The PRH (Personal Responsibility for Health) Chronicles: 3-Then and Now
David L. Katz, MD, MPH
CMO, Tangelo. Founder: Diet ID; True Health Initiative. Founding Director, Yale-Griffin PRC (1998-2019). Health Journalist. COVID Curmudgeon
Please also see The PRH Chronicles: 1-The Way We Were and The PRH Chronices: 2-The Way We Are
Mik-tal was left to wonder whether Bo-tu and the other hunters would return. One might wish for a Hollywood ending, a successful hunt, a satisfying resolution. A family happily reunited, a clan secure.
But even if Bo-tu returns, Mik-tal, Kanda and the others are no more assured than before of living happily ever after. In the world of our ancestors, life was a constant struggle, a constant state of uncertainty. If Bo-tu did return, some other hunter, with some other mate and some other child did not. Precarious in the predictable redundancies of occasional feast and persistent famine, survival was a contest sometimes won, often lost. And those that won did so in increments that themselves perpetuated uncertainty. One more generation would continue the struggle, and the uncertainty. Until the eons passed, the world changed, and the age of modern plenty arrived.
You may decide for yourself if Bo-tu returned. Truly what mattered then and consequently matters still is the uncertainty. Our ancestors, those that did survive, did not know any more certainly than those that did not (never to become ancestors), that they would overcome the hazards of their world. Everything of consequence was overshadowed by an uncertain supply of food. Every aspect of physiology and culture shaped itself around the overriding reality of life: enough food meant survival, too little, demise.
If Bo-tu returned, there was the chance that on some subsequent outing he would not. Mik-tal knew this all too well. She lived with this uncertainty, and in accordance with its harsh demands. And passed it along to her children. And they to theirs, through all the ages. Only by knowing Mik-tal’s endowment to us can we hope to meet the challenges of the modern world. Our efforts to find our way home begin by knowing where home is, and where we are now. Our efforts to achieve dietary health begin by knowing ourselves.
The human genome, the blueprint responsible for much of what we are, has not changed appreciably in 100,000 years. That takes us back to countless generations before Mik-tal and Bo-tu. Their genes are our genes. The implication is that their traits, their metabolism, their physiology are ours, too. Mik-tal and Bo-tu are Michelle and Peter; and Michelle and Peter are us.
-fin
-The PRH Chronicles will continue...
Dr. David L. Katz; www.davidkatzmd.com
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RN school nurse at Jennie Blake Elementary School
11 年Have you heard of redox signaling molecules? Helping your 25 trillion cells, balancing your body for health,stabilized in a bottle for the past 3 yrs, and studied for 17 yrs. amazining discovery even since when Penicillin was famous for what it did. Peggy RN, MPH, PNP
To state that the blueprint that is responsible for much of what we are has not changed appreciably in 100,000 is incomplete and incorrect. Of course, if one attempts to explain external phenomena strictly in terms of the sense (i.e. a materialistic point of view) one will typically fall into error on this topic. Consider how human beings came to feel (by degrees) and be conscious of the essence and power of the I; the human ego. This is most certainly an appreciable change! Of course, this began happening right around the 4th century, which also maps to changes in position of thought patterns, as well. Abstraction increasingly became a quality of concepts and ideas while concrete reality increasingly became nothing more than the external sense world...these two streams have persisted into modern times. One can easily map this to historical proofs. Of course, there have been several other appreciable changes, as well.
We have some of the same physiology but we humans are also very different than even humans from before 1348 (the black death). Some (not all of us) can consume unfermented cow and goat milk. That trait is only about 9000 years old which in evolutionary terms is like having a 4th generation iPhone. We have extra liver enzymes not because beer is awesome but because fermentation preserves both the nutrients of grain and makes water potable. Cro Magnons from 12000 years ago would have never been able to survive a toga party. Another false assumtion is that earlier humans spent their time almost starving to death. When you look at the few hunter and gatherers around today they view the idea of starving to death as something only stupid people do, because they have no division of labor. Sites excavated near Lascauex in France point to Neanderthals that lived in the area for 250,000 years or more not starving until the arrival of modern homo sapiens. We sometimes do not give our forbearers the credit they deserve for keeping us alive long enough to farm wheat, own dogs and other fruits of civilization.
Sr. Bio-Medical Engineer , Department of Maintenance at NHN National Healthcare Network
11 年It is a history of surviving .