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286 comments on DrumBeat: October 8, 2008

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Matthew on October 8, 2008 - 12:38pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

We're on the verge of one of those "step changes" Greer talks about

Step changes? As in stepping off the windowsill of a skyscraper?

When the economy collapses, many millions of Americans are screwed. What happens when their only source of income vanishes? Or when the grocery stores close up shop overnight, due to the total breakdown of our credit system? How will people eat? Is FEMA going to feed a nation of 300 million people? State governments are bankrupt. Municipalities either are, or will soon be in, the same boat.

Greer takes historical examples of collapse and generalizes them to our situation: Because Easter Island and Rome experienced catabolic collapse, so will we. I'm still scratching my head about out why he thinks this is valid.

The vast majority of Romans were not dependent on just-in-time delivery of food, fuel, and other necessities. Their civilization wasn't propped up on stilts by a rapidly vanishing energy source. The Romans hadn't destroyed or paved over all their good farmland. The Roman populace hadn't lost the knowledge, skills, and abilities with which to procure the necessities of life.

In the US, it almost seems as though we deliberately built up a society rigged for a rapid, catastrophic implosion. Sure, maybe in a decade or two the survivors (200 million people? Or fewer?) will have figured out how to grow food locally, manufacture basic necessities like clothing and medicine, and so on. And I suppose one might call this a "step change", in a dieoff-sort-of-way. But by that time, won't extreme energy scarcity (and possibly climate change) deliver the coup de grâce?

It's all so depressing. What a waste.

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Leanan on October 8, 2008 - 12:45pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Is FEMA going to feed a nation of 300 million people?

They don't have to. Not everyone will lose their jobs at once.

Greer takes historical examples of collapse and generalizes them to our situation: Because Easter Island and Rome experienced catabolic collapse, so will we. I'm still scratching my head about out why he thinks this is valid.

I think it is.

The government can feed the population. It may do so as inefficiently as it handled Katrina, but they can do it. They can make sure the farmers get first dibsies on petroleum products, and they can distribute the food, or move people to where the food is.

I suspect that people will move on their own, closer to the supply lines, and where there may be jobs. It will be painful and tremendously disruptive.

And face it...most Americans won't starve for a very long time, even if the grocery stores close overnight. ;-)

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veganmaster on October 8, 2008 - 1:23pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Exactly - when morbid obesity and its inevitable Pandora's box of chronic disease (caused by meat/dairy/oils & overnutrition), when these things are gone from the general population, then one can talk seriously talk about starvation in America. A single pound of FAT contains enough energy to fuel several days of mild activity - nearly ALL Americans have more energy stores in the form of chicken FAT than the average 3rd world farmer has in their entire body!!!

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MacDuff on October 8, 2008 - 3:41pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

"Caused by meat/dairy/oils & overnutrition"

This does not reflect current scientific studies at all

in fact, quite the opposite - but I am getting as used to you misrepresenting the facts on food as I do the McCain/Palin campaign the facts on just about anything

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NeverLNG on October 8, 2008 - 4:25pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

which studies would those be? I look around, and I see a sea of fat, diabetes, hypertension, coronary artery disease and low back pain.

What else might be wrong? Not that people eat too much!

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Leanan on October 8, 2008 - 4:42pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

The question is why they eat too much. And the answer, it appears, is refined carbohydrates. Refined carbs screw up your body chemistry and your appetite control system.

Amazingly, despite the conventional wisdom, there's little scientific evidence that fat is bad for you.

The obesity explosion in the US started after the government starting recommending a low-fat diet.

The conventional wisdom on this really is changing. A friend of mine in Ohio had a heart attack recently, and the doctors told him that his number 1 priority should be to cut down on refined carbs. Not fat, refined carbs.

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Ben on October 8, 2008 - 4:45pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I blame high fructose corn syrup. Cheaper than sugar, and in damn near everything, starting early 70's. Your body tastes the sweet but doesn't process it the same way as plain old sugar.

I know they have their own commercial now, which to me just proves it's horrid.

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HARM on October 8, 2008 - 4:49pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I 100% agree on the refined carbohydrates point (personally lost ~90 lbs by switching to a low-carb diet). However, it's important to distinguish between "good" fats (non-hydrogenated, unsaturated, Omega-3/6-rich) vs. "bad" fats (hydrogenated = worst, saturated = better, but not great).

