Unpopular Opinion: I Think Some Of Ray's Ideas Are Just Not Helpful And Actually Make Matters Worse

[Kelj]

I’d love to know what Peat is wrong about? Perhaps particular recommendations may not work for everyone, but I would say his general premise is pretty spot on...

It takes time and experimentation to properly implement the premise he provides into your own context. Peat’s genius is in his principles not his specific recommendations.

For example:
-Peat says coconut oil is good, saturated fat is good, PUFA is bad
-ray peat forum member john doe reads this and then decides to eat 30% of his calories as coconut oil
-john doe develops intestinal issues
-john doe now believes saturated fat is bad despite the fact that coconut oil is known to irritate the intestine in large quantities in certain people
-john doe write off saturated fat. I mean why wouldnt he, it causes bacterial translocation, endotoxemia, obesity, and heart disease despite that fact that it has been a traditional food in cultures without obesity and other diseases for many generations....
-john doe then goes to a ultra low fat, high carb diet; he feels better for a week. He proceeds to give advice to others to lower thier fat, you know cuz the randle cycle bro
-2 weeks later he has bloating, brain fog, loss of libido and needs to eat constantly to avoid adrenaline rushes. Liver must be shot—> 1000mg of caffiene 6x per day
-john doe comes back to forum, asks for help. People say that he needs to go lower fat to clear his PUFA so his liver can store glycogen better.
-john doe goes lower fat, feels worse. Only 4 more years buddy, your PUFA will be gone: Enter Valhalla
-john doe invests in idealabs supplements
-john doe feels better now, hes taking lisuride, metergoline, thyroid, pansterone, oxidal, mitolipin, tocovit, kuinone. All are applied to his scrotum, except for metergoline that goes to his sphincter. He decided to take them all at once, he doesnt need to test each one out, the plain packaging indicates extreme safety of course
-john doe developes side effects, he now believes all supplements are bad and stops using them.... excipients (cue smeagle voice)
-john doe then reads that vitamin A is a poison so he goes on a low vit A diet to clear his stores. Franco aka grant genereux, aka edward j. Edmonds aka gbolduev aka tyw PM’s the secret anti- vit a diet that also happens to avoid alot of other problematic food components, its the vit a tho, grant said so... enter: meat and rice diet
-he also reads travis post on veganism and decides that meat is bad because it causes cancer because of its amino acids. Goddam polyamines, all growth, no diferentiation
-john doe then reads a westside PUFA post on starch. He goes on a high starch diet. Feels better. Determines that sugar is bad. The stars are aligning now travis, westside PUFA, and grants principles are all making sense, especially because all major civilizations lived on starch, I mean why wouldnt they, its what made humans so smart: wheat the staff of life
-eventually john doe becomes bloated and constipated. He hears peat talk about antibiotics, he decided to use penicillin after much debating about destroying his microbiome
-Uses penicillin, feels better for a day and then gets diarrhea. Microbiome is now...... Trumps hairline
-now his guts messed up, he cant eat anything, his anxiety is through the roof, and cant sleep. Good thing he can still post on the forum, phew...
-answer: fruitarian diet, kidney detox, peeing cloudy
-after a while his teeth erode and hes colder than travis after a disparaging joke about vegans
-so now, sugars, meat, iron, pufa, vit a, saturated fat, grains, dairy, fruit, masturbation, caretenoids, ejaculation, blue light, all electronics, exercise, supplements, sleeping facing south, oxygen, and living in society are all “stress”, nitric oxide, serotonin, estrogen oh my (apparently estrogen is beneficial now)
-john doe concludes Ray Peat is an A** hole, haidut is a used car salesman and the forum is filled with morons except for CLASH, his sarcastic humor and obvious bias towards the use of saturated fats even though they cause bacteria to be spread to your organs was very helpful in john does recovery
-john doe goes on a carnivore diet in the domican republic after creating a patreon account and youtube series called Locks like a mare

THE END


EDIT: added more sarcastic humor

A lot of people's exact experience. Very funny.

