Healthy food, natural supplements, and herbal teas

Digger Nick said:

That's why you shouldn't actively try to make it shorter by eating unhealthy or say smoke, it is so easy to make it shorter still. Modern diets are often terrible, just have that in consideration and you've already made progress to a healthier and more enjoyable life.

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Again, having a pizza once in a while is not going to shorten your life.

Humanity has risen! said:

That is simply not true. Your great great grandmother never exercised, and never got fat. The term aerobics didn't even exist until the 60s, and it was unheard of to exercice in a gym.



Exercising does nothing or virtually nothing for weight loss and stimulates appetite.



You need to remain active, but exercise should be of low intensity and long in duration.

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That's not true.
Exercising burns calories and if done well then it trains your body to burn more calories by building up muscles.

Burning calories is basically what weight loss is about.

Humanity has risen! said:

That is simply not true. Your great great grandmother never exercised, and never got fat. The term aerobics didn't even exist until the 60s, and it was unheard of to exercice in a gym.

Exercising does nothing or virtually nothing for weight loss and stimulates appetite.

You need to remain active, but exercise should be of low intensity and long in duration.

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What are you talking about. If I add an hour of exercise a day it will result in no extra weight loss? So if I burn an extra 250 calories a day, 2500 calories a week that will result in nothing? That's just totally false. Keep in mind that approximately 3000 calorie equals a pound.

Now if your saying if I exersice an hour a day and then sit around and eat ice cream and do nothing the rest of the day that the exercise does nothing.

Well then you'd still be wrong actually.

Obviously that wouldn't be healthy and I'd end up packing on the pounds but the calories burned during that hour would still be beneficial. You would gain weight slower than if you didn't exercise for that hour.

Actually there are studies showing you can benefit from short high intensity workouts. That's why the fitness industry is jumping on the bandwagon with all the 10 and 30 min workouts. Trying to cash in.

As for appetite there are studies suggesting that exercise releases hormones that suppress appetite. Nothing is proven though so take that with a grain of salt. It seems to be more of a person to person thing. I for instance don't feel like eating at all for a good hour after a workout but a friend of mine gets very hungry so who knows.

I'm sorry to say it, but as a chemist, I don't buy into a lot of the stuff you're eating. What exactly does "High potency bilberry extract" even mean? It sets of almost every warning flag there is for me. And why are you eating a lot of vitamins? If your diet is varied, extra vitamins is not going to do anything for you. In fact, the fat-soluble ones can be downright dangerous to eat too much of. Not "now" though, but if you for one reason or another go down in body fat, excessive amounts of fat-soluble vitamins can be harmful. And has the whole turmeric thing not been debunked? Nothing wrong with a bit of turmeric in your food, obviously, but it won't actually help you.


I have a far simpler philosophy when it comes to food:
Eat varied, don't eat too much. Veggies are good.
Also, exercise is good.

I do the following every day:
Eat whatever I can find in the fridge that works as breakfast. Usually it means yogurt (and some müsli) or some dark bread with butter or margarine.
For lunch I eat what I made for dinner yesterday. Can be anything that I like. As I like a lot of different types of food.
An apple or some nuts.
For dinner I make whatever I want that I can also have for lunch tomorrow.
And finally some dark bread or similar before I go to bed (can't sleep if I'm hungry).

Humanity has risen! said:

Exercising does nothing or virtually nothing for weight loss and stimulates appetite.

You need to remain active, but exercise should be of low intensity and long in duration.

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That's blatantly untrue. Weight gain/loss follows a very simple pattern:
If energy in > energy out you'll gain weight
If energy in < energy out you'll lose weight

Some people put on weight faster than others.

Exercise requires energy. Thus if you exercise you'll either slow down your weight gain or lose weight, depending on your energy intake.

The reason for people were less likely to gain weight back in the days was because of the food. Energy rich food that was not very filling was not nearly as common/cheap as it is today, thus people did not eat as much "junk".

Why are we taking about weight loss?

If you excercise a lot you will get heavier because your muscles are getting bigger, it does not mean you are getting fat.

I don't diet but have a few simple tips for everybody who is interested (or not interested i'll type them anyway)

Only drink water, tea or preferably coffee! Without sugar and milk and it must be filtered.

