Where Does Ray Stand On The "Ascorbic Acid Is Not Vitamin C" Claim?

Douglas Ek

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Hmm migraines eh? That's very interesting. I was reading a piece on how ascorbic acid can inhibit nitrosamine conversion from nitrate interacting with heme iron and stomach acid in the stomach. In a lipid free environment it does quite well at inhibition BUT when lipids are present the ascorbic acid INCREASES Nitroso conversion 1000 fold!

Now, I'm far too uneducated to know if Nitroso could make migraines happen but it might be interesting to research lol. I've read that nitric oxide can lessen migraines (pain anyway) so i suppose it stands to reason that a rise in oxidants like Nitroso could have the opposite effect.

Agree hard to say but for me it just feels like serotonin or something gets affected. Feels like a nerv swelling behind the eye. Basically migraine feels like someone plunging a pencile into your eye slowly over and over. At least for me some people experience pain around the eye area on one side of the head. Anyway ascorbic acid has some toxic effect on me 100% sure while i eat ***t loads of fruits and always get like 500% of RDI of vitamin c i never gave problems then. And its not fillers in the supps because i never get ant symptoms from other supplements i take.
 

stargazer1111

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Vitamin C is not a complex and synthetic ascorbic acid is the same as "natural" vitamin C. Most animals make their own vitamin C and they only make ascorbic acid, not the other parts of the "complex" that people are trying to claim exists.

The body recognizes molecules based on structure. Synthetic l-ascorbic acid has the exact same structure and chirality as "natural" ascorbic acid so the body doesn't know the difference.

Ray Peat has a legitimate point with possible contamination, though. I remember getting ascorbic acid powder that clearly tasted metallic so threw it all out.
 

Capt Nirvana

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Where does Ray stand on the "Ascorbic acid is not Vitamin C" claim?

Now, I know that Ray Peat thinks that (at least modern) vitamin C supplements carry the risk of carrying contaminants and at least for that reason, he's not a fan of vitamin supplementation. (Not sure if he, or someone, said that possibly synthetic vitamin C in Linus Pauling's day was less likely to be contaminated, or maybe that's just my speculation).

Leaving the contamination issue to one side, there is a more fundamental issue that a lot of people seem to be saying that plain ascorbic acid is not the "real vitamin C". See here for example:

http://www.thedoctorwithin.com/vitaminc ... -vitamin-c

And furthermore, I've seen mentions of reports about bad effects from long-term high dose supplementation with synthetic ascorbic acid. (I haven't checked these out for myself though, or tried to establish whether there are many other studies to the contrary). Pauling himself lived to 93, but then did die of cancer. There again, we all have to die of something. To me personally, he's the best argument in favour of supplementing (if only we could avoid contamination).

Anyway, Pauling himself was adamant that ascorbic acid was vitamin C and vitamin C was ascorbic acid.

Here is a counter to the first article:

http://vitamincfoundation.org/NaturalC.pdf


Before I read the first article, I had just accepted what I read in one of Pauling's books about ascorbic acid being vitamin C. While I wasn't (so far) convinced by the first article, I did find what it said about Dr. Albert Szent-Georgi gave me pause for thought, and I'd like to find out more, perhaps from a less biased source than that particular article. After all, you can't just ignore the actual discoverer of vitamin C.

I was also rather disturbed to read of what happened to Dr. Royal Lee, a pioneer in so called whole food vitamins. (I'd really like to know what Pauling might have thought of his ideas - not sure if he would have been aware of them).


Anyway, I got to wondering about what Ray thought about this whole subject.
Does anyone happen to know? Has he ever discussed this aspect of vitamin C?
 

Capt Nirvana

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Durk Pearson & Sandy Shaw considered dehydroascorbic acid the "bad guy." Ray Peat considers it the "good guy." I'm not a Peat-atarian, but I'm siding with him this time. :)
 

Experienced

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L-Ascorbic acid is that synthetic? When I read on the internet people claim that it comes from oranges and it's natural and the most potent Vitamin C (claims to be even purer than Quali-C ) this vitamin stuff is very complex imo and someone needs to explain about this.

If Ray is right. (Why do High dosed Scientific studies have positive results for example cancer patients that gets a dose of 1-10G a day for their treatments.)