Unfortunately the FDA and Big Agribusiness have colluded over the past 30 years in a massive propaganda campaign to convince Americans that ALL fats are "bad" for you, while all carbohydrates are "good". Most Amreicans are simply too lazy and ignorant to do the research and decide for themselves.

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Leanan on October 8, 2008 - 5:00pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

However, it's important to distinguish between "good" fats (non-hydrogenated, unsaturated, Omega-3/6-rich) vs. "bad" fats (hydrogenated = worst, saturated = better, but not great).

No, it's not. The "good fats vs. bad fats" thing is as bogus as the low-fat diet.

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xuewen on October 9, 2008 - 12:01am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

'fraid not.

Consumption of fats and oils is not as simple as delivering energy to the body. Omega 3 and 6 in particular are "essential" in that they cannot be manufactured by the body. These things are building blocks for cytokines which have important regulatory effects on the immune system. Get them out of whack in your diet, and your own biochemistry will suffer.

The incidence and progression of MS for instance is pretty strongly related (although not "proven") to saturated fat consumption. Also very good epidemiological evidence that omega-3 is protective of that, and of heart disease.

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Leanan on October 9, 2008 - 6:46am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I suspect that consuming a variety of fats is probably the healthiest thing to do. And perhaps certain fats are better for people suffering from MS. That does not mean we should all eat that way, though. Indeed, that is a key point from Gary Taubes' Good Calories, Bad Calories. Some of the conventional wisdom (such about cholesterol) is based on what happens with people who have a genetic defect that results in abnormally high levels of cholesterol. What's good for them may not be good for normal people - may in fact be bad for normal people.

Taubes also argues that the omega-3/heart disease has little scientific support. It was proposed as an explanation for why Inuit, who live on meat and blubber, don't suffer heart disease.

But if it's actually refined carbs, and not fat, that cause heart disease, no explanation is necessary.

If you have not read Good Calories, Bad Calories, read it. It's really eye-opening. An awful lot of what we thought we knew about nutrition is actually based flimsy, even contradictory, evidence.

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xuewen on October 9, 2008 - 8:00am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

perhaps certain fats are better for people suffering from MS. That does not mean we should all eat that way, though

There is evidence that reducing saturated fat intake and taking in sufficient quantities of omega 3 reduces the prevalence of MS in the population, as well as reducing progression rates for those who have it.

So yes, it probably does mean that we all should eat that way (at least if we want to reduce our chance of developing MS).

Ref: George Jelinek, "Taking Control of Multiple Sclerosis", (2005, I think)

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Leanan on October 9, 2008 - 8:54am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

There is evidence that reducing saturated fat intake and taking in sufficient quantities of omega 3 reduces the prevalence of MS in the population, as well as reducing progression rates for those who have it.

Another point from Taubes' work: correlation is not causation. That is probably the biggest problem with research on human nutrition. You cannot do the kind of experiments on people that you can do on, say, rats. You cannot keep all other conditions the same, and change only one variable.

MS is an autoimmune disease, and like many autoimmune diseases, is more common in wealthy, developed nations. Which might be assumed to have a different diet than in poorer nations. That makes epidemiological studies on diet suspect, or at least very complicated.

That is the problem Taubes found with the fat-heart disease link. Fat and meat consumption go up as a population gets wealthier...but so does refined carbohydrate consumption. It's difficult to tease them apart. And the obvious test cases, such as Alaskan natives that eat a lot of fat and few carbohydrates, were ignored as a fluke.

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xuewen on October 9, 2008 - 11:05pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

You're right that correlation is not causation, and as you say there is really no way to carry out the experiments that are required to prove causation. The same problems would apply to "proving" anything relating to simple carbohydrates.