Although coffee has a bad name it is actually very healthy. Recent studies show coffee is good against alzheimer and a couple forms of cancer, but you have to drink 4 cups a day. Milk and sugar are useless calories in the coffee and don't improve the taste IMHO.
Why filtered? ( so no espresso), ground coffeepowder still contains a small amount of sterols that have a negative effect on your cholesterol. But because sterols are fatty, any paper filter will remove them from the coffee.

Second tip: eat dark chocolat even if you don't really like it, you'll get used to it, even my wife did.

Third: try to substitute your chips and cookies for nuts. Don't mind the calories, nuts also contain very healthy unsaturated fatty acids.

You won't get much thinner, but you'll be a bit healthier

My general advice is just avoid processed garbage. There's tons of other options if you want to get more anal from there (avoid common sensitivities like diary/gluten etc).

If weight loss is a goal exercise is going to play a key role. It's really simple math: more cals burned than consumed = weight loss. Cutting down on carbs on non-lifting days (which is better than just cardio due to prolonged metabolism boost + fact that muscle burns more cals naturally) can make a big difference.

Fnord said:

I'm sorry to say it, but as a chemist, I don't buy into a lot of the stuff you're eating. What exactly does "High potency bilberry extract" even mean? It sets of almost every warning flag there is for me. And why are you eating a lot of vitamins? If your diet is varied, extra vitamins is not going to do anything for you. In fact, the fat-soluble ones can be downright dangerous to eat too much of. Not "now" though, but if you for one reason or another go down in body fat, excessive amounts of fat-soluble vitamins can be harmful. And has the whole turmeric thing not been debunked? Nothing wrong with a bit of turmeric in your food, obviously, but it won't actually help you.


I have a far simpler philosophy when it comes to food:
Eat varied, don't eat too much. Veggies are good.
Also, exercise is good.

I do the following every day:
Eat whatever I can find in the fridge that works as breakfast. Usually it means yogurt (and some müsli) or some dark bread with butter or margarine.
For lunch I eat what I made for dinner yesterday. Can be anything that I like. As I like a lot of different types of food.
An apple or some nuts.
For dinner I make whatever I want that I can also have for lunch tomorrow.
And finally some dark bread or similar before I go to bed (can't sleep if I'm hungry).

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The bilberry along with a few of the other supplements, like the fish oil, the astaxanthin, and the lutein, are all for eye maintenance and health. I spend a lot of time in front of my computer screen, often practically all day due to my work, and I am a dry eye sufferer. I want to take optimal care of my eyesight.

Vitamins are useful because although they are not a replacement for healthy food, often we don't eat enough, or we don't eat enough good food. Due to a condition I have a very low appetite. And it's true that too many of certain vitamins can be harmful, or even just certain vitamins taken in standalone or syntethic form. That's why I took a lot of time to find a formula that was optimized so as to do no harm and bestow total body health using the best of today's nutritional science.

Vitamin D, however, is not harmful even at high dosages, which can often be beneficial for some people, especially northerners.

Turmeric is one of the supplements that has the most solid clinical data behind it, for a huge variety of different ailments. However, turmeric has very low bioavailability, unless it is cooked in a very specific ways like Indians do. In order to harness its potential it is needed to get an extract that has the best possible bioavailability, else you are wasting your time.

Yogurt often is ladden with sugar or has low fat; you need healthy animal fats, especially in the morning. Dairy to an extent is problematic; that's why I never drink any milk, although I will use butter in full fat form, and on occasion some 10% fat Greek yogurt. Cereals are also bad and rich in glucids, and often again ladden with sweets; I am not buying any for my young son. So is bread. Margarine is made out of hydrogenated oils and is rich in bad omega 6 fats.

I eat grass-fed beef, dark leafy greens, eggs (7-8 a day), some chicken, some berries, and most of the time it suffices.

Fnord said:

That's blatantly untrue. Weight gain/loss follows a very simple pattern:
If energy in > energy out you'll gain weight
If energy in < energy out you'll lose weight

Some people put on weight faster than others.

Exercise requires energy. Thus if you exercise you'll either slow down your weight gain or lose weight, depending on your energy intake.

The reason for people were less likely to gain weight back in the days was because of the food. Energy rich food that was not very filling was not nearly as common/cheap as it is today, thus people did not eat as much "junk".

