Should I start a paleo diet?

[Anonymous]

Any reasons why I should or should not?

Yes, you should

No, you shouldn't

[Anonymous]

Well, the idea behind Paleo is to eat the things we evolved to eat.

Which makes sense, on the surface, the idea that our bodies evolved to process certain kinds of food and that most of what we eat now are things our ancestors did not eat, and so those things are detrimental to our health.

There are several problems with this idea though. The first is that there exists very little data on what our early, early ancestors actually ate, and there exists evidence of man "processing" his food for almost as long as there is evidence of man.

The second is that it romanticizes a particularly horrid point in our history. Early man did not live in some utopia where he always ate perfect foods and lived to be old and disease-free. Early man was lucky to be alive at all, and rarely survived to see 30. Life was incredibly difficult, and man had to forage and eat all kinds of things, whatever was available. If anything, mankind evolved to be able to use nutrients from as many sources as possible, not the other way around.

Point is, even with all our processed foods, we live far, far longer and healthier lives than our ancestors, who commonly died from disease and malnutrition. The idea that going "back to our roots" nutritionally has little bearing in science, and there's no real evidence that eating "paleo" is any healthier than what's accepted to be a normal, well balanced diet.

[dogbert444]

It's a fad diet and will not work long term. Better to change your eating habits, exercise portion cotrol and stick with low sugar, low fat, low salt products. Eat three balanced meals each day, and no more than 2 treats each of 100 cals or less.