Free the Animal

No Soap or Poo Update

Richard Nikoley — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 00:39:27 +0000

Well it was just over a month ago when significant attention was bestowed upon me over my self experiment -- months in the making -- to rid and free myself from soap and shampoo. You know the story.

I got a kick out of a lot of the comments at boingboing at the time, like, "he must be a vegan." Many suggested I must be an unwashed hippie. And many failed to draw the distinction, right there in the boingboing post title -- "Body washing with water alone" -- between not using soap & shampoo and not washing at all. But more than a month later, the comment I laugh about the most was the guy who said: "Don't use shampoo; use real poo." Cracks me up to this day. How weird am I?

So I have an interview tomorrow morning with the Columbia University Journalism School wire service that distributes via the NYT wire. So, potentially, it could go out to many sources, or, it could fizzle -- but I don't know much about this sort of thing. But I'm game. This is mostly about the growing trend to no shampoo, as the reporter explained it. We'll see how it goes. Manbe I can get in a bit about paleo, primal, evfit, eh?

So, it has been more than a month. Did anyone give it a try and care to report their results, positive or negative? I've got a few to share with you. The most extensive report is by Sean Bonner who wrote up a whole deal on it.

I’ve given up using soap & shampoo forever

Towards the end of December I came across an article written by a guy who had given up on using soap and was now washing himself with water alone. My immediate thought was this must be some dirty hippy and I felt sorry for anyone who lived or worked in close proximity to him – however I was interested in why someone would make a choice like this so I sat down and read both the article and the extremely long comment thread which made much more sense than I expected it to. If you have some time I recommend reading it though the author, Richard Nikoley, is active in the paleo-scene so a lot of the comments reference those ideas. But this post isn’t about that article, it’s about my own experiences.

Please extend him the courtesy of a big increased traffic day and go read the post about his experiences.

Next up is this post where he touches on several life tweaks:

Flipping Switches and Turning Dials

Hair: It just gets weirder. Welcome to the next stop on the freak show. A few weeks ago, I read this post over at Free the Animal. Giving up the use of shampoo and other hair care products seemed unorthodox, to say the least. I tend to be particular about my hair. Yet, I was intrigued.

Go check out his results.

And finally, just a few days ago "Jinx" commented on the original post.

It's been a month since I went soap free, and 4 weeks since shampoo last touched my hair. My hair is soft, manageable, shiny, has no odor, and my scalp doesn't itch. I still use soap on my hands after using the toilet, but that's it. Haven't even used facial moisturizer. My skin is soft, has no perfumey soap residue, and I don't need moisturizer even though our winters are very very dry. My hands get dry after using some soaps but a couple of hours later they're soft again. It's working out really well for me. I'm glad I found out about this!

So that's three. Any more who've tried it and given it an honest month or more? Positive or negative, let's hear it.

More Publicity for the Paleo and Evolutionary Fitness Way

Richard Nikoley — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 19:27:56 +0000

It's Art and his wife this time, local news.

You can read the story here, and then get a good belly laugh at dozens and dozens of illiterate and incoherent moronic commenters. It's been a while since I've seen this much stupid in one place.

Later: I almost forgot. Art and Loren Cordain are featured in EXCELENT article on Paleo in Cycling Weekly. Art has provided open public access to the PDF.

Art De Vany, John Durant, Erwan Le Corre and Richard Nikoley in Der Spiegel

Richard Nikoley — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:39:34 +0000

Here's the original German version for those who can read it. What follows is the English translation, courtesy of Yoda Translation Services. Just kidding. Art ran it through the Google engine. Also, the full size images can be seen at the German version of the article. The author, Philip Bethge, holds a PhD in biology.

Endless Campingtrip

By Philip Bethge

In the United States created a subculture of modern stone-age people. The paleo-fans take an example from the ancestors: They eat lots of meat, swimming in ice water and barefoot sprint.

Paleo-fans: Fit like the Stone Age

John Durant receives the hunters and gatherers of New York once a month in his apartment on the Upper East Side. Homemade beef jerky, it will exist. Gathered around the hearth, you replace recipes for carpaccio with vegetables or wild boar roast.