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The pattern is not as simple, as it's not only about the quantity of calories, but also about the different types of calories, which provoke different metabolic reactions. Not everyone has the same metabolism, but more or less, the same dieting principles can be used to make people healthy.

When it comes to burning calories, it actually takes a whole lot of exercise to burn just a few calories, and doing that exercise makes you want to eat more to compensate.

See this article for an explanation:

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2007/oct/28/healthandwellbeing.features1

Exercise is not a panacea at all. Of course, to remain healthy, we need regular physical activity. But lack of exercise is being used as a scapegoat to depict the population's poor physical health and shape as a problem of their own making, when the real problem is that they follow the official dietary guidelines, and those guidelines are the ones that make them sick.

I only eat exfoliated raw fronds of acacia cabbage that have been taken for walks in the countryside for no less than 5 miles prior to a light basting of extract of ohhhhhmmm followed by 2.59 minutes of intense tickling.

It really brings out the Vitamin f-

I found something I didn't even know existed at a health food store, white tea matcha! I bought it and made myself a cup, it tastes the same as white tea and is pretty good.

Matcha is so cool, you don't even need to boil it. You just drop half a teaspoon of the powder in a glass of water, mix, and enjoy. Since you drink the plant instead of just an infusion, it is much more potent than regular tea, to the vein of 15x or even more. Yes, 15x the antioxidant power! You can even put it in a smoothie, or in a bowl of yogurt or ice cream. If you go to a ice cream store, chances are you'll find matcha varieties.

It is such a good and nutritious stimulant, which has none of the crashes of coffee. It is an excellent coffee substitute!

So beside fish oil what can I take to enhance my gaming experience and endurance ?

ilm said:

So beside fish oil what can I take to enhance my gaming experience and endurance ?

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Crack or Meth!!!!!

I'm with Fnord with this one. As an ex-chemist (changed career) I don't really believe in these vitamins and "healthy food" craps. Don't get me wrong, if doctor recommends it, by all means. But as Fnord mentioned, taking fat-soluble vitamins can be dangerous if consumed over a long period of time *especially* if your body don't need them (gets stored in your fatty tissues and won't get excreted easily). Taking water soluble vitamins won't be so dangerous, but it is a waste as it will get excreted from your body if not need.

What also boggles me is that people are taking all these questionable health food by just watching advertisement or recommendation from you friends or gym trainer. Someone I know is taking this thing called "Vital Green" because apparently it's high in energy from *natural* vegetable - one of the component is spirulina and we have almost no scientific evidence this is actually beneficial for humans.

Strange world, strange people if you ask me!

As I said, some are backed by a lot of solid clinical evidence. I focus on them, as they have actually demonstrable results.

Due to a condition I am extremely tired all day, in a lethargic state. If I didn't do things like these I wouldn't even be able to work. And I love what I'm doing, it's my passion.

It's indeed possible to take too much of certain vitamins, and most formulations have too much of some nutrients, some which have shown to be harmful in isolated forms, or they are filled with hamful binders, dyes or fats. With a correctly balanced and researched formula assembled in a properbly bioavailable form however, there is nothing wrong.

There is also the fact that it's very hard to get enough of some nutrients daily. I look at something like lutein, and the foodstuffs that contain lutein, and I wonder how anyone does. And yet, lutein is essential to keep healthy eyes and healthy eyesight. This is especially important for avid computer users like us. Astaxanthin is very powerful in maintaining vision, and has a broad range of other health benefits, which are seriously impressive, and supported by ample research. I used to have very sore dry eye, and experience tremendous relief through it.

There are a lot of con artists out there who make products with exaggerated claims, but some of it is very legit. And by and large, it is very very safe. No one dies from supplement use, while thousands of people die for something as seemingly benign as Tylenol use, every year.

Humanity has risen! said:

The bilberry along with a few of the other supplements, like the fish oil, the astaxanthin, and the lutein, are all for eye maintenance and health. I spend a lot of time in front of my computer screen, often practically all day due to my work, and I am a dry eye sufferer. I want to take optimal care of my eyesight.

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But what exactly does "high potency bilberry extract" mean? In pretty much every case I've seen when someone has talked about "high potency" when it comes to natural products, it either means that it's dried and possibly concentrated, or it's nothing special at all, often sold at a very high price. I would advocate eating some regular bilberries or some other form of blueberry instead. It's probably a lot cheaper.

