The lenght of time that you are talking about, ie a couple of generations, is not enough time to have such a dramatic evolutionary shift to account for the dramatic rise in the claimed incidence of allergies.
No, a couple of generations won’t show an evolutionary shift. However, the percentage of people with food allergies who survive into breeding age has greatly increased.
Agreed. Regardless of that fact, it is unlilely that there is any genetic basis for the dramatic shift. Likely, it is more awareness, bad science and dramatic attention seekers that bring this to the forefront as an actual issue. For example, you have claimed for years that “one speck” of black pepper will cause you extreme dietary distress. Yet, in this very thread you say that you have a black pepper threashold. Very little is ok, but too much is too much. This is why the reporting is so poor and often exaggerated and why one must undertand the true length of time to cause an evutionary shift. Too many people point to genetics as an excuse coupled woth the prevalence of processed food somehow altering their genes. The fact is, there hasn’t been enoigh time for that to happen.
Environment affects genetics. Although the past, let’s say, 500 years isn’t enough time for a significant genetic shift (aside from something that kills off 99+ of the population, which just hasn’t happened in history) the environment most certainly HAS changed. It is entirely possible the rise of allergies is a legitimate result of interactions between human genes and our altered environment.
I’m not addressing the rise in incidence of allergies, I’m responding to the idea that if folks just “eat right”, they wouldn’t be allergic, or sick, or whatever the claim du jour is.
Also, the ability to keep people with severe allergies alive has been going on for far longer than a couple of generations, nor does there have to be any evolutionary shift to have far more allergics if those who are homogeneous for allergies are living to produce more allergics.
My threshold for black pepper is considerably lower than one speck, though. If my steak is cooked on a grill where other steaks have been cooked and seasoned with black pepper for several hours, even if my steak isn’t seasoned, it’s likely to pick up enough black pepper to cause a reaction.
Over the years, I’ve kept a number of food diaries. One thing that I’ve learned is that if I try to eat black pepper, even a small amount of it, then I’m going to have an unpleasant reaction about 99% of the time. Usually I just take the shortcut of saying “I can’t eat any black pepper”, because most people aren’t going to be interested in all the little exceptions. There are other foods that will cause a reaction in me MOST of the time, but not always. Why do I sometimes not react? I don’t know. Neither do the doctors know. But they assure me that this is common, and that as long as I know what my triggers are and do my best to avoid those triggers, that this is probably the best course for me. The major problem is that the foods that I can eat without causing gastric distress are mostly simple carbohydrates…which is exactly what I should be limiting as a diabetic. So several times a day, I have to choose whether I’m going to raise my blood sugar by an inadvisable degree, or whether I want to suffer quite a bit of pain in the near future. This makes me grumpy, to say the least. I don’t have good choices. I only have bad choices.
I am glad for this thread, though, as someone suggested that I carry the single serving container of peanut butter in case of a low blood sugar incident. I have put a single serving of PB in my purse, along with a couple of graham crackers and a plastic knife. I feel much more secure, now.
Your personal genetic make up has not been altered by your environment. Nor was your moms or her moms. Genes do not change in an individual, only in a population.
I hate to state the obvious here, but you did not get enormously fat by avoiding food. Clearly you found some balance between your “severe gastro distress” and eating.
Technically, genes can only change in an individual, when they mutate. What happens in a population is a change in frequency of a gene.
Where is your evidence that I’m enormously fat? And did you even NOTICE the part where I said " The major problem is that the foods that I can eat without causing gastric distress are mostly simple carbohydrates."? Let me tell you what I can eat without worrying about gastric distress. Mashed potatoes (made with potatoes and milk), boiled rice, milk, plain white bread, some fruits (apples and bananas for the most part), and just about any sugar. Now, I’m going experience some distress with my blood sugar rising if I eat too much of those foods, but they aren’t going to cause gastric problems. Oh, and I can often manage to eat chicken broth, but not always. The safest broth is the stuff that I’ve made myself. Most of the time I can eat plain poultry. I like turkey, chicken is meh. I love beef and pork, but sometimes I just can’t eat those protein sources. I can usually manage to eat ricotta cheese without problems.
Yes, I’ve found some sort of balance, but it’s not really a great diet.
The POINT, which apparently sailed over your head, is that environment affects how genes are expressed. Hypothetically, there are genes that protect the possessor in an environment full of intestinal parasites but cause problem in an environment without them. Change the environment and suddenly all these allergies appear! Parasites tend suppress the immune system, so the notion that someone with genes that keep their immunity high even in the presence of parasites might have a system that over-reacts when the parasites and their suppressing effects are removed.
It’s rather like the sudden rise of myopia - the genes haven’t changed, but the early environment certainly has, and every population that moves to early education with heavy emphasis on reading has a spike in myopia. The genes didn’t change, the environment did.
If we went back to an environment full of gut worms and without a lot of classroom learning we might see allergies and myopia levels drop back to the level seen 500 years ago. Allergies are not new - there is a description of what seems to be a death from anaphylactic shock after a wasp sting in Ancient Egyptian writings, El Razi (Middle Eastern doctor) described hay fever in the 10th Century, and Maimonides (Jewish doctor) described asthma in the 12th Century. These conditions aren’t new, but they have become significantly more common in the past century. What has also changed in the past century? The environment. It has changed dramatically.
What does this mean?
I’ve always had the impression that you were obese, probably from your posts about diabetes and remarks you’ve made about not liking to answer the door. Aren’t you obese? I could easily be mistaken.
To your first point–agreed, plenty of people DON’T have problems with grains. That’s not the point. That poster argued, or seemed to argue, that his lack of problems with raw grains means that the entire human race has no problem with grains. The one does not follow from the other.