The following day, the hosts will be happy to turn out a few meals. For the ancestors did not have until the next hunting success starve? Instead of eating, rather Durant sprinting barefoot across the Brooklyn Bridge, or he is doing now in the winter, at Coney Iceland in the "Polar Bear Swim" in the icy Atlantic.

The 26-year-old and his colleagues of the New York group for "Evolutionary Fitness" (EF) are part of a growing subculture that health and happiness in the lives of their Paleolithic ancestors, is looking for. "Hunter-gatherers" or "Palaos" they call themselves, a sworn Clan modern Stone Age people. Their creed: It is best adapted to the body of that life which led to tens of thousands of years before humans.

Plenty of meat is part of the diet of Wildbeuter of the 21 Century. It there is climbing, practice sprints and jumps as if they were still on the lookout for marauding mammoths. Some even regard the donations as part of their primitive existence: Finally, the forefathers had shed much blood in battle with the saber-toothed tiger.

Hunting and gathering in the rhythm of the seasons

"What did the people then eat, how they have moved and what does that mean for us today?" Durant says. The answers he finds are quite obvious. The human genes are optimized for a life of wandering, for a life of hunting and gathering in the rhythm of the seasons.

"The life of our ancestors was a perpetual Campingtrip," says Arthur De Vany, "but of course without camping stoves and energy bars." The emeritus professor of economics is a kind of pioneer of the movement. "It's not about glorifying the Stone Age people," he says. But let the evolution to conclusions that would promise a healthier and happier life.

De Vany lives with his wife, Carmela, in a small town named Washington in the Utah desert. The view from his living room overlooks the green of a golf course. "In the morning I often point a bit there, sprint back and forth," says the 72-year-old. For 25 years he followed his program. His body is that of a toned mid-forties, 185 centimeters tall and 95 pounds, "with a body fat percentage of eight percent." De Vany suggests a golf ball over 250 yards. And to demand his muscles are so right, he pulls his SUV on the rope had time on his driveway.

Only twice per week, the Steinzeitfan trained, each for less than an hour. Chronic stress, such as jogging it deems harmful. "Can you imagine how hard it is to break down a mammoth with a stone?" Says the fitness guru. The key to happiness lies in a short but stiff body work.

Diet also follows strict rules: paleo-diet may only be called, was the ancestor of what is already in the stone knife. Cereal? The presence of Fred Flintstone's a terror. Spaghetti? "A plate full of sugar," says De Vany. Carbohydrates in any form, are regarded by him as the devil's work. Potatoes, chocolate, pizza, bread, but also milk, cheese and refined oils despise the EF fans. Instead, there are a lot of game meat and fish, fresh vegetables, seeds and fruits.

Ice-cold nights - without clothes

"We try to eat only that which existed before the invention of agriculture," says De Vany. Variation is the law in doing so: Sometimes proffers Carmela roast turkey with bacon for breakfast, sometimes there is a half-avocado.

The life of the ancestors, the professor has an amazingly good idea. "I admire their skills and their severity," he marvels. "They were able to survive cold nights with no clothes."

De Vany is a romantic. And yet many researchers acknowledge one of his theses. The medical examiner Lynda Frassetto at the University of California at San Francisco in healthy volunteers sat around for only ten days a paleo-diet of lean meat, fruits, vegetables and nuts. Everything else was forbidden. The blood pressure of the test subjects improved with decreased insulin levels.

The U.S. researcher Loren Cordain calls "holistic nutrition". For "average Steinzeitkost" he calculated, the lay fat and protein accounts for between 60 and 80 percent. Today's high-carbohydrate diet does not fit the genetic makeup of humans and had reason for lifestyle diseases such as diabetes and hypertension.

Healthy Stone Age people were much stronger and fitter than we are today, "says anthropologist John Shea of the U.S.. From tiny cracks in bones long since faded hunter-gatherers can read the research, how it was with the ancestors: "Their activity was highly variable, in search of food they are far gone, they have probably only driven once a week."

Although the average life expectancy was low. But this was not due to infirmity, but infections, accidents and a high infant mortality.