Humanity has risen! said:

Vitamins are useful because although they are not a replacement for healthy food, often we don't eat enough, or we don't eat enough good food. Due to a condition I have a very low appetite. And it's true that too many of certain vitamins can be harmful, or even just certain vitamins taken in standalone or syntethic form. That's why I took a lot of time to find a formula that was optimized so as to do no harm and bestow total body health using the best of today's nutritional science.

Vitamin D, however, is not harmful even at high dosages, which can often be beneficial for some people, especially northerners.

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Vitamin D is actually quite dangerous in high doses. One of the more serious side-effects is overcalcification, but there are other symptoms as well.

Excess intake of vitamin D or of its metabolites may result in hypercalcemia and extra-osseous calcification, particularly in arterial walls and in the kidney, leading to chronic renal failure.

source
this might also be of interest

There are in other words scientific studies that supports my statement about vitamin D being dangerous in high doses. It is true that many northerners suffer from lack of vitamin D during winter though, and if you can't get enough through other means, that's the only time I would recommend taking supplements.
For most vitamins, in particular the common water syllable ones, you're likely to get far more than you actually need (check the GDI of vitamin C in most forms of fruit juice, in particular citrus ones).

Humanity has risen! said:

Turmeric is one of the supplements that has the most solid clinical data behind it, for a huge variety of different ailments. However, turmeric has very low bioavailability, unless it is cooked in a very specific ways like Indians do. In order to harness its potential it is needed to get an extract that has the best possible bioavailability, else you are wasting your time.

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I'm still trying to find studies that supports this statement, beyond the fact that turmeric is a good antioxidant (recent studies regarding antioxidants though seem to indicate that they are not as important as we used to believe, and that it is possible to overdose those as well).

Humanity has risen! said:

Yogurt often is ladden with sugar or has low fat; you need healthy animal fats, especially in the morning. Dairy to an extent is problematic; that's why I never drink any milk, although I will use butter in full fat form, and on occasion some 10% fat Greek yogurt. Cereals are also bad and rich in glucids, and often again ladden with sweets; I am not buying any for my young son. So is bread. Margarine is made out of hydrogenated oils and is rich in bad omega 6 fats.

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While recent studies seem to indicate that the whole aversion to saturated fats might have been misguided (one professor called the whole "saturated fats is bad" "the largest and worst dietary experiment ever conducted"), though omega 6 is not actually bad. The latest reports I read on it indicated that you should strive for a balance between omega 3 & omega 6, with between a 1:2 & 1:5 ratio.


I'll respond to the rest as soon as I have time.

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I've never noticed much change based on what I eat or drink, except for alcohol and coffee.

Alcohol is tricky, because it can be a great way to enhance the mood at appropriate times - but it can also be a very bad thing under the wrong circumstances. For instance, I've sometimes enjoyed a few glasses of wine with the intention of playing a game during that time - and I've found that the two simply don't mix well. Also, alcohol tends to make me feel bad the following day, and I'm not talking about the traditional hangover - I'm talking about my mood, which can get really dark and unpleasant.

So, I do what I can to avoid drinking.

As for coffee, I can't take more than a couple of cups per day. But, again, it depends on what I'm doing. But my mind is already so busy that adding caffeine can make it so I can't feel at ease - and I don't enjoy my mind racing that much.

I tend to go by what my body and mind tell me - not what other people say I should do, but I also try to keep an open mind. To me, it seems that the vast majority of this health food trend is based on flimsy research - and my personal take is that if you don't feel good, it's just an easy way to tell yourself you've found a solution. That might work for some, but I doubt it will be a long-term aid.

Obviously, I can't know - and it's strictly my experience with people who've done this kind of thing and how they've changed or not changed.

Humanity has risen! said:

That is simply not true. Your great great grandmother never exercised, and never got fat. The term aerobics didn't even exist until the 60s, and it was unheard of to exercice in a gym.

Exercising does nothing or virtually nothing for weight loss and stimulates appetite.

You need to remain active, but exercise should be of low intensity and long in duration.

Click to expand...

Well, most of the great great grandmothers lived to be 50 years old if that On top of that they had a lot of every day excersice ( no slacking in front of computer or TV ).

There is overwhelming amount of proof that even as little as 30 minutes exercise per day, makes a huge contribution to your health. If you think otherwise, study the subject for a day and come back to the thread again.