 

[MarcelZD]

A purist Peat diet could include starch, conditionally.

You confuse what Peat himself prefers to eat personally and as a general over-arching philosophy versus what, when and how you can eat it. You posted two quotes AGAIN about starch that only reinforce that. How in the world are you missing that!? Starch not preferable to sugar. Starch however along with sugar as carbohydrates are both fair game, knowing the how and when to eat them. Read those quotes you posted and think about it. He is NOT saying "NO starch" he is saying preference of sugar over starch. His qualifying statement of "...even a high starch diet isn't necessarily incompatible with good health..." and "...should eat as much sugar and starch..." settles that debate. It signifies that starch is not off bounds. You'd never hear him equate PUFA intentionally as something he would CONDITIONALLY or in any case say to eat (other than dying from starvation). End of story. He NEVER says "...even PUFA is not incompatible with good health..." He would never have said that a potato is "almost a perfect food," being a starch. Or he would have qualified almost with "but only if it weren't a starch" rather than what he actually said which is "other than missing some B12 and A." Think about it. Those quotes DO NOT AT ALL equate to "no starch." There is something wrong with the processing of logic if you believe that.

"PREFERABLY" means ideal, more desirable, it does NOT mean definitively not at all as you are trying to establish. Again, you misunderstand.

Peat has pointed out many problems with starches. Insulin spikes, presorption, endotoxin etc. . That's why he and many of his early followers don't eat them. This is about optimization and not about context - after all why eat bread if you could obtain the same amount of carbohydrates from orange juice and avoid aforementioned issues? That's what I meant by 'Peat purism'.

 

[Cirion]

Bro nothing wrong with well cooked beans: low PUFA, particularly lentils and most other legumes apart from maybe soy and chickpeas which have a bit higher levels of fat. Also, beans have exceptionally good amino acid profiles, with very low tryptophan and methionine. Nothing wrong with some fibre, peat recommends people to eat quite a bit of fibre everyday with the raw carrot salads. Leafy green veggies are great for all sorts of minerals including calcium. Also, if you're not eating meat or dairy then gelatin is a waste of time and probably very problematic in terms of its powdered form. Peat doesn't recommend eating powdered gelatin, and only recommends eating gelatinous cuts of meat if one is to eat meat, because the amino acid profile of the gelatin will balance out and be protective against the high amounts of tryptophan and methionine in the rest of the meat and dairy being consumed. If much of your food consists of dairy and meat, then you will be eating an extremely high tryptophan and methionine diet, hence the rationale for eating gelatinous cuts of meat thereby adding in extra gelatin to the diet. If you aren't eating meat, or dairy for that matter, your consumption of tryptophan and methionine will be very low hence no need to add in gelatin to balance it out.

I don't really have a lot of problem with fiber, just that fiber fills me up too easily and makes me get low on calories, which is only good for losing weight and not good for overall metabolism (I start to feel weak, hungry but not wanting to eat any more fibrous foods, tired etc...)

Don't you need like 10 cups of veggies to get enough calcium? I don't really like veggies and don't have the patience/stomach for 10 cups lol... Gelatin is also good for more than just balancing other aminos... glycine has many pro-metabolic effects outside of this, and it helps me get back to sleep, also it is good for gut health... also for eliminating glyphosate from the body...

Peat has pointed out many problems with starches. Insulin spikes, presorption, endotoxin etc. . That's why he and many of his early followers don't eat them. This is about optimization and not about context - after all why eat bread if you could obtain the same amount of carbohydrates from orange juice and avoid aforementioned issues? That's what I meant by 'Peat purism'.

