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The Danger of Milk

Caine said:
Hey its "evolution"

No. It's a genetic abnormality. It wasn't in response to enivronmental pressures. And we can't "evolve" to requiring milk from a different species. :doh
 
Kelzie said:
No. It's a genetic abnormality. It wasn't in response to enivronmental pressures. And we can't "evolve" to requiring milk from a different species. :doh

It was a joke!!!!!!
 
Kelzie said:
No. It's a genetic abnormality. It wasn't in response to enivronmental pressures. And we can't "evolve" to requiring milk from a different species. :doh

Sure we can, and as long as the world has chocolate, we must!
 
Kelzie said:
No. It's a genetic abnormality. It wasn't in response to enivronmental pressures. And we can't "evolve" to requiring milk from a different species. :doh


Okay, I'll start here.

It's an adaptation, is all. It's evolution in action, and where's this word "require" sneak in? It doesn't belong. What the new digestive enzyme does is enable individuals to take advantage of a new food source, which always confers a survival advantage.

My wife is half asian, but she grew up eating a lot of cheese in Paris. As did all her siblings. She clearly inherited the enzyme.

I'm as European as can be. In recent years milk has occasionally disagreed with me. What can you say.

My kids are weird. They drink milk, or water. I have never managed to get orange juice or any other drink down their throat. As far as I'm concerned, I'm blessed.

What bother's me about milk isn't the milk itself. Homo sapiens' success in populating all the niches on the planet is a result of his omnivorous heritage. Milk in does no harm.

At least I'd be happy with that last statement if they fed the cows food, and not hormones. Chickens, too. I think I'm starting to become a fan of organic food, and that's scary.

What's next? Garden burgers?
 
Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Okay, I'll start here.

It's an adaptation, is all. It's evolution in action, and where's this word "require" sneak in? It doesn't belong. What the new digestive enzyme does is enable individuals to take advantage of a new food source, which always confers a survival advantage.

My wife is half asian, but she grew up eating a lot of cheese in Paris. As did all her siblings. She clearly inherited the enzyme.

I'm as European as can be. In recent years milk has occasionally disagreed with me. What can you say.

My kids are weird. They drink milk, or water. I have never managed to get orange juice or any other drink down their throat. As far as I'm concerned, I'm blessed.

What bother's me about milk isn't the milk itself. Homo sapiens' success in populating all the niches on the planet is a result of his omnivorous heritage. Milk in does no harm.

At least I'd be happy with that last statement if they fed the cows food, and not hormones. Chickens, too. I think I'm starting to become a fan of organic food, and that's scary.

What's next? Garden burgers?

Actually, milk does quite a bit of harm. Because we're not meant to drink it.

Did you read the beginning of the thread? Heard of the Harvard Nurses Study? Countries that drink the most milk have the highest rate of osteoperosis. That's right kids. "Drink milk for healthy bones" was a big fat lie. By the way, the countries with the lowest level of osteoperosis drink almost no milk.

There's another study that hasn't been concluded. Called the China study I think. Looks like it's going to show that casein in milk is what turns on a lot of cancers, which is why the US has such a high rate of cancer.

Still think milk is an "adaption"?

And ps., milk drinking in children is linked to an increase in ear and nasal infections.
 
Yep, it's still an adaptation. There's no divine guidance on evolution. An adaptation to one environmental variable doesn't mean perfection.

Barbequeing a steak introduces all sorts of nasty potential carcinogens into the food, but damn if they don't taste GOOD! No one denies that cow slices aren't a natural part of our diet. It's part of our evolutionary heritage.

A person MAY suffer increase risk of osteoporosis when he's seventy if his early childhood contained a lot of cow juice.

He'll die a heck of a lot sooner if all he has available is milk and cheese but lacks the enzymes to digest it.

Oh, and the problem with osteoporosis is that the evolutionary process can't select for events that happen after the animal passes child-bearing age. You hit menopause, and you're off the program, except where the presence of long-lived grandparents can assist in the survival of their own descendants. And we're the only species where grand-parents have a role.
 
Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Yep, it's still an adaptation. There's no divine guidance on evolution. An adaptation to one environmental variable doesn't mean perfection.

Barbequeing a steak introduces all sorts of nasty potential carcinogens into the food, but damn if they don't taste GOOD! No one denies that cow slices aren't a natural part of our diet. It's part of our evolutionary heritage.