If you're often very tired, and have problems with your eyes, try to excersice outside in a place with good air quality…. just an hour is enough.. if you haven't noticed a positive difference in your health condition after a couple of months I'd be very surprised. Unless of course your sickness prevents you from doing physical excersices, than it is a tough position.

Exercise is a way of burning calories - and that will lead to weight loss if you burn more than you consume.

There's no right or wrong way to exercise - as that will depend on your general disposition and psychology.

Don't confuse your own disposition and psychology with that of other people.

Some people thrive on physical activity and as such, it can be great with high intensity and shorter durations. It doesn't matter - so long as you don't consume more than you burn.

That's as factual as anything we can say about biology.

Trying to deny it is like saying water isn't wet.

GothicGothicness said:

Well, most of the great great grandmothers lived to be 50 years old if that On top of that they had a lot of every day excersice ( no slacking in front of computer or TV ).

There is overwhelming amount of proof that even as little as 30 minutes exercise per day, makes a huge contribution to your health. If you think otherwise, study the subject for a day and come back to the thread again.

If you're often very tired, and have problems with your eyes, try to excercise outside in a place with good air quality…. just an hour is enough.. if you haven't noticed a positive difference in your health condition after a couple of months I'd be very surprised. Unless of course your sickness prevents you from doing physical excersices, than it is a tough position.

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There are other reasons for the shorter life span of the previous generations, such as a lack of food (per opposition to an abundance of bad food), lack of protection against diseases, and lack of access to medicine. And what about the women who had domestic servants for all these tasks? I think you're overstating the amount of exercise many of these women had to do. Generalized obesity came with the proliferation of industrial food, not before.

Exercise is good, but for overall body health, not for weight loss. If you try to lose weight, what needs to occur is a radical overhaul of your diet.

And no, my problem is a grave hormonal imbalance. I have used a drug for over ten years, and have started daily injections very recently to inhibit some of the excess hormones. Short of treating the source nothing will make this change.

But that's why I became so interested in healthful eating; having my vitality slipping away from me, I wanted to be as healthy as I could in all kinds of other ways.

I've no doubt that there is misinformation floating around about many of the popular natural supplements. Many of the benefits of vitamins has solid evidence behind it (although there's much debate over exactly how much people need, which forms / sources are most beneficial, bio-availability, etc.). But in the case of herbal supplements where very often little or no scientific research has been done and the "evidence" presented for their purported benefits is entirely anecdotal. I commonly here things like "The Chinese have been using X for thousands of years". Of course without controlled scientific studies to back up these claims we have no way of knowing if people are experiencing anything more than psychosomatic (i.e., placebo effect). The natural / herbal supplement industry is big business so of course the manufacturers and retailers are going to treat these anecdotes as verified facts. Perhaps not quite on the level of snake oil salesman, but not far off. However, I do think there is some pretty solid evidence for the benefits of anti-oxidants from green / white tea.

That being said, it often disturbs me at the almost blind faith many people put into the "Western" medical industry. To hear some of them speak, you'd think they were infallible gods. The truth is medical doctors are often pretty lousy scientists. In college, one of my neuroscience professors would bring in articles from major medical journals like JAMA and then we'd discuss the fairly obvious ways in which their methodology was flawed. Then there's the fact that the perceived effectiveness of many new medical treatments is based on animal research, which means we eventually find some treatments often don't always work as well (or at all) on humans.

Call me a cynic, but medical doctors aren't really going to be big on preventative medicine, because that isn't nearly as profitable as treating people for chronic conditions. I'm not in any way saying that you shouldn't see doctors for serious medical problems, but I think doing your own research and / or seeking a 2nd opinion are both really good ideas before taking any drug, undergoing any major surgery or other type of treatment.

For my own part, I follow what many people would consider a pretty "strict" diet- I almost never drink any alcohol and have been a vegan for 13 years (not entirely for "health" reasons but that's not relevant here) and I love it. While I was once a big consumer of red meat, dairy, and other junk food, I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything now. Will I live longer / better because of that? Probably, (there were some studies indicating vegetarians live 7 years longer on average IIRC), but if not I really don't care, because I enjoy the food I eat a lot and in some ways feel healthier now than when I was a teenager. I only wish I could afford more fresh fruits and veggies.