For myself and many others here, a carb is not a carb... in the sense that sugar can be good for activating metabolism, but starch is better when you need to get that "full" feeling, for me, a requirement to get to sleep especially. Too much sugar relative to starch and I'm gonna have massive insomnia. I am pretty sure 100% of us are aware of the quotes you are referring to but a pure sugar diet just does not work for many

 

[MarcelZD]

For myself and many others here, a carb is not a carb... in the sense that sugar can be good for activating metabolism, but starch is better when you need to get that "full" feeling, for me, a requirement to get to sleep especially. Too much sugar relative to starch and I'm gonna have massive insomnia. I am pretty sure 100% of us are aware of the quotes you are referring to but a pure sugar diet just does not work for many

Yes, it's very similar for me. I also tend to lose lean body mass, so I suppose it has to do with starch's insulinogenic/anabolic effects. Matt Stone had this debate with Peat's sugar-only advocates before this forum even existed.

But it's not about what you or I believe. Peat clearly treats starch as an inferior carbohydrate source compared to sucrose, irrespective even of the great mineral density that tropical fruits tend to have. There is nothing in his work to indicate that starchy foods might have certain advantages (I assume that you consider being able to fall asleep an advantage).

 

[Cirion]

Yes, it's very similar for me. I also tend to lose lean body mass, so I suppose it has to do with starch's insulinogenic/anabolic effects. Matt Stone had this debate with Peat's sugar-only advocates before this forum even existed.

But it's not about what you or I believe. Peat clearly treats starch as an inferior carbohydrate source compared to sucrose, irrespective even of the great mineral density that tropical fruits tend to have. There is nothing in his work to indicate that starchy foods might have certain advantages (I assume that you consider being able to fall asleep an advantage).

The tricky thing is I now believe there are at least two different ideal diets

One for restoring good health
One for maintain good health / turning good health into optimal health

Peat's diet seems more oriented for the latter, not the former. gbolduev said that the "peat" diet would only work for around 20% of people. Probably because 80% of people are not good enough health to make it work. Probably why a majority of people (wouldn't be surprised if 80% here too) fail on such a diet.

But maybe it does work better for restoring health also IF you take a few other suggestions like take T3. I am going to start taking T3 soon, curious to see what it does for me. It also probably does work better if you can live in a perfect environment which 90%+ of us cannot do. It'd be great if I can live on a beach in Hawaii and do workouts every morning as the sun rises on the beach (while also living in a zero EMF environment), but most of us can't. Certainly, this is a goal one day when I have enough money though...

And honestly Peat himself recommends T3 and/or T4 to most people who are hypo anyway, so that's actually Peaty. And he himself has said some severe cases require extreme intervention (like the one woman needing 15 grains a day). This basically indirectly is an admission that diet alone won't fix the issues. At least not the diet that he himself eats.

 

[schultz]

Yes, it's very similar for me. I also tend to lose lean body mass, so I suppose it has to do with starch's insulinogenic/anabolic effects. Matt Stone had this debate with Peat's sugar-only advocates before this forum even existed.

I think it could be useful for this reason. If someone wanted to limit starch they could time it to a peri-workout period. Also, protein can do the same thing as it is also insulinogenic. Or you could combine them into a delicious meal!

But it's not about what you or I believe. Peat clearly treats starch as an inferior carbohydrate source compared to sucrose, irrespective even of the great mineral density that tropical fruits tend to have. There is nothing in his work to indicate that starchy foods might have certain advantages (I assume that you consider being able to fall asleep an advantage).

They are cheaper and more available. He mentioned that before, and that is an advantage for sure. Another pro is that they can taste good. Ray has mentioned several times that enjoying your food is a positive thing. He does treat them as inferior though. I tend to agree, but I still eat starch. It is my opinion that you can get away with a lot more as long as you avoid PUFA. PUFA seems to amplify the damage caused by other things, even environmental toxins and such (alloxan comes to mind).

Thankfully I've never had trouble falling asleep in my entire life. That sounds like an awful problem. So starch helps you fall asleep? Does it also help you stay asleep?

