Scientists have reconstructed the history of the culinary preferences of our ancestors and answered the question: is it worth returning to the Paleolithic diet?
There is an idea among fans of proper nutrition that our distant ancestors were distinguished by good health, because they ate organic products. The diet of ancient hunter-gatherers allegedly included the freshest gifts of forests, fields and rivers, so the ancestors did not know caries and problems with obesity. Having abandoned the Paleolithic diet, together with fast food, soda, chocolate bars and other achievements of civilization, we received a bouquet of cardiovascular diseases, oncology and diabetes …
Therefore, enthusiasts suggest returning to the menu of a Stone Age man, believing that this will allow us to prolong youth. This trump card is being wagged by adherents of raw food and fruit diet, vegetarians and meat-eaters. Let's try to figure out whether it is worth adopting the experience of our ancestors?
MILK MUTANTS
At first glance, this idea has a healthy grain: if over hundreds of thousands of years our body has been formed under the conditions of the paleo diet, then this is the most natural nutrition system for us. However, here the first disappointment awaits us. According to a professor at the University of Minnesota, Merlin Zuck, modern man is by no means a genetic copy of his ancestor. As a striking example, she cites the fixation of a gene mutation that today allows adults to digest milk.
The fact is that in all mammals (which include humans), young are able to assimilate milk only at a tender age. As they grow older, the babies' bodies stop producing an enzyme that breaks down lactose - milk sugar. This mechanism was "invented" by nature in order to push the grown-up cubs to an independent life.
But people about 7-6 thousand years ago begin to domesticate cows and goats (they were originally domesticated because of meat), which simultaneously give milk. And the ability to drink milk as an adult becomes a very beneficial benefit. Therefore, several variants of mutations in the lactose tolerance gene have spread in the population in an incredibly fast way: in just a couple of millennia. Although not all adults are still able to digest milk, this is especially true for the population of Japan and China.
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WHAT IS IT, BERRYMOR? PADAL, SIR
The second snag is that the diet of ancient man was, to put it mildly, very specific. Our earliest ancestors, who lived 6-4 million years ago, sat on fruits and leaves, which today constitute the main diet of chimpanzees. When we finally got off the tree, left the forest and began to develop the savannah, tubers, rhizomes, seeds, grass and sedge appeared on our menu. Such a diet may have added health, but not the mind (hello to vegetarians!) The decisive step that separated humans from the animal world was made thanks to meat. The transition to protein nutrition took place about 2-2.5 million years ago. This led to an increase in the brain, its structure became more progressive - for example, a speech center appeared. But hardly anyone wants to adopt the diet of the first meat eaters. Because our then ancestor - a skilled man - was a scavenger.
- In conditions of a decrease in the quantity and quality of plant food, the ancestors of people learned to effectively use the remains of the meal of saber-toothed cats (the then owners of the savannah - author). - explains Academician Alexei Lopatin, Director of the Paleontological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences. - Due to the specific structure of the canines, they left a significant part of the prey uneaten. The scavenger retinue had something to profit from, this retinue included flocks of giant hyenas and families of ancient people.
It was important for people to get "to the table" right after the saber-toothed cats, ahead of the hyenas. Large predators, as well as hyenas, are nocturnal. Therefore, people occupied the niche of daytime scavengers. In order to have time to get to the killed antelope during the time window, when the saber-toothed cat moved away from it, but the flock of hyenas had not yet reached, people learned to run fast. And also wield stone tools to cut the carcass into pieces and take it to a safe place.
True, about 1.5 million years ago, saber-toothed cats in Africa became extinct, their niche was occupied by lions and leopards, which left behind much less remains. The famine forced the ancient Africans themselves to switch to an active hunting strategy and create a new type of stone tools suitable for this.
DO YOU WANT TO ANSWER THE FROG?
Maybe then the primitive hunters ate tasty and healthy food? But, as it turns out, their example must also be followed with great care. For example, Neanderthals were specialized meat eaters, preferring to hunt large animals - mammoths and rhinos. But this diet turned out to be a dead end, the Neanderthals became extinct. What was the advantage of the Cro-Magnons (these are the ancestors of modern people), who lived in the neighborhood with the Neanderthals?
“This trump card was omnivorousness, the desire to make the most of the variety of food sources,” says Maria Dobrovolskaya, a leading researcher at the Institute of Archeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, author of the book “Man and His Food”. - Narrow food specialization was a vulnerable strategy as it was more susceptible to climate change.
Indeed, archaeological research proves that the sapiens' food system was extremely simple - they ate everything that was at hand and was edible. Therefore, it is impossible to deduce a single diet from the practice of ancient people.
Moving to a new place, an omnivorous hunter-gatherer could become a meat-eater, like an Eskimo, and consume fatty foods without any harm to health (atherosclerosis of the vessels is practically not found in them). And he could switch to a Mediterranean diet, like the inhabitants of Italy and Spain. And in times of famine - like the French during the Hundred Years War, people can taste the charm of boiled frogs and snails. And, having got a taste, preserve this culinary tradition to this day - the French eat about 4 thousand tons of frogs every year (the Americans are in second place - 2.8 thousand tons). Koreans know a lot about dogs, and representatives of the highest caste in India - brahmanas - eat only plant foods …
But let's leave aside the extremes. For example, hunter-gatherers of the Odinovo culture of the Barabinsk forest-steppe (Novosibirsk region), 5 thousand years ago, adhered to two types of food. Isotope analysis of the teeth showed that those of them that lived near rivers and lakes leaned on fish. Inhabitants of forest areas, in addition to meat, actively consumed mushrooms. And all this is within the same culture. In addition, if a primitive man lived up to 35 years old on organic products, this was considered a great achievement. We now use store-bought milk and sausage without meat for an average of 70 years …
Therefore, attempts to popularize among people some specialized diets, hiding behind the "experience of great ancestors" is nothing more than speculation. Man, fortunately, is adapted to eat whatever is horrible. You just need to not get carried away with the amount of food and do not forget about physical activity. And all will be well!
Yaroslav KOROBATOV