MGTutoring.com. A Rational Perspective on Education.

February 14, 2013

Barefoot

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Recommended Books,Science — Administrator @ 11:06 am

In “Barefoot Running Laced With Health Benefits” (WebMD, Jan. 27, 2010), Bill Hendrick writes:

Running barefoot causes less collision force to the feet than running in cushioned shoes, a new study says.

Researchers reporting in the Jan. 28 issue of the journal Nature show that runners who run without shoes usually land on the balls of their feet, or sometimes flat-footed, compared to runners in shoes, who tend to land on their heels first.

Cushioned running shoes, which date back only to the 1970s, may seem comfortable but may actually contribute to foot injuries, say Daniel Lieberman, PhD, professor of human evolutionary biology at Harvard University, and colleagues.

The scientists, using motion and force analyses, showed that barefoot runners who strike on the fore-foot (land on the balls of their feet) generate smaller collision forces than shod rear-foot strikers.

The researchers say that although there are anecdotal reports of reduced injuries in barefoot populations, more work is needed to test their view that either barefoot runners or those with minimal footwear (such as sandals or moccasins) have reduced injury rates.

©2005-2012 WebMD, LLC. All rights reserved.

So we’ve been barefoot, like every other animal, for hundreds of thousands of years, but all of a sudden we need shoes? I don’t think so. Here are some recommendations for transitioning to barefoot, to get as much barefoot time as your work and lifestyle allow:

1.  “The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Barefoot Running”  by  Leo Babauta.

2.  “How To Start Barefoot Running”

3.  “So, you wanna start running barefoot?”

4.  Advice from Dr. Daniel Howell, who wrote “The Barefoot Book”

5.  “Barefoot is Better” by Dan Peterson

6.  “The Effect of Running Shoes on Lower Extremity Joint Torques” by D. Casey Kerrigan, MD, Jason R. Franz, MS, Geoffrey S. Keenan, MD, Jay Dicharry, MPT, Ugo Della Croce, PhD, and Robert P. Wilder, MD. (Published in PM&R: The journal of injury, function and rehabilitation, Volume 1, Issue 12 (December 2009), published by Elsevier.)

But I’d disagree with this sentence:  ”These findings confirm that while the typical construction of modern-day running shoes provides good support and protection of the foot itself.” Running shoes are bad: they are not intended to work within the limits and nature of the human body and human foot but to supposedly remedy deficiencies in human nature. If research and design of running shoes were premised on the former (i.e., nature), not the latter (i.e., deficiencies), they’d look and perform much better.

7.  “To Run Better, Start by Ditching Your Nikes” by Dylan Tweney

January 30, 2013

Stay Away From Grains

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Education,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Parenting,Science — Administrator @ 12:10 pm

In “Beyond Celiac: Study Sheds New Light on Obesogenic Effects of Gluten – Are PPARs & Bacteria Both Involved?” (12-25-12), they write:

Bottom line: The study at hand provides a good reason to limit your intake of ‘healthy whole grains’ and other gluten containing foods, regardless of whether you suffer from celiac or not. Whether the established detrimental effects of gluten on the integrity of the intestinal wall and the increased leakage of bacterially produced endotoxins from the highly unfavorably changes in the gut microbiome in response to the high fat diets (Hildebrandt. 2009) are part of, or even the primary cause of these observations still has to be elucidated. The same goes for strategies to counter the translocation of the endotoxins across the gut lining (cf. ‘Shedding some light on the leaky gut’) and the dose response relationship between the total amount of gluten in your diet and its effects on your metabolism. With 7% of pure gluten, it goes without saying that you would basically have to live of wheat in order to get to anywhere similar amounts of gluten in the diet… that said: Is it possible that the effects occur only in the presence of the high fat diet? After all, this alone has been shown to favor a pro-inflammatory gut microbiome.

For your health and for your children’s health, avoid grains. Focus on meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds. Pastured, organic products are the best; buy from a local farmer with good farming practices, if you can.

Another Reason We Need Better Education

Filed under: Animals,Biology,Culture,Education,Logic,Science — Administrator @ 12:07 pm
In “What’s Behind the Campaign to Condemn Raw Diets for Pets?,” Dr. Becker says:
Following on the heels of the AVMA’s condemnation of raw pet food came a similar position statement by the American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) that it “does not advocate or endorse feeding pets any raw or dehydrated nonsterilized foods, including treats that are of animal origin.”
…
What the AAHA neglects to mention is the GI tracts of dogs and cats evolved to handle heavy bacterial loads from food. Your pet’s body is well equipped to deal with heavy doses of familiar and strange bacteria because nature built him to catch, kill and immediately consume his prey.
Your dog or cat’s stomach is highly acidic, with a pH range of 1-2.5. Nothing much can survive that acidic environment – it exists to keep your pet safe from potentially contaminated raw meat and other consumables. And in addition to the acid, dogs and cats also naturally produce a tremendous amount of bile. Bile is both anti-parasitic and anti-pathogenic. So if something potentially harmful isn’t entirely neutralized by stomach acid, the bile is a secondary defense. And your pet’s powerful pancreatic enzymes also help break down and digest food.
© Copyright 1997-2013 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved.
Cats and dogs eat raw in nature — but raw is not recommended? Wow. Unbelievable. They advocate foods that injure and destroy the health and lives of our pets. They advocate feeding foods that have massive recalls because of contamination. They need to learn to reason, to use logic, and to be objective. Thank goodness for people like Dr. Becker!