Life in the wilderness makes you look slim

So is it really sensible to indulge in the animalistic past? Richard Nikoley from San Jose, California is convinced. "Free The Animal" is his webpage. His own inner beast he has been let off the leash. Three years ago, he weighed over 100 kilograms. Today there are almost 30 less. "As strong as never before in my life," feels the 49-year-old.

Especially fond of shows Nikoley barbrüstig now. In agony, he is not alarmed. "Do not hunt animals with a full stomach," he is. 30 hours for the business man has therefore been fasted until the following training. Only after he ate. His finding: "I've never had such a clear head."

Or the New York Durant: He recently formed a friendship with a Vorturner the motion. Erwan Le Corre, 38, is a sort of Stone Age undead. While the Frenchman has athletic shorts instead of a loincloth. His body, however, dares to fight with the means to woolly.

Le Corres Fitness Club is the wilderness. In his courses, the clientele crawling on all fours through the undergrowth, playing with stones thrown off, as big as bowling balls, or runs - mostly naked - through the jungle. "It was great," Durant says on a recent visit to the training camp of the master in Mexico, "we climbed up trees, we have learned how to jump properly, and we dragged the tree trunks."

How boring now seems the existence of the average soft modern times. "We live like laboratory rats, without threats, fully air conditioned and with predictable food supply," complains De Vany. Although the cage rodents live three times longer than the average of its wild species. But at what price?

"There is an experiment in which they hang a rat in a wire and see how long they can hold on," says De Vany. "The laboratory rat plops to the ground after a short time."

And the wild rat? "The pull up and disappears."

[I really thank Art De Vany for going to the trouble to put me in touch with Dr. Philip Bethge and thanks to Philip for taking the time and asking so many good questions.]

Update: I just received an email from Philip with a PDF of the print edition that hit news stands on Monday, February 8.

Out & About on the Internets

Richard Nikoley — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 00:01:02 +0000

Here's a Saturday afternoon link roundup.

~ Karen De Coster at LewRockwell.com: Primal Life: A Journey of Diet and Health. Yours truly is quoted and at the end she provides an enormous list of paleo and primal resources.

~ Don Matesz at Primal Wisdom puts together the definitive guide and rebuttal to the most cited and most bogus argument against eating paleo: Life Expectancy.

~ My good friend Dr. Kurt Harris takes on some of Matt Stone's ideas: 180 + 180 = 360. Quite a lot of interesting comments.

~ And Dr. Mike Eades shows why it's a good policy to be skeptical of meta-analysis studies: Saturated fat and heart disease: studies old and new.

To give you an example of what I mean, let’s assume that we have a study looking at a flipped coin. If a researcher flips a coin 10 times and comes up with 6 heads and 4 tails, runs this through a program checking for statistical significance, he/she will discover that the 6-4 ratio isn’t a statistically-significant difference because of the low number of overall flips (10). Now, let’s say that 50 researchers did the same kinds of study and some found that their coins came up heads 6 times out of 10 or 4 times out of 10, etc. If a researcher then wants to ‘prove’ that heads comes up more times than tails on a coin flip, he/she can gather all the studies showing heads come up more times than tails, add them together in a meta-analysis and come up with 25 studies, each with 10 flips, showing that heads came up 63 percent of the time. Now we’re talking 250 flips and we would probably reach statistical significance. We know that over the long run a flipped coin is going to come up heads about 50 percent of the time and that the more the times it is flipped the more likely the number of heads will close in on the 50 percent figure. But, the meta-analysis that selected the studies showing the 63 percent heads is statistically significant because the studies were cherry picked.

~ And even more New York City "cavemen" in the news. Just wait until the raw meat eating scene!

~ Let's just finish up with some humor, ok? I'm talking about John Robbins and his take on the paleo way.

Central to Audette's views is his belief that we are natural meat-eaters. If you think there is validity to his argument, then I would ask you to consider a simple experiment. The next time you see a deer or wildebeest, see if you can run it down, jump up on its back, and dig your teeth into its hide. I think that you would discover several things. You'd probably find out that you don't have a lot of desire to do this. Even if you tried, though, you'd probably find that you can't run fast enough or jump high enough to manage the task. And even if you could, you'd find that your mouth doesn't open very wide, and your canine teeth aren't very long or very sharp or very hard. And even if you could bite off a piece, I think you'd find yourself quite displeased with the result.