 

[danishispsychic]

@danishispsychic what would you say were your mistakes on vegan eating? I am finding I am doing a "vegan inspired peat diet" currently actually based upon my findings on both excess protein and excess fats. But I am not eating nuts (too high PUFA) or beans for that matter, so that I can be under 2 gram pufa a today. I also don't like the high fiber content of a lot of vegan foods anyway, and don't eat many veggies either. Mostly, I'm just doing this to go low or even zero meat and dairy (I have since brought back 1-2 cups of nonfat dairy with no added vitamin A or D though since getting calcium is hard otherwise) but meat? I have almost no need for it anymore, except maybe for B12, but my protein intake was just wayyy too high before. Really I'm not technically vegan though, because I also still have gelatin. Like I say I was mostly just inspired by what they think about meat and dairy in terms of health. I really think fatty dairy in particular trashed my health.

I think my biggest mistake was thinking that someone who has 97 percent more Neanderthal DNA that most of the population ( true story according to 23/me lol ) and that is O positive with 2 parents that have thyroid issues, AND I have MTHFR and other genetic variants... ( blah blah ) would benefit from a vegan diet. Both beans AND rice do not work for me. White rice is ok but brown makes me want to die. Beans will not even digest in me and give me tons of gas. I do not do well with FODMAPS in general. Wheat has to be super refined for me to do ok with it, raw veggies tear my colon up , fruit works as long as it is RIPE and smoothies basically made me bloat. I dont like nuts, i dont eat seeds, greens give me a histamine response in general , so really with all that, what is left to eat when you are vegan? I do better fasting than I do trying to eat vegan. Also , I figured out that at that time I was basically afraid of food because I could digest nothing. I am convinced that my parasite infection and candida horror all started with being " raw vegan". OMG. my temps were always like 97.1 back then and I was always depressed. Now I eat a whole different way. I am not all Danny Roddy cray with eating like 5 different items - I eat starch sometimes, I now drink both whole and low fat milk, I do not eat ice cream because I just do not like it , I drink coke because it actually helps me digest stuff... I eat some grass fed beef, low ammts of chicken, I gave up my sushi habit ( it is my FAVE food ) but I got a 36 inch fish tape worm from that so, that is over. I take collagen and food grade DE everyday and some coconut oil, I take an iodine product that has selenium and B2 in it ( Pure Horizon IO plus ) . I drink a lot of sugar lemonade with collagen in it . - I dont drink OJ but take C gummies ( shoot me, i know, but they are rose hips at least. ) I dont really eat any vegetables anymore. My temps are always 99.1 now just about . I do not calorie restrict or drink a lot of water either. I do moderate salt as needed. I love animals and that is why I was vegan really... I do feel bad about that part of not being vegan. I do not touch protein shakes or whey also - I do take a D/K2 oil supplement too and get sun . It helps everything.

 

[lvysaur]

I wish people would stop prefacing things they say with "unpopular opinion", it's pretty silly

 

[Ritchie]

Ray actually said this? BEASTMODE posted this in the Ray Peat Email Advice Depository thread on March 8th of this year:

"Me:
Are you familiar with a safe way to make jello for kids? My toddler is wanting different types of foods she sees, but they’re all filled with harmful material.

Ray:
I mix Great Lakes (or similar) gelatin with sugar, add some water, and warm it in a microwave until it’s clear, then add frozen orange juice concentrate, or lime, lemon, or grape juice."

I stand corrected, although I think perhaps as a food additive for jello/ sweets etc.. not sure about as a food source.

 

[Ritchie]

Don't you need like 10 cups of veggies to get enough calcium? I don't really like veggies and don't have the patience/stomach for 10 cups lol... Gelatin is also good for more than just balancing other aminos... glycine has many pro-metabolic effects outside of this, and it helps me get back to sleep, also it is good for gut health... also for eliminating glyphosate from the body...