January 23, 2013

Health Practictioner Doing It Right

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Logic,Parenting,Philosophy,Science — Administrator @ 12:42 pm

Beginning “The Curse of No Symptoms,” Christian Wernstedt writes:

A frequent misunderstanding in the world of health is that having no symptoms equals health. This is not so. Symptoms are often the last thing to happen when the is suffering from malfunction. Being symptom free can be a curse, because there are no warning signs until something dramatic happens. [Editor's note. I whipped this up quickly so I'm sorry for grammar/spelling errors.]

After discussing, with technical exhibits/measurements, some systemic failures of an individual’s body functioning, Christian says:

He knows that the process will take time, probably years. Repairing tissue and re-growing bone takes time, but he is also certain of a couple of big picture ideas about health and aging:

  1. What people call “aging” is often not aging at all. It is the resulting degeneration that comes from chronic exposure to things like food sensitivity, infections, and toxicity which gradually erode the health of the body.
  2. Being free of symptoms, whether it is because of symptom suppressing medications or because of one’s body, for one reason or another, not producing noticeable symptoms (yet), is a dangerous proposition. (Who knows, if the H Pylori and digestive issues hadn’t been discovered, our guy might suffer a “sudden” fracture a couple of decades in the future, or his teeth might begin to fall out of his mouth, or he might develop cancer because of a lack of proper nutrition.) [Editor's note: On the last point, read up on Bruce Ames' triage theory of aging.]

Bottom line: Disease prevention and functional investigation of one’s body should ideally start long before one ever experiences symptoms.

This is the way health should be dealt with. Another win for Aristotle and Hippocrates over Plato.

Dysbiosis in Pets

Filed under: Animals,Biology,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Science — Administrator @ 12:41 pm

Some cats and dogs have gut problems and “leaky gut,” just as some people do. Dr. Becker talks about the causes, symptoms, and care of it in “Dysbiosis: The Root Cause of Many Other Pet Health Problems.” She writes:

Dysbiosis treatment involves addressing food allergies and intolerances, as well as any underlying nutritional deficiencies caused by malabsorption or inefficient digestion. Appropriate probiotics, enzymes, and nutraceuticals must be prescribed to help reduce inflammation in the GI tract.

Probiotics are an extremely important part in the treatment of dysbiosis. They reseed your pet’s gut with good bacteria and prevent an overgrowth of bad bacteria, which returns the intestine and mucosal lining to good health.
…
In general, removing highly processed, high-stress foods from a sick pet’s diet in favor of a balanced species-appropriate, low-stress diet, plus appropriate supplements to address inflammation and yeast, if necessary, and support of other organ systems including the liver and pancreas, can relieve symptoms, address the root cause of the leaky gut, and get the pet on the road to recovery.

© Copyright 1997-2013 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved.

January 18, 2013

Learning Problems?

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Education,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Homeschooling,Parenting,Psychology,Science — Tags: — Administrator @ 1:16 pm

Is your child having learning or behavioral problems? The issue could be the grains in his or her diet. Read “A Gluten for Punishment: the Whole Grain Assault on Health” (12-5-12) by Nathan Daley, MD, MPH for more information.

An excerpt:

Individuals with the silent version of the disease are just as likely (or even more likely) as those with symptomatic celiac disease to develop or have osteoporosis, lymphoma of the small bowel, and other autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis (hypothyroidism), and perhaps even dementia[2],[3],[4],[5],[6],[7],[8].

Additionally, certain symptoms or disorders like constipation and bloating, diarrhea, gastroesophageal reflux, fatigue, depression, skin rashes, muscle aches and muscle damage, neuropathy (nerve dysfunction, especially motor and sensory dysfunction), migraine headaches, seizures, kidney disease (IgA nephropathy), type I diabetes, infertility, and mouth sores may be present but medical providers may fail to suspect an association with gluten[9],[10],[11],[12],[13],[14],[15],[16],[17],[18].

January 15, 2013

Scientific Analysis

Filed under: Culture,Education,Homeschooling,Logic,Science — Administrator @ 3:00 pm

Here is what we should be learning to do in school. As it is now, unfortunately, students are told pre-digested ideas; they are not informed how the ideas were developed; principles like Newton’s laws of motion are presented as commandments; abstract, complex ideas in biology are, to students learning them, empty words to memorize. Students should be taught how an idea derives from the evidence of the senses and what chain of reasoning was used to develop it. (Teachers should push back (as much as possible; they should not jeopardize their jobs or career or family) on the philosophic ideas and values requiring them to teach Platonically. If we had only private schools, their job would be much easier and their teaching much better.)