Looking forward to hear more stuff about this :) :bump2
 
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L-Ascorbic acid is that synthetic? When I read on the internet people claim that it comes from oranges and it's natural and the most potent Vitamin C (claims to be even purer than Quali-C ) this vitamin stuff is very complex imo and someone needs to explain about this.

If Ray is right. (Why do High dosed Scientific studies have positive results for example cancer patients that gets a dose of 1-10G a day for their treatments.)

Looking forward to hear more stuff about this :) :bump2

I think in those cases the ascorbic acid is acting like an oxidant, similar to what your immune system would use.
 

Recoen

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Or AA is becoming oxalate which is killing the cancer cells (along with the other “healthy” ones).
 

Experienced

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I think in those cases the ascorbic acid is acting like an oxidant, similar to what your immune system would use.
Okay I get it but is using ascorbic acid regularly bad for us?

Or AA is becoming oxalate which is killing the cancer cells (along with the other “healthy” ones).
I hope that this is not true lol , I take myself upper limit 2g daily I'll be lowering it to 1g
 

Recoen

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Okay I get it but is using ascorbic acid regularly bad for us?


I hope that this is not true lol , I take myself upper limit 2g daily I'll be lowering it to 1g
The TLO group says any amount over 250mg will. Do you drink OJ? If you are, then I doubt you’re deficient.
 

Experienced

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Are you able to consume any citrus? That would be the best way to get vitamin C.
For example lemon?

(EDIT*) 5-9 servings is too much for me. (Pain in the ****)

You need 5–9 servings of fresh, minimally processed, or frozen fruit and vegetables per day to get about 200 mg of vitamin C [28].

Here is a list of foods high in vitamin C, including some little-known superfoods [12, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33]:

  1. Kakadu plum or Terminalia ferdinandiana (vitamin C content estimated at 2,300 to over 5,000 mg per 100 grams )–this fruit is native to Australia and is also a good source of protein, zinc, calcium, iron, linoleic acid, and other nutrients [34, 35, 36].
  2. Camu camu or Myrciaria dubia, a relative of guava, is a berry that grows in the Amazonian rainforest (contains from 1570 up to 3,000 mg of vitamin C per 100g). The pulp is usually dried, pulverized, and formulated into supplements [37]
  3. Acerola cherries (1000 to 4500 mg per 100 grams), which are also rich in diverse antioxidants like carotenoids, phenolics, anthocyanins, and flavonoids [38]
  4. Indian gooseberry or amla (estimated at 440 to 880 mg per 100g) [39]
  5. Rosehip, especially the pulp (300-1200 mg per 100 mg–large variation between different species, highest in Rosa nitidula) [40]
  6. Baobab pulp (over 100 mg per 100 grams)–this African superfood is also rich in calcium, protein, and various antioxidants [41, 42]
  7. Peppers, sweet, raw (97 mg)
  8. Kale (93 mg) [43]
  9. Kiwi (about 93 mg)
  10. Broccoli (91 mg)
  11. Brussel sprouts (85 mg)
  12. Persimmons, native (66 mg)
  13. Papaya (61 mg)
  14. Strawberries (58)
  15. Citrus fruits, including oranges and lemons (20-53 mg)
  16. Guava (50 mg)
  17. Pineapple (48 mg)
  18. Cauliflower (48 mg)
  19. Bilberry (44 mg)
  20. Mango (38 mg)
  21. Cabbage, raw (37 mg)
  22. Guanabana (28 mg)
  23. Blackberries (21 mg)
  24. Tamarind (18 mg)
  25. Arugula (15 mg)
  26. Cranberries (14 mg)
  27. Tomatoes (13-27 mg)
  28. Apricots (10 mg)
  29. Apples (4 mg)
Vitamin C is destroyed by heat and long storage times, so eating raw (or minimally processed), fresh fruits and vegetables is the only effective way to get adequate amounts of dietary vitamin C [27].
 
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Experienced

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I think there are only 3 vitamin C manufacturers in the world.
do you think that Thorne is using DSM Vitamin C? because when I check for Quali-C it`s exactly L-Ascorbine acid I could be wrong too.

upload_2020-10-4_15-9-40.png
 

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