Going Back to the Basics of Human Health
This book, by a journalist (Mary Frost), not a doctor or nutritionist, is a sort of review of various books and a few articles surrounding nutrition and nutrient supplementation. Although I enjoyed reading it, and it certainly made me think about whether the vitamins I sometimes take are really helping me or not, there are also a few problems with the book which tarnish what otherwise might have been a great resource.
Lets go through some of its strengths first. It is very straightforward and is not very technical, but also doesn’t gloss over things so much so that the reader feels insulted. It covers fairly wide ground and references some of the well known sources of information or opinion in the field of nutrition, including Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston A. Price, Empty Harvest, by Dr. Bernard Jenson and Mark Anderson, Protein Power by Drs. Michael and Mary Dan Eades, and Dr. Atkins New Diet Revolution by Dr. Robert Atkins. So in this way it is a good introduction to many of the ideas contained in these books. The ideas are mainly about how eating traditional diets (that which our hunter-gatherer forebears) is much healthier than the over-processed diet that modern humans consume. Attached to this is the idea that modern farming techniques have polluted both the plants and the animals that eat them (both of which are consumed by the public) with harmful chemicals and depleted them of natural nutrients.
I can’t complain too much about the content of this book, since I come to it already with opinions that are very close. I am a big fan of the Eadeses’ Protein Power and the philosophy of eating as much of my food from organic sources, including free-range or grass-fed meats, raw dairy, etc. The new information for me in this book was the contention that many vitamins sold in stores are produced in the lab from otherwise inedible substances such as coal tar. The production converts this, but the criticism is that the conversion does not account for 100% of the original materials, which are potentially harmful. The Eadeses actually touch upon another issue involved in nutrient supplementation, but Frost adds some information that the Eadeses cover other parts of. What I’m referring to is the notion that vitamins are not one chemical, but actually groups of compounds that act together symbiotically. The main part of Vitamin C may be Ascorbic Acid, but there are many other “cofactors” that allow it to do it’s job more effectively. If one consumes only one or even just a few of the cofactors and not all of them, the body cannot regulate its levels of that main compound and there is a danger of it rising to levels that actually cause harm.
So, what is my problem with this book? Perhaps it is a minor one, but it is a bit nagging for me because I feel like this book could have been much better. The one thing that jumps out immediately is the actual look of the book. It looks like it was published 30 or more years ago, or by a very substandard press. In fact the publishers are The International for Nutrition and Health. Unfortunately they have produced a “book” that looks pretty amateurish. The type is not just oversized, but in many different sizes. It has so many quoted, bulleted, bolded, italicized and indented entities that these stylizations lose any and all meaning. Frost also refers to her “upcoming book” at least half a dozen times. Going Back to the Basics of Human Health was published in 1997 and I still cannot find ANY other book by Mary Frost other than this one. Although she references some authoritative sources, if you look in her bibliography, you will quickly see that probably 80% of her references are to 3 sources. I really think this book could have been a great resource itself if the author had included more of a variety of articles and studies, and if the typesetting hadn’t been so poorly done.
Another thing that bugged me was that Frost makes several references to a source of more naturally produced vitamins, and while it’s helpful to have this information, it creates the appearance that the book is merely an advertisement for the product. I’m sure that there are other suppliers that provide similar products but they are not mentioned. I’m also sure that there are some nutrients that can be had in a form that is produced in a lab (minerals, for example, like magnesium perhaps), but this is never pointed out. In other words, in such areas there doesn’t seem to be any balance, but rather just a sales pitch, albeit not a egregiously cheesy one.
There is yet one other thing that makes me a bit uncomfortable. Perhaps it’s an unjustified prejudice, perhaps not. Much of the book surrounds figures who are not medical doctors. Dr. Lee, for example, was trained in dentistry. Dr. Jenson is a Doctor of Chiropractic and Dr. Weston A. Price was also dentist. Some of the tools mentioned in this book are standard for chiropractors or “neuropathic” doctors, including the “acoustic-cardiograph machines,” reflexes, and “kinesiology.” I won’t speak to the first two of these, but I once saw a demonstration of the third that impressed me as so easily manipulated as to be useless – akin to a parlor trick. Perhaps some of these tools do provide useful information and I do not want to besmirch entire professions because they do not involve going through a standard medical school (which we all know can be shamefully deficient in some areas, such as nutrition), but still there is a sense that much of the information or advice surrounding these alternative medical methodologies are questionable to say the least. The Eadeses, at least, use hard science, including many studies, scientific journals, and so forth. This gives their books an air of solidity that Getting Back to the Basics of Human Health, as well as some others, can lack. Perhaps this is the aspiring scientist in me that causes doubt, and I realize that mainstream medicine has failed in many ways due to its own arrogance and collusion with industries and government that provide a great deal of monetary influence. At the same time, though, science should be used throughout in an effort to gauge how accurate theories are and we always need to be vigilant that claims that are being made should not simply be accepted because they sound morally right or logical or make us feel better.
Too often, people adopt an all-encompassing ideology when it comes to health and nutrition and refuse to listen to things that might prove to be a chink in their philosophy. I believe that ones view on such matters should not be set in stone, but be a very flexible mesh that allows for contradictions. Contradictions don’t have to weaken a theory, but rather may point towards ones still not devised that present a more accurate picture of things. A continual process of honing our understanding means theories building on previous ones and not fixing all of our ideas in cement and rejecting anything that might get in the way. Instead, that kind of approach will only prevent any future progress.
In any case, Going Back to the Basics of Human Health is an interesting read and a good introduction to some of the ideas out there regarding a more traditional/natural diet and environment. If one ignores the poor print quality and some of the sales pitches, one can get some good and intriguing information.