Early Humans Likely Ate Carbs and Sugary Foods

dboreham

I don't think this is new. The idea always was that proto-humans had to live in an environment rich with energy dense food (fruit) prior to growing a brain large enough to figure out how to make barbeque. Otherwise you never get to the barbeque capable brain. The whole point of making fire and therefore consuming cooked meat is that now you can migrate to places that don't have abundant sources of energy dense food.

louiereederson

If you’re constantly moving sugar is a necessity for maintaining glycogen. There’s nothing inherently wrong with any food type, it’s all about context.

slicktux

There’s many theories but one that I learned was that women and children provides the bulk of the calories for Early Humans. While the men went out and hunted for meat they also relied on the fruit harvested by the women and children. That would give them the energy necessary for trekking and hunting.

accountrequired

Sugar is life. Saccharides FTW!!! vrooooooooooooooooomm

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS

What a coincidence, so do I

jhoechtl

Today we know sugar was a key ingredient for brain development in humans, not just proteins because of eating meat.

miika

It’s interesting. Human baby is in ketosis when born, breast feeding maintains it. There is no essential carb.. Switching to ketogenic diet is cure for many health issues. Then again, I know fruitarian who runs ultramarathons. He eats only sugar, so clearly human body can run on two different fuels very well. Maybe we shouldn’t mix them but choose just the other? Carbs or fat. It would make sense that if there are two paths to get energy from eating, the system may not run optimally if you keep feeding both at the same time?

hbarka

Who knew the human body is multi-fuel.

sebstefan

The link doesn't work (it only serves a redirect to hearsnetworks.com/) if you are outside the united states

jamesgill

Humans have always eaten carbs; it’s the body’s preferred energy source. But human bodies can get energy from three sources, in order of preference—carbs, fat, and muscle (when all else fails). Our bodies evolved to store fat for this very reason—future energy needs. Ancient humans lived feast or famine, and our biology adapted. We’re built to fast for days, using body fat for energy. When carbs are available, they’re preferred because they are faster and easier to burn. Sugar is carbs. But ancient fruit in no way resembles today’s cultivated monstrosities, in appearance or sugar content. Our modern problem is—we gorge on carbs all day long. So our body helpfully stores the excess as body fat for future use—because it expects eventual ‘famine’ where we’ll be fasting with few carbs available and need it. But we never let our body get to burn that fat.