Haha what makes you think you need that much calcium? Looking from a Peat perspective, he would be concerned with the calcium : phosphorus ratio. A result of eating a high meat and dairy diet is that your phosphorus will be through the roof (not only are animal proteins the highest in phosphorus, the form of phosphorus in meat and dairy is the most rapidly and easily absorbed).. So in this sense, Peat would recommend a very high calcium intake to balance it out. It becomes a bit of a catch 22, drink lots of milk for the calcium to balance out the phosphorus from the milk and meat.
As far as the glycine goes, fair enough if you notice these good effects then I don't see any issues with a good quality glycine supplement.

 

[Cirion]

Haha what makes you think you need that much calcium? Looking from a Peat perspective, he would be concerned with the calcium : phosphorus ratio. A result of eating a high meat and dairy diet is that your phosphorus will be through the roof (not only are animal proteins the highest in phosphorus, the form of phosphorus in meat and dairy is the most rapidly and easily absorbed).. So in this sense, Peat would recommend a very high calcium intake to balance it out. It becomes a bit of a catch 22, drink lots of milk for the calcium to balance out the phosphorus from the milk and meat.
As far as the glycine goes, fair enough if you notice these good effects then I don't see any issues with a good quality glycine supplement.

I agree that with less or no meat that the total calcium needs would go down in order to keep a decent calcium:phosphorus level - but - does Ray say how much total calcium is recommended in any of his articles or does he only talk about ratios? I just know that the RDA of calcium is around 1000 mg, and that's hard to get without milk. I still think calcium is a necessary mineral, I just am confused how much we need if phosphorus is also low. I have noticed my teeth feeling sore lately and have been a little concerned about my calcium intake.

 

[Peater Piper]

Nevermind, better things to do.

 

[Kelj]

"Nutrition is one of the most important sciences, and should certainly be as prestigious and well financed as astrophysics and nuclear physics, but while people say “it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure that out,” no one says “it doesn’t take a nutritionist to understand that.” -Ray Peat

Ray is right. This is complicated stuff. Studies are posted on Pubmed every day. Studies, of course, need to be done. Well-designed studies. But, what are we to make of the studies already out there. They seem to indicate this or that in a complicated landscape. Do the recommendations springing from these studies do harm? Often, yes. Even cause death. In the meantime, we must eat something. Ray says a good place to start is any craving. I agree with this. But, the question is, is Dr. Peat always right? Can we disagree with him? He tries, like every conscientious person, to be right, but like any humble person, changes his mind when he finds new information. However, he is such a good researcher, his findings are a great jumping off place for anyone interested in the truth. He tackles the dogma.
My one critique which encompasses all that has been touched on in this thread is: Ray is thinking in terms of a 2000 calorie diet. This is not a level of calorie consumption that can support a fully functioning thyroid or optimal metabolism. If one eats this amount of calories, you have to think of optimizing nutrition in what you do eat. You can't frivolously eat a piece of toast. You have to say "there is almost nothing of value" in eating starch foods, as Ray does say, when compared to the vitamins and minerals in Orange juice and milk. If you are trying to keep your calorie consumption to 2000 calories, the more orthorexic you will have to be to optimize nutrition, worrying about food quality.
We need to give up the tinkering based so much on guesswork. Is calcium part of our body and diet? Is PUFA part of our body and diet? Is vitamin A part of our body and diet? How about estradiol? Does it have a function? Cholesterol? Of course.
Who is the true expert on how to balance all these factors? Who knows how much we need to eat? Who knows what will make us healthy? My body knows and your body knows. This is why Ray rightly says start with a craving. Does your body need vitamin A? If it does, you will crave something that contains it until the need has been met. Then, you won't want it anymore. You will not overdo it if you follow your body. If you eat the amount of food your body wants, plus exactly what sounds good to you, you will take care of deficiencies and not cause the problems tinkering and guesswork cause with supplementing. This is a trust in "the basic rationality of the organism", which is how Ray put it. Modern medicine doesn't promote that, but neither does alternative medicine, usually. Won't you get fat and stay fat eating everything your body wants? Nope. That happening would for sure be an argument against the "basic rationality of the organism". If Dr. Peat and the rest of us look at nutrition through this lense, many issues could be settled.