A good example of how to think is found in Dr. Becker’s “Study Results Can Sometimes Be Misleading” (December 12, 2012). She writes:

As soon as the University of Illinois study was published, online media outlets picked it up and ran articles with headlines like: “High-protein diet may be unhealthy for kittens,” and “High-protein diet not so good for kitty’s belly. Kittens fed a high protein diet have less beneficial gut bacteria than those who eat a more balanced diet.” 2
…
The biggest factor to consider is that the two diets used in the study were, unfortunately, dry food formulas, which means they were seriously deficient in a nutrient felines MUST get from their diet — moisture. We also know most dry pet foods are cooked twice: once when the protein is rendered (turned into meal), and a second time when the kibbled mixture is extruded to form small, crunchy nuggets. This extreme processing also changes the structure of proteins and destroys vitamin A, vitamin E and the B-group vitamins, at a minimum.

Next we have to wonder about the protein source used in the dry food diets. It was unnamed in the study abstract, so we don’t know whether the food contained animal protein, a less biologically appropriate protein (for example, from a plant), or a combination. Generally speaking, dry pet food made with animal protein contains rendered meat by-products, which are more difficult for pets to digest than human grade meat.

(more…)

January 11, 2013

Not Only People; Animals in General

Filed under: Animals,Biology,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Science — Administrator @ 1:21 pm

More evidence for inducing and integrating that what we need are a species-appropriate diet and exercise.

In “Why are So Many Pet Owners Allowing Their Companions to Get Fat?” (July 06, 2012), Dr. Becker writes:

Banfield Pet Hospital recently released their State of Pet Health 2012 Report, and the news isn’t good. In fact, it’s extremely troubling.

Chronic diseases in cats and dogs have risen dramatically over the last five years.

The report is a compilation of medical data from about 2 million dogs and over 400,000 cats that visited a Banfield hospital in 2011. Some of the disturbing findings:

Overweight and obesity increased in dogs by 37 percent, and in cats by a stunning 90 percent
Arthritis increased 38 percent in dogs and 67 percent in cats
Almost half of arthritic dogs and more than a third of arthritic cats are also overweight
Nearly half of diabetic dogs and cats are overweight
Forty percent of dogs with hypertension and 60 percent with hypothyroidism are overweight

The data set is limited, but Banfield is big. But maybe since it is big it gets a different clientele than other vets? They seem conventional, too; Dr. Becker’s clinic would not be like this: her pet patients get better and her clients would generally be more health-conscious. But, she is rare — unfortunately!!

Not sure if the data is representative of US or of developed countries or not, but from my general knowledge, it seems generally representative of the culture and yearly changes in health status.

Not sure how they classify, either, and classification is a determinant of the stats.

She then points out something that is the same for people as for dogs and cats:

(more…)

January 8, 2013

Another Reason We Need Training in Science

Filed under: Animals,Biology,Child Development,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Parenting,Science — Administrator @ 6:24 pm

Taking an integrated, inductive view of pet health, Dr. Becker writes in (“More Veterinary Nutritionists Endorse Grain-Based Dog Food,” December 05, 2012):

And then there’s the problem of not connecting the dots when an animal develops health problems seemingly unrelated to digestion, for example, skin allergies. Poor coat condition and itchy, dry, flaky skin is often related to a diet deficient in omega-3 essential fatty acids and micronutrients, but most pet parents and vets don’t make the connection.

So there are a lot of nutrition-related health problems that aren’t treated as such when they crop up. In addition, it can take several years for more serious symptoms of low-grade, species-inappropriate or unbalanced nutrition to appear.

Your pet’s body is resilient. Her organs will attempt to compensate when her body isn’t receiving the type of nutrition nature designed her to eat. So for a number of years, it can appear as though all is well on the outside, while things are slowly deteriorating on the inside. Those overworked organs can’t be counted on indefinitely – they will eventually wear out.
…

As for “treating disease through diets” … the goal should be preventing disease through biologically appropriate nutrition that replicates the animal’s natural diet. In my opinion, most commercial pet foods on the market today create or contribute to the diseases so many pets suffer from.

© Copyright 1997-2013 Dr. Joseph Mercola. All Rights Reserved.

The same principle applies to humanity. We need to nourish our children and ourselves properly so we can learn properly, be calm, and be healthy.

January 5, 2013

Science Is for Practice 2

Filed under: Animals,Biology,Horses,Logic,Science — Administrator @ 1:06 pm

In the Q&A “Why Should Horses Be Barefoot,” Jaime Jackson said:

The biology of Equus Caballus, the result of 1.4 million years of natural selection, demands that we work with its nature — not against it. The equine species is genuinely adapted to go barefoot. It is only through human ignorance of the horse’s natural state that led us to the incorrect, and harmful, conclusion that shoes are necessary — or useful. They aren’t, and, moreover, contribute significantly to the lameness we see everywhere around the world.

(c) by AANHCP

To understand how horses should be taken care of, we must understand what a horse is, and to do that, we need to look at it in nature and in history. But to do this, we need to have a proper view of science, reasoning, and logic, all of which start, not with convention, but with the evidence of the senses.

Picture from Wikipedia.

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