User:QuackGuru/Sanx2
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12:25, 2 July 2018
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The Paleolithic diet (also called the Paleo diet, caveman diet or stone-age diet[1]) is based mainly on foods presumed to have been available to Paleolithic humans.[2] The ideas behind the diet can be traced to Walter Voegtlin,[3]: 41 and were popularized in the best-selling books of Loren Cordain.[4] The Paleo diet has become popular worldwide due to its purported health benefits.[5]
While there is wide variability in the way the Paleo diet is interpreted,[6] the diet typically includes vegetables, fruits, nuts, roots, and meat[2] and typically excludes foods such as dairy products, grains, sugar, legumes, processed oils, salt, alcohol or coffee.[1] The diet is based on avoiding not just modern processed foods, but rather the foods that humans began eating after the Neolithic Revolution when humans transitioned from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to settled agriculture.[2] It is essentially absent of high–glycemic index foods.[5]
Like other fad diets, the Paleo diet is promoted as a way of improving health.[7] Limited data exist on the metabolic effects on humans eating the diet.[6] The evidence indicates following this diet may lead to improvements in terms of body composition and metabolic effects compared with the typical Western diet.[6] This diet led to increased short-term benefits in the treating metabolic syndrome compared to national nutritional guideline diets.[5] The diet seems to have considerable short-term improvements in weight loss but it may not be practical for some people due to the unclear long-term benefits.[8] It can lead to an inadequate calcium intake[2] though this diet may contribute to a beneficial calcium homeostasis due to its low salt and alkalizing properties.[5] Side effects can include weakness, diarrhea, and headaches.[8]
The digestive abilities of anatomically modern humans, however, are different from those of Paleolithic humans, which undermines the diet's core premise.[9] Neanderthals and early modern humans consumed a similarly more complex diet than previously indicated and worldwide spread of human population meant that humans were, by necessity, nutritionally adaptable; in contrast, several authors have indicated that major behavioral changes, such as a wider diet, happened among modern human groups.[10]