Of course, the reason we don't have the teeth and claws of a pure carnivore is because we evolved big brains as our principal offensive weapon, along with the manual dexterity to exploit our brain's potential, and then we fashioned tools our brains and hands could use. In fact, stone tools go back more than 2 million years. Can he possibly be that ignorant?

Pork Shoulder Ribs Sous Vide

Richard Nikoley — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 21:35:37 +0000

Here's last night's fare. Boneless Pork Shoulder Ribs, mashed potatoes with plenty of butter, buttery organic free-range chicken gravy, and green beans with bacon. Click for hi-res.

Pork Shoulder

It was a collaboration. Robert & Julie brought the mash & green beans and I did the pork & the gravy. A nice hearty meal for a cold & rainy evening.

While the shoulder ribs were not as good as pork chops sous vide, it's probably because they need to be in the SVS longer than I had time for. Pork chops are amazing at 141F for an hour. I did these at 141 for an hour-1/2, but did not achieve the fork tender consistencies of chops. I finished them off in cast iron & bacon drippings.

Next time I'll get them started way earlier and go for a four hour run.

For those interested in the carb intake, this was virtually the totality of it for the whole day. Earlier I'd had meatza (almost zero carb) and a shake consisting of an egg, unsweetened whey powder, a tbsp of blueberries, two big tsp of full-fat Fage yogurt, and 1/4 cup heavy cream. At any rate, we played cards until after midnight and I didn't get tired until 1am, so I'm handling moderate starch intake very well. Definitely no post prandial elevated blood glucose crash.

Bacon, Cheddar, Cheeseburger Meatza

Richard Nikoley — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 21:45:42 +0000

The process of making a Meatza is right here in this previous post. In this case, it was inspired by a pizza I used to order from one of the pizza places years back. It's the standard 2 pounds of ground beef (grassfed in this case), about 8 slices of bacon sliced and fried, about 2/3 of a small yellow onion, and a decent block of cheddar cheese. Then it's 1/2 bottle of Trader Joe's pizza sauce. I did toss all the ingredients together (bacon, onion, cheese) for a nice even distribution. Click for the pretty images.

Bacon Cheddar Cheesburger Meatza

And, if you like your burgers with produce, we have produce.

With Produce

Now it's time for some lunch at 1:40 pm, my first meal of the day. I did a fasted workout at 10:30. Spent 5 minutes in the 40 degree (F) cold plunge and and just now getting hungry. Leftover meatza and perhaps a fatty shake with an egg in it.

Richard Nikoley has a “Low Body Temperature” and “Edema?” You be the judge.

Richard Nikoley — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 23:34:28 +0000

This is a pain to have to do this but I feel a bit of an obligation. Back in April '09, nearly a year ago, some guy popped up in comments at Peter's Hyperlipid blog promoting something he and Matt Stone of 180DegreeHealth were calling a "High Everything Diet." Basically, the idea is to jump start or improve metabolic function through a pretty high caloric intake, with plenty of carbs. After some time watching this assault, I did a post about the whole thing.

I really encourage you to read that first, but here's a key excerpt.

HED: High Everything Diet (If eating garbage is your problem, just eat more of it)

I've said before that I don't think carbohydrate is the primary problem (for those without type 2 or borderline, or obese), and the Kitavans and other H-G groups seem to prove that. In that regard, this HED does seem to eliminate at least some of what might destroy a high-carb munching Kitavan's health, i.e., refined sugar, high fructose corn syrup, processed vegetable oils (HEDers seem also not too fond of omega-3 PUFA -- the Ray Peat influence) and trans fatty-acids.

He has also posted that lots of the low-carbers ignore the Kitavans, which is true. I don't think that's the case for all the paleo-like eaters, and certainly not true for me, as I've often written that healthful diets exist from equator to arctic circle, from high carb intake (Kitavans, Kuna and others -- mostly from starch) to virtually zero carb (Inuit).