As far as eating raw wheat, I don’t. Who even does? No human population that I know of eats it raw. That’s because most raw grains are hard to digest, with the exception of well-soaked raw rice.
I’d say that no food is absolutely perfect for every person. Even red meat causes allergies in some people, and it’s probably the least allergenic food out there. Wouldn’t you agree that the foods that cause the fewest allergic reactions are probably the ones we’re more likely to be best adapted to?
People who drink raw milk are idiots, huh? Then include ALL of your ancestors from the mid-1800s back, if you’re of pure European descent.
Grassfed cows produce cleaner, healthier milk. The e. coli load is many times lower in the milk of grassfed cows. In addition, those animals tend to be much healthier, and therefore less prone to all kinds of diseases and bacterial infections. I agree that raw milk from grainfed animals needs to be scrupulously clean. You’re forgetting (or more likely, NEVER KNEW) that the Amish eat all of their dairy products raw. They take it quite seriously. A few have even been jailed for selling raw dairy products, but they really believe in the stuff. I know a number of families who own goats/cows, and sell and drink raw milk/butter/cheese all the time. They don’t ever get sick.
The easiest way to get food poisoning is from improperly handled flesh foods, I’ve gotten badly ill from raw oysters before, and ill from undercooked poor-quality chicken as well, though not as badly.
Oh, guess what? Homogenization has nothing to do with bacteria. The process of heating milk to kill pathogens is called “pasteurization”…clearly you’re no expert on these matters. I find it funny that you’re so willing to attack me, but you don’t even know the difference between homogenization and pasteurization. Homogenization is where milk is forced through tiny openings in a metal plate to reduce the size of the fat particles, to keep the cream from rising to the top of the milk. It’s not at all similar. You really don’t know much about milk, do you? Full of pronouncements about it ,though, I see.
As far as teeth-loosening, my co-mod is scrupulously careful with dental hygeine. I don’t know the mechanism of teeth-loosening for him, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. Who cares? The point is that it is not helpful.
And this is why I have said several times that dairy needs its own thread.
Why is their average lifespan lower than the national average?
To be nitpicky, mutagenic materials in the environment can change one’s genes.
Apparently you do:
That’s from post 496 in this very thread. Are you having memory problems? On one page you say you eat raw wheat on the next you don’t.
No, because being digestible has nothing to do with whether or not a food is allergy inducing.
Digestibility is dependent on the person having the biochemical means to break the food down into something usable by the body. Allergies have to do with the immune system treating an otherwise harmless substance as an pathogenic invader. You can be allergic to something non-food, such as hay or penicillin. Someone with the proper genes can still produce lactase in adulthood and can therefore be able to digest milk, but still be allergic to it.
As for “best adapted to” - largely a meaningless question. Someone with adult-production-of-lactase genes is adapted to consuming dairy past weaning. Someone lacking it is not. They are both equally human.
Even if susceptibility to allergies has a genetic factor, it’s the environment that produces the allergy. Rice allergies are most common in places like Japan and urban China. Corn allergies are most common in the Americas. Wheat allergies are more likely to be found in Europe than in Asia or the Americas.
Not that it’s relevant, but no, I’m not of “pure” European descent.
That bit of trivia out of the way, there is a difference between “does not know better” and “knows better but still does it”. Just because modern pasteurization was invented in 1862 or thereabouts doesn’t mean everyone in the world knew about it by 1863. In the old days, before the internet, smart phones, TV, and radio it took considerable time for new knowledge to travel around the world. Someone in 1890 who hadn’t gotten the latest science just didn’t know any better.
People in the 21st Century, in first world countries, do have access to 150 year old science and medicine. People who drink raw milk these days are idiots who are risking disease for unproven health benefits.
The CDC reports 300 cases of illness from raw milk in 2001 and about 200 in 2002. Given that raw milk is not readily available in the US that’s a higher number than you might expect. Clearly there is actual risk from raw milk.
It’s not just E. coli you need to worry about. Raw milk can also carry tuberculosis, campylobacter, listeria, salmonella, yersinia, and brucellosis.
A feat it seems several hundred people a year fail to pull off.
As it happens, I live next door to Amish country and run into Amish folks from time to time. I am aware they prefer raw dairy. Sure, they really believe in the stuff. They also believe God created the earth in a literal six days and a lot of other superstitious bullshit. Sincerity or strength of belief does not make a belief true. If they live in a state where selling raw dairy is illegal and they do so then hell yes, they should go to jail for breaking the law.
I did mention the caveat that if you personally own the dairy animal and are willing to make the effort to keep the milk hygienic it is possible for raw milk to not be hazardous but pasteurization of dairy products was not made mandatory over so much of the civilized world on a lark. Again, according to the CDC something like one quarter of all food-borne diseases in the early 1930’s were from contaminated raw milk. These days it’s less than 1%. Requiring pasteurization was a clearly successful public health measure.
So… you don’t know why it’s happeneing, but you blame milk? Based on what? Your own prejudice?
Feel free to start one.
Back before modern medicine those with what we now call allergic tendencies were likely those most resistant to intestinal parasites, and thus in fact those most likely to live to reproductive age and to be considered desirable mates. If one of the various hypotheses about allergies is correct it’s the lack of such parasites that results in allergies.
In other words, those same genes, in another environment, actually used to be an advantage. It’s the changed environment that makes them a disadvantage.
The term “homogeneous for allergies” would only have meaning if allergies were caused by a single allele pair. They aren’t. It’s almost certainly a multi-gene situation interacting with the environment.
Yes, they can alter the genetic material in groups of cells, however it will not change your intrinsic genetic make up. It may cause differences in gene expression, which may be systemic in symptoms but this is a widely studied phenomenon with few solutions to cure disease or alleviate on any large scale.