A person MAY suffer increase risk of osteoporosis when he's seventy if his early childhood contained a lot of cow juice.

He'll die a heck of a lot sooner if all he has available is milk and cheese but lacks the enzymes to digest it.

Oh, and the problem with osteoporosis is that the evolutionary process can't select for events that happen after the animal passes child-bearing age. You hit menopause, and you're off the program, except where the presence of long-lived grandparents can assist in the survival of their own descendants. And we're the only species where grand-parents have a role.


Nooo...the problem of osteoperosis is that animal proteins leach calcium from your bones. Which is why drinking more milk leads to greater bone loss. And your risk factors for osteoperosis are set in your teenage years. Not after menopause.

And at no point was all prehistoric man had available "milk and cheese". It's not an adaption. It's an abnormality.

Lions have evolved to eat meat. They do it perfectly. They have short intestinal tracts to limit the amount of time carcinogenic meat is present in their bodies. Their cholesterol level doesn't rise when they eat saturated fats. Why would our body evolve to be able to eat something that was harmful to us? It wouldn't.
 
Kelzie said:
Nooo...the problem of osteoperosis is that animal proteins leach calcium from your bones. Which is why drinking more milk leads to greater bone loss. And your risk factors for osteoperosis are set in your teenage years. Not after menopause.

Doesn't matter. Osteoporosis isn't a concern until years later. You have to live long enough to get the problem before it's important.

Kelzie said:
And at no point was all prehistoric man had available "milk and cheese". It's not an adaption. It's an abnormality.

You need to work on your understanding of evolution and the concept of adaptation. Also, your use of the word "abnormality" is also inappropriate in an evolutionary context. It's "trait".

I wasn't talking about any specific historical context, I was discussing a hypothetical situation to show that long term effects aren't as important as short term realities.

Another example: DDT is a potential carcinogen. Should we continue the ban on DDT when DDT is one of the best anti-mosquito agents available? The consequences of DDT use shall be limited for discussion purposes to only potential increases in cancer rates in human populations and deaths by malaria borne by mosquitos. Three million people die annually because of malaria. What do you think they would prefer, and their parents, death this year because of malaria, or the chance of death twenty years from now by
cancer?

Everyone I know would rather risk getting sick from cancer later.

The person with the milk-digesting enzyme can make that choice. The person without it cannot. And there are situations where the calories and protein from milk are important dietary components. The Masai tribesmen of Africa live with their cattle, they practically sleep with them.


Kelzie said:
Lions have evolved to eat meat. They do it perfectly. They have short intestinal tracts to limit the amount of time carcinogenic meat is present in their bodies. Their cholesterol level doesn't rise when they eat saturated fats. Why would our body evolve to be able to eat something that was harmful to us? It wouldn't.

Because we're not lions, we're killer apes. We evolved from bug-eating, berry-picking scavanger apes that needed calories of any kind to survive. We're generalists, not specialists, our digestive tracts aren't specialized to any one item, so we can find more to eat even if we're less efficient about processing it.
 
Scarecrow Akhbar said:
You need to work on your understanding of evolution and the concept of adaptation. Also, your use of the word "abnormality" is also inappropriate in an evolutionary context. It's "trait".

You know what they say. The person who starts slinging mud first has lost the debate. And it's a genetic mutation. And seeing as the vast minority of the world's population has this mutation, I stand by my word.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
I wasn't talking about any specific historical context, I was discussing a hypothetical situation to show that long term effects aren't as important as short term realities.

Another example: DDT is a potential carcinogen. Should we continue the ban on DDT when DDT is one of the best anti-mosquito agents available? The consequences of DDT use shall be limited for discussion purposes to only potential increases in cancer rates in human populations and deaths by malaria borne by mosquitos. Three million people die annually because of malaria. What do you think they would prefer, and their parents, death this year because of malaria, or the chance of death twenty years from now by
cancer?

Everyone I know would rather risk getting sick from cancer later.

This analogy makes no sense. The people that can digest the milk live in areas where they don't need the extra calories (N. America and W. Europe). The only way to make your analogy work is if there was no mosquitos. Now you have the choice of not dying now, or dying of cancer 20 years later. Which is it?