What I think is of far more importance is to find the diet or life way that works for you. First, begin with a principle: Real Food and nothing but Real Food. Next, attempt to determine where your genetic ancestry evolved in the last 50,000 years since coming out of Africa. Did your ancestors evolve in tropical regions with plenty of starches and fruits available year round, in regions with limited starches and fruits only seasonally, or with pretty much nothing but meat and animal fat most of the time?

Start there and go with how you feel as your first and primary authority. It's a process. There is great variability, so you may be more adaptable to one macronutrient mix than another, or, it may not make much of a difference. Some are going to feel better on high carb, and some on zero carb, and some in-between.

But never forget the Real Food principle. That's a safe haven and you just can't go wrong.

So HED was an intriguing idea, but the guy was promoting the eating of lots of junk, like bean burritos from Taco Bell, pizzas, and so on. I'll remind everyone again. I had two gum surgeries in 2000. They were rotting away. I had been on OTC allergy meds since teenage years and prescription ones since college. While in France I even did the scratch tests and undertook two years of increasing strength subcutaneous injections of allergens to stimulate the immune system, as I understand it. Unfortunately, that was paid for and administered by the French navy and when I left, so ended the treatment. It seemed somewhat beneficial but I was very soon back on the meds.

Fast forward to 2008, after more than a year of being off grains and when I had skipped not only one, but three successive quarterly hygienist appointments at the dentist. I hadn't been in a year, and not only did they find no advancement of my gum disease, it had actually reversed to readings even better than the early 90's. Oh, and I hadn't taken an allergy pill or nasal spray for months, and I still haven't.

Fast forward to a month or so ago when I began seeing Matt Stone show up in comments here and there. One thing to another and I thought it would be a good idea to pay attention. We've tweeted each other back & forth a bit and agree that we agree far more than we disagree. That hasn't changed. I've made my readers aware of his work, he has reciprocated. Fine & dandy.

But this, a comment posted on Diana Hsieh's blog, is simply an outrage that I will not tolerate from anyone (emphasis added).

I've studied this as thoroughly as anyone. I actually believe that low-carb diets in general ameliorate one of the symptoms of a low-metabolism, which is insulin resistance. Seems that the body's natural response to a low metabolism is triggering fat storage. But, ironically, a low-carb diet is counterproductive for actually healing the core of the condition. This is why guys like Richard and Jimmy Moore have low body temperatures and corresponding health problems. You can even see the edema in Nikoley's photos - in the cheeks and eyes.

He is absolutely full of shit and nobody could be fuller of it.

I am not particularly low carb and have not been in quite some time, yet I continue to lose fat slowly, about 1/2 pound per month, now. I did use VLC primarily to lose the weight. I still IF and consider it an important health benefit.
I don't have "low body temperatures" and I challenge anyone to show me where I have indicated any such thing. I have indicated simply that I had cold hands & feet, sometimes (those aren't core, last time I checked). A bit of iodine fixed that in a few days.
I was diagnosed with a hypothyroid in 2000, seven years before going paleo and was on synthetic T4 through that whole period of gaining about 35 pounds (from 200 - 235, now 175).
The hypothyroid is the only health problem that has persisted since going paleo. What has improved is that my inflammation markers like CRP are rock bottom, I no longer have the puffy, itchy skin I used to, I lost 60 pounds, am 300% stronger, took BP from 160/100 to normal levels with no meds, got off the GURD meds I'd been on since 2000 (I was a big Tums gobbler for years prior).