 

[Cirion]

@Kelj

Does Ray really say we should only consume 2,000 calories? Do you know where he says that?

That's pretty disappointing if true. He of all people should know better than to continue to spout that stuff.

 

[somuch4food]

Who is the true expert on how to balance all these factors? Who knows how much we need to eat? Who knows what will make us healthy? My body knows and your body knows. This is why Ray rightly says start with a craving. Does your body need vitamin A? If it does, you will crave something that contains it until the need has been met. Then, you won't want it anymore. You will not overdo it if you follow your body. If you eat the amount of food your body wants, plus exactly what sounds good to you, you will take care of deficiencies and not cause the problems tinkering and guesswork cause with supplementing. This is a trust in "the basic rationality of the organism", which is how Ray put it. Modern medicine doesn't promote that, but neither does alternative medicine, usually. Won't you get fat and stay fat eating everything your body wants? Nope. That happening would for sure be an argument against the "basic rationality of the organism". If Dr. Peat and the rest of us look at nutrition through this lense, many issues could be settled.

I entirely agree with that, but rewiring yourself to listen to your body is chaotic and tedious. I'm currently trying to listen to my body more and shut down my little voice that tells me what to eat based on education. I think intuitive eating is really key to health. My cravings for processed foods have all but disappeared since I noticed I become more stiff and less energetic whenever I eat too much junk. It's way more convincing to listen to my body than to some health article bashing sugar and preservatives.

 

[Kelj]

@Kelj

Does Ray really say we should only consume 2,000 calories? Do you know where he says that?

That's pretty disappointing if true. He of all people should know better than to continue to spout that stuff.

If memory serves, in his interview on KMUD called Weight Gain. I'll check & if elsewhere I'll correct.

 

[Kelj]

I entirely agree with that, but rewiring yourself to listen to your body is chaotic and tedious. I'm currently trying to listen to my body more and shut down my little voice that tells me what to eat based on education. I think intuitive eating is really key to health. My cravings for processed foods have all but disappeared since I noticed I become more stiff and less energetic whenever I eat too much junk. It's way more convincing to listen to my body than to some health article bashing sugar and preservatives.

I agree, It's a process of deciding if It's your intellect talking or your body. At times I really craved the processed foods and I think they are therapeutic when you do. For me, the desire for them comes and goes. Sometimes I really crave a cucumber, sometimes a donut. When the body needs calories, a cucumber won't do. My experience was that if I was stiff, achy, and low energy, healing was going on in my body and it would pass if I continued feeding myself what I wanted. It is healing that causes pain. It is healing that diverts energy from unnecessary movement to where the healing is happening.

 

[somuch4food]

My experience was that if I was stiff, achy, and low energy, healing was going on in my body and it would pass if I continued feeding myself what I wanted. It is healing that causes pain. It is healing that diverts energy from unnecessary movement to where the healing is happening.

It can be difficult to make the distinction between healing and worsening when the pain is dull or chronic.

I do think I'm now able to feel systemic inflammation. It might sound weird, but I can feel my whole body vibrating when I'm highly inflamed and know that I won't be feeling too well for the next few hours. It's usually accompanied by low motivation to do anything.

Otherwise, I can feel tired/achy and still have enough drive to get through my todos for the day without feeling like complaining for each one of them. That's probably when I'm healing.

 

[Kelj]

edinstitute.org/blog/2013/5/25/pain-i-why-is-there

 

[somuch4food]

edinstitute.org/blog/2013/5/25/pain-i-why-is-there

I think you meant this link: Pain I: Why Is There So Much in Recovery?

I think I will use my "feeling inflamed" as my cue that the food I ate did not agree with me rather than increased pain. I actually see my current state (low energy, dull pain) as a good state since I'm avoiding the anxiety/stress hormone state I was in when I was clean eating this summer. I've actually visited that site a few times and I tend to agree with it, but I often go astray since I've always been told otherwise. Thanks for the good reminder.