise it becomes a Peat urban myth.

What commercial foods did you hear Ray give the okay on? I just saw that he doesn't eat any restaurant food. I guess I'm not keeping up!

 

[Mauritio]

If anybody knows more about this remark of Ray's, please let me know:

Intramuscular administration of anything can cause unexpected systemic effects. What was the progesterone dissolved in? If that experiment was done in recent years, the experimenters should have known better.

Did you read my follow up question ?

 

[Dave Clark]

What commercial foods did you hear Ray give the okay on? I just saw that he doesn't eat any restaurant food. I guess I'm not keeping up!

I don't believe Ray would trust a restaurant, lol, unless he knew the owners, etc. What I meant was, when he recommends a food, etc., and he is asked what to look for or what he uses, he often says products that are found in a grocery store {commercial}, as opposed to a small business that produces strictly organic, such as a farm, etc. I am not saying Ray eats junk, just that he himself consumes foods that may have contaminants, yet is so particular about supplements. Foods can have more contaminants than supplements.

 

[rr1]

I don't believe Ray would trust a restaurant, lol, unless he knew the owners, etc. What I meant was, when he recommends a food, etc., and he is asked what to look for or what he uses, he often says products that are found in a grocery store {commercial}, as opposed to a small business that produces strictly organic, such as a farm, etc. I am not saying Ray eats junk, just that he himself consumes foods that may have contaminants, yet is so particular about supplements. Foods can have more contaminants than supplements.

I believe a big part of it is trying to make what he recommends accessible to the average listener. His famous recommendation of 2L milk, 1L orange juice is definitely not a perfect diet, but what he believes should be easy/cheap enough/accessible to the average person. He has mentioned this in the past.