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
The person with the milk-digesting enzyme can make that choice. The person without it cannot. And there are situations where the calories and protein from milk are important dietary components. The Masai tribesmen of Africa live with their cattle, they practically sleep with them.

And yet, they are lactose intolerent. Point?


Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Because we're not lions, we're killer apes. We evolved from bug-eating, berry-picking scavanger apes that needed calories of any kind to survive. We're generalists, not specialists, our digestive tracts aren't specialized to any one item, so we can find more to eat even if we're less efficient about processing it.

Actual, the gene mutation occured thousands of years ago. A mere fraction of the time that humans have been evolving. Obviously, we didn't need the calories that badly.
 
Kelzie said:
You know what they say. The person who starts slinging mud first has lost the debate. And it's a genetic mutation. And seeing as the vast minority of the world's population has this mutation, I stand by my word.

Well, you haven't started to sling any mud yet, so you're still in the race. Meanwhile, I'll stand by my statement that you're not employing the correct definitions of the words. That is not mudslinging, at best it's an opportunity to clarify communication. And again, you seem to be using a word and attempting to charge it with negative connotations. Mutation or not, it's still an adaptation.

I could postulate that since european winters are harsher than elsewhere, then babies that could consume cow's milk were more likely to survive. But that's just guessing. You can point to the Arctic winters and the eskimos, I suppose, but they didn't have cows. No grass. Not only that, there's no saying that a adaptation peculiar to one place and circumstance must also arise in similar places and circumstances. Evolution doesn't work that way.

Kelzie said:
This analogy makes no sense. The people that can digest the milk live in areas where they don't need the extra calories (N. America and W. Europe).

I can't believe you're suggesting that the ability to absorb extra calories isn't an adaptational advantage. I fail to see the logic in anyone claiming that an increased ability to absorb calories is not a positive survival characteristic for any animal. Explain this.

Conditions change faster than characteristics. Overly specialized species, ie "efficient" ones, find themselves in trouble when the environment starts to exceed their adaptation. What would koala bears do if a virus started killing all the eucalyptus trees? How did the Irish fare when the fungal blight wrecked their potatoes?

As far as the "need" of extra calories is concerned, you're projecting your perceptions of current conditions onto earlier eras. African tribes to this day go raid termite mounds to collect the bugs because they need the protein.

Now, North America is not relevant to the discussion, the trait developed in Europe. Nor did the trait develop recently, after industrialized farming ended famine. It predated the invention of hay, even. The trait apparently developed in people living in the primitive conditions and the harsh climes of Northern Europe.

Kelzie said:
The only way to make your analogy work is if there was no mosquitos. Now you have the choice of not dying now, or dying of cancer 20 years later. Which is it?

Okay, forget the analogy. I can flip analogies out like a blackjack dealer in Vegas. All I'm trying to say is that milk has to be examined on a cost/benefit basis. Hemlock/no hemlock is a pretty clear choice. Milk isn't that clear-cut, and certainly when the digestive enzyme appeared none of the potential hazards of milk would have been apparent. Not only did they not live long enough for the alleged problems to occur, they lacked the ability to make the connection.

How this relates to the milk issue is that before the wonders of gasoline powered tractors, every once in a while crops would fail, the weather wouldn't cooperate, the arrows refused to hit the deer, and your babies would start to starve. People that were more efficient at absorbing milk were more likely to survive. The widespread presence of the enzyme in Northern European populations is a sure indication that the adaptation did have some usefulness, just like white skin.

Kelzie said:
And yet, they are lactose intolerent. Point?

They still drink the milk. They even mix it with cow blood as a special kind of pink Quik. Yuk. But drink it they do. They may be lactose intolerant, but they have to be drawing sustenance from the fats and proteins nonetheless. Recall what I said about similar circumstances not necessarily leading to similar results.

Kelzie said:
Actual, the gene mutation occured thousands of years ago. A mere fraction of the time that humans have been evolving. Obviously, we didn't need the calories that badly.

And the trait doesn't extend across then entire species, either. Needless to say, there's an enormous number of genetic anomalies from group to group.