What we have with MS is some pretty strong epidemiological evidence, plus a plausible biochemical basis. It really amounts to what standard of proof you want, but it's good enough for me:

- MS is much more prevalent in inland Norway than on the coast, the primary difference between the two being that the inland diet is heavy in saturated fats from a dairy based diet (lots of milk, cheese and butter) whereas the coastal diet is heavy in fish (lots of omega-3). Lots of other less direct evidence but this is the one that sticks in my mind as far as saturated fat / omega-3 issue goes.
- Swank's longitudinal diet study indicated that long term progression for MS patients was greatly reduced (order of magnitude improvement) in those who could stick to a diet of less than 20g of saturated fat per day. This is a much larger effect than any of the medications that have ever been tested.
- omega-3 is the building block for a group of cytokines that suppress inflammation, which presumably includes inappropriate immune interaction with the nervous system in the case of MS (omega-6 is the building block for the pro-inflammatory cytokines. Both synthetic routes use a common catalyst in the body and what can happen is that if you eat too much omega-6 (from, say, canola) that can block the conversion of omega-3 by saturating the synthetic pathway).

Yes simple carbs are a problem with diabetes / syndrome X. But the simple carb story is not the only important nutritional story that needs to be told.

The point I'm trying to make is that "fats ain't fats". They are biochemically active and have different nutritional functions in your body. They are not just inert energy carriers (although they serve that purpose also).

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JimK on October 8, 2008 - 7:10pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

If anyone is looking for a good baseline book on nutrition, I recommend Walter Willett's Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy.

It's really important to distinguish between refined carbohydrates like table sugar or white flour, versus whole foods like especially whole grains. "Glycemic index" is one measure, but it gets tricky. E.g with whole grain flour, it depends on the coarseness of the grind.

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Consumer on October 8, 2008 - 1:36pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I knew there was a reason I was storing all those calories just above my belt!

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jjhman on October 8, 2008 - 8:40pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

The most credible advice I ever heard about food was to never eat anything unless people had been eating it for at least 1,000 years. Thank god that includes beer.

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Matthew on October 8, 2008 - 9:01pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

The government can feed the population. It may do so as inefficiently as it handled Katrina, but they can do it. They can make sure the farmers get first dibsies on petroleum products, and they can distribute the food, or move people to where the food is.

In theory, the government can do a lot things. In reality, they often just make matters worse. They launch & support wars instead of building the nation's infrastructure. They subsidize ethanol instead of developing viable alternative energy sources. They pass bailouts instead of genuinely dealing with our financial problems.

But I am fairly confident that the government will do a great job of relocating the jobless masses into major cities...

I suspect that people will move on their own, closer to the supply lines, and where there may be jobs....

In terms of longer-term viability, isn't this exactly opposite of what we want? Instead of people concentrating in cities and along supply lines, they need to spread out across any & all arable land, forming localized communities. Right?

Jobs, medical services, food and electricity are going to disappear from the periphery first - the remote countryside, far-flung suburbs, etc. But setting up a relatively self-sufficient community requires significant amounts of time, tools, knowledge and capital. Most Americans will have none of these things.

Therefore, I think many families will be forced to turn to the government for shelter, heat, food, and medicine. We'll have hundreds of thousands internal refugees living in government camps (FEMA, Red Cross, etc.) This number will only grow with each passing year. Will these people ever be relocated out to viable communities? If not, what will happen to them when the camps run out of supplies?

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Leanan on October 8, 2008 - 9:28pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

In theory, the government can do a lot things. In reality, they often just make matters worse. They launch & support wars instead of building the nation's infrastructure.

They have to feed people in order to launch wars. Don't forget...the purpose of the school lunch program was to improve the quality of Army draftees.

In terms of longer-term viability, isn't this exactly opposite of what we want? Instead of people concentrating in cities and along supply lines, they need to spread out across any & all arable land, forming localized communities. Right?

What do you mean "we," Kemosabe? Nobody here agrees on what "we" want. Alan, for example, thinks cities and supply lines (rail) are the future.

In any case, what "we" want doesn't matter. I'm talking about what likely will happen, not necessarily what I want to happen.

Therefore, I think many families will be forced to turn to the government for shelter, heat, food, and medicine. We'll have hundreds of thousands internal refugees living in government camps (FEMA, Red Cross, etc.) This number will only grow with each passing year. Will these people ever be relocated out to viable communities? If not, what will happen to them when the camps run out of supplies?

If I had to guess...they'd be moved out of camps in a sort of "welfare to work" program. The work is likely to involve joining the Army...or becoming farm laborers, perhaps on government farms. Which would at least give them a path to the localized communities you want.

Me, I don't think it will come to that for quite some time.

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286 comments on DrumBeat: October 8, 2008

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