Most importantly, I cured the one thing most important of all: Hunger. Matt seems to think that body temperature, specifically low body temperature, is the Holy Grail for solving all health problems. Maybe he's right; I honestly don't know. But, you can talk body temperature all you want, and if you're chronically hungry all the time you're not going to make it. And BTW, if you think you know what your core body temperature really is, you're probably fooling yourself:

Measurement method - Normal temperature range

Rectal 36.6°C to 38°C (97.9°F to 100.4°F)

Ear 35.8°C to 38°C (96.4°F to 100.4°F)

Oral 35.5°C to 37.5°C (95.9°F to 99.5°F)

Axillary 34.7°C to 37.3°C (94.5°F to 99.1°F)

Those are some pretty damn large ranges and some of you are out there talking about changes in tenths of degrees... And on top of that, how do we know normal is necessarily 98.6F? Has anyone done readings on wild humans? But as in diet and other health factors...as in enormous differences in vitamin D absorption, tolerance to toxins like alcohol, cholesterol levels and a host of other things, I suspect that there's some range of body temperature that's normal for most people and that probably even those ranges can vary by individual.

So, now & finally, on to "edema." That is so absurdly ridiculous; no, effing stupid -- and downright rude -- that I'm not even going to address it except to post some recent photos and comparisons for you all to judge for yourselves (and perhaps to weigh this when next Matt Stone comes around with his various assertions).

2004 trip to Hawaii and last September when my tan was still decent

Here's a face shot from the same trip and right now, in my office, and my tan has left me

From a late September '09 camping trip. Oh, look at that health plagued poor guy. Oh, Matt Stone-san, can you please come to my rescue?

Black

What a picture of poor health. I need help!

Can someone please help me???

Meet John Durant (and The Colbert Report)

Richard Nikoley — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:10:34 +0000

A few weeks back I mentioned this Cavemen and the City article in the NYT. It focussed on a Mr. John Durant, a gentleman I was fortunate to meet nearly a couple of years ago at Art De Vany's Las Vegas EvFit seminar.

John wrote me a few days ago to congratulate me for this blog's recent success with visitor traffic and my recent interviews, and he added:

As a result of the New York Times article a few weeks back, our group has been getting a lot of media inquiries. That Der Spiegel piece came from it (and to you via Art), and there's been more. France, Japan, more from Germany, Sweden, Norway, Brazil, Russia, Italy, and other stuff in the US. I've actually been booked for the Colbert Report on this coming Wednesday, if you can believe it.

Well, he did indeed appear on the Colbert Report, and here's the video. Do note what he's wearing on his feet, and be sure to listen to the end where he talks about the sorts of women he meets in NYC and what his idea woman would be.

Later: Go see John's website at the appropriately named Hunter-Gatherer.com.

More later: Apparently this can't be viewed outside the US. However, I've learned you might be able to see it via this proxy site: http://www.hidemyass.com/. You'll need to past the link:

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/263270/february-03-2010/john-durant

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

John Durant

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Economy

Ribeye Steaks Sous Vide

Richard Nikoley — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:08:26 +0000

This is the second time I've done ribeyes in the Sous Vide Supreme. I packed them up with some salt, pepper, a bit of onion & garlic I sauteed in a pat of butter.

Vacuum Pack

Then it was into the water at the typical 134F for an hour. Comes out perfect every single time. Impossible to ruin.

Ribeye Steak Sous Vide

There are some tradeoffs, however. My wife & I have both agreed that for ribeyes, we just prefer them grilled. On the other hand, sous vide is such that the fat is very succulent. This time I used the kitchen torch to char the outside and that was probably a mistake. Better to use butter or ghee in a pan. Alternatively -- and this is what I should have done -- you could rub the steaks with butter and then torch them. I've done this before and have no idea why I didn't think of this.

I guess we'll just have to have more ribeye steaks. Damn!

Not Quite Rock

Richard Nikoley — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 05:38:13 +0000

I'm going to watch AmIdol right about now. Yea, big fan -- and I weep over some of the sad stories with hope, which makes my wife laugh her ass off...

I've pretty much watched every episode since day one. I love -- I'm an enormous sucker for -- the American Dream. That's my draw to it. That dream, as a guiding world principle, is more in danger than ever (sorry my good friends from abroad...). We're striving to "be just like everyone else," like a pack of wolves who get a conscience beyond their nature. That means death. America will die; not with bombs, but by default. I can't do anything about it.

Anyway, here's another look into my eclectic tastes. I've owned and cherished this album among my favorites since it came out a long time ago. Rickie Lee Jones, Flying Cowboys. Title track.