And, to make things perfectly clear, I'm not necessarily disagreeing that milk isn't a potential hazard. Almost any food you can name taken in excess is. And certainly modern adults don't need to drink the stuff. But let's put it this way...what's easier, feeding a kid milk to meet his calcium requirements, or trying to stuff him full of spinach every night? I think I'm lucky that my girls like broccoli and hate soda, but there are limits to what they'll do.
 
Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Well, you haven't started to sling any mud yet, so you're still in the race. Meanwhile, I'll stand by my statement that you're not employing the correct definitions of the words. That is not mudslinging, at best it's an opportunity to clarify communication. And again, you seem to be using a word and attempting to charge it with negative connotations. Mutation or not, it's still an adaptation.

Course it's not. But telling me to "brush up" on my knowledge is. And you seem to have an unneccisarily negative connotation of the word abnormal. Curly hair is abnormal. Doesn't mean it's bad.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
I could postulate that since european winters are harsher than elsewhere, then babies that could consume cow's milk were more likely to survive. But that's just guessing. You can point to the Arctic winters and the eskimos, I suppose, but they didn't have cows. No grass. Not only that, there's no saying that a adaptation peculiar to one place and circumstance must also arise in similar places and circumstances. Evolution doesn't work that way.

I love it when somebody knows my point before I say it. :mrgreen: Cuts down on the time we spend hashing out our points. And it means, even if we disagree, we can understand where the other is coming from. And I never said evolution worked that way. Did you hear that elephants are evoloving to be born without tusks? I think that is...well, not cool really, but interesting.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
I can't believe you're suggesting that the ability to absorb extra calories isn't an adaptational advantage. I fail to see the logic in anyone claiming that an increased ability to absorb calories is not a positive survival characteristic for any animal. Explain this.

I'm not saying that. However, if we didn't need the ability in the first place, and the new item we are now able to digest causes more harm than good, I fail to see how you could continue to say we "evolved".

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Conditions change faster than characteristics. Overly specialized species, ie "efficient" ones, find themselves in trouble when the environment starts to exceed their adaptation. What would koala bears do if a virus started killing all the eucalyptus trees? How did the Irish fare when the fungal blight wrecked their potatoes?

Well...potatoes aren't native to Ireland anyway...but plenty of other civilizations have survived without the ability to drink milk.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
As far as the "need" of extra calories is concerned, you're projecting your perceptions of current conditions onto earlier eras. African tribes to this day go raid termite mounds to collect the bugs because they need the protein.

Like I said. It's not needed.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Now, North America is not relevant to the discussion, the trait developed in Europe. Nor did the trait develop recently, after industrialized farming ended famine. It predated the invention of hay, even. The trait apparently developed in people living in the primitive conditions and the harsh climes of Northern Europe.

It is dated to after humans started collecting herds of animals. Which was thousands of years ago. Again, fairly recently as far as the human line is concerned.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Okay, forget the analogy. I can flip analogies out like a blackjack dealer in Vegas. All I'm trying to say is that milk has to be examined on a cost/benefit basis. Hemlock/no hemlock is a pretty clear choice. Milk isn't that clear-cut, and certainly when the digestive enzyme appeared none of the potential hazards of milk would have been apparent. Not only did they not live long enough for the alleged problems to occur, they lacked the ability to make the connection.

Just because they didn't make the connection doesn't mean that natural selection didn't make the connection for them. Survival of the fittest doesn't require you to understand it to work. Some other things that milk causes:

Crohn's Disease
Asthma
Early Sexual Maturation
Early Breast Growth
Diabetes
Breast Cancer
Colon Cancer
Leukemia
ADD or ADHD
Prostate Cancer
Osteoporosis
Arthritis
Sinuses
Autoimmune Disease
Lung Cancer
Childhood Anemia
Diarrhea & Constipation

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
]How this relates to the milk issue is that before the wonders of gasoline powered tractors, every once in a while crops would fail, the weather wouldn't cooperate, the arrows refused to hit the deer, and your babies would start to starve. People that were more efficient at absorbing milk were more likely to survive. The widespread presence of the enzyme in Northern European populations is a sure indication that the adaptation did have some usefulness, just like white skin.

Milk is a mutation that hurts us now more.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
They still drink the milk. They even mix it with cow blood as a special kind of pink Quik. Yuk. But drink it they do. They may be lactose intolerant, but they have to be drawing sustenance from the fats and proteins nonetheless. Recall what I said about similar circumstances not necessarily leading to similar results.

