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Diet Fallacy #10: “Your diet should consist of a certain fixed ratio of protein / fat / carbs”

September 20, 2005 09:18 AM

Diet Fallacy #10: "Your diet should consist of a certain fixed ratio of protein / fat / carbs"

The suggestion that there is one nutritional ratio of protein /fat/carbs that fits all humans is ludicrous.

So is the notion that there is an ideal "Zone" upon which all humans reach peak performance.

There isn't yet any substantiated scientific evidence to back up these claims. In fact, quite the opposite: there is a substantial amount of evidence that humans have primarily adapted to thrive while rotating between different seasonal foods and thus different ratios of macronutrients.

Furthermore, due to the primal necessity to survive on different accessible food sources (i.e. vegetarian or animal food) humans were forced to cycle their diet and adapt to different ratios of protein/fat/carbs. There is no "one ratio that fits all".

It has been established that people in different climates differ in their capacity to utilize foods. By virtue of adaptation to the arctic climate, Inuits fare better on raw fish and blubber. Native Africans who have adapted to a warm, tropical climate, survive better on grains or fruits.

The notion of a fixed ratio of protein/fat/carbs is an attempt to apply an over-simplistic theory to a desperate demand by the diet-addicts for a quick fix.
When it comes down to nutrition there is no quick fix and for that matter no fixed ratios.

The ongoing debate between the original 30/30/60 ratios versus the 40/30/30 or the 45/25/30 is essentially a dog chasing its own tail. It's noting more than a well-orchestrated marketing scheme to feed the addiction to fads.

Scientists contest that we carry the same genes as our ancestors, the cavemen. Our body is therefore primarily adapted to better survive on food and exercise that closely mimics the way we ate and lived about 10,000 years ago.

Does it make sense that while fighting for survival in hard primal conditions, the caveman had the time and means to carefully measure the ratio between protein fat and carbs in his meals so that he would be in the "Zone"?
 

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