Yeah. Yuck. But they're still lactose intolerant.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
And the trait doesn't extend across then entire species, either. Needless to say, there's an enormous number of genetic anomalies from group to group.

So anomaly is an okay word, but abnormality isn't? Picky, picky.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:
And, to make things perfectly clear, I'm not necessarily disagreeing that milk isn't a potential hazard. Almost any food you can name taken in excess is. And certainly modern adults don't need to drink the stuff. But let's put it this way...what's easier, feeding a kid milk to meet his calcium requirements, or trying to stuff him full of spinach every night? I think I'm lucky that my girls like broccoli and hate soda, but there are limits to what they'll do.

Anything in excess is bad, true. But the more milk you drink, the more calcium you need. Again milk=osteoperosis.
 
Kelzie said:
I'm not saying that. However, if we didn't need the ability in the first place, and the new item we are now able to digest causes more harm than good, I fail to see how you could continue to say we "evolved".

The thing to always keep in mind is that evolution isn't about longevity. It's about reproduction. All that's needed is for the animal to survive and produce offspring. If a trait that somehow enhances that survival kills the animal after the sperm is passed on, that's tough. Clearly it's better to be a female black widow than a male.

Kelzie said:
It is dated to after humans started collecting herds of animals. Which was thousands of years ago. Again, fairly recently as far as the human line is concerned.
Evolution isn't a static process. We're either an "intermediate" stage from what comes next, or a dead end.

Kelzie said:
Just because they didn't make the connection doesn't mean that natural selection didn't make the connection for them. Survival of the fittest doesn't require you to understand it to work. Some other things that milk causes:

Crohn's Disease
Asthma
Early Sexual Maturation
Early Breast Growth
Diabetes
Breast Cancer
Colon Cancer
Leukemia
ADD or ADHD
Prostate Cancer
Osteoporosis
Arthritis
Sinuses
Autoimmune Disease
Lung Cancer
Childhood Anemia
Diarrhea & Constipation

I'd argue with some of that. Specifically early puberty and development of girls. That phenomenon is more recent than milk drinking. I can remember when I was ten and twelve. The girls now are developing at ten when before they weren't starting until twelve. I think I've read somewhere that it isn't necessarily the milk itself but what they're feeding the cows.

I won't argue your list, but I will say that anytime before two hundred years ago, most children didn't live to the age of three or so, and so many of them wouldn't have been able to get those diseases, but those that were lucky enough to get milk at least were getting more calories before whooping cough, diptheria, and the measles killed them.


Kelzie said:
Milk is a mutation that hurts us now more.

No, most people still are past their reproducive prime when these things show up, so evolution doesn't care.


Kelzie said:
So anomaly is an okay word, but abnormality isn't? Picky, picky.

Anomaly: a deviation from a general rule

Abnormal: deviating from the normal or average.

Ya got me. Perhaps it's just me, but the word "abnormal" carries tones of social disapproval and negative connotations that don't ride with "anomaly".

Okay. Here's a question:

Milk is touted as the easy calcium source. What's the alternatives? I can't imagine feeding my kids strawberry Rolaids would be effective. :lol:
 
Scarecrow Akhbar said:
Okay. Here's a question:

Milk is touted as the easy calcium source. What's the alternatives? I can't imagine feeding my kids strawberry Rolaids would be effective. :lol:

But strawberry rolaids are so good! :lol: Kidding, I've never had them. I'm only responding to this because the rest of it was evolution sucks after you pass sexual maturity. Not much I can do about that. Except to tell you not to drink milk!

Anyway, other sources. Here's a serious source. I would have copied and pasted, but there's a whole chart thing going on, and maybe a hundred sources. So I figured you could just look for yourself. They also have milk on there for comparison. And some articles on why milk is evil (is it a vegan website you ask...okay, maybe). One thing to remember is that if you get calcium from a non-animal source, you need about half as much (400-600 mg instead of 1000mg...does that sound right? I'm sure there's an article about it on the site.)

http://www.soystache.com/calcium.htm

I'll give you some sources in case you don't wanna look.

soybeans
sesame seeds (have more calcium than milk actually)
pretty much all beans
dark leafy greens (arugula, dandelion, kale, mustard, spinach)
most tofus
 
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