Vicious Vacuous Vapid Vegetarian/Vegans

Wolves in vegetarian/vegan clothing

     Since vegetarians/vegans select themselves out of the general population, they are representative of same, and include the normal range of ill-educated, self-aggrandizing, abusive, intellectually and ethically challenged, as well as irrational behaviors as the masses.  Some present themselves as self-styled authorities on human diet, and steadfastly refuse to consider rational and scientifically-credible critiques of their public postings.  They refuse to correct their errors.
     This page is to identify and document these people, by their own public writings, who are an embarrassment to the vegetarian/vegan movement and cast a dark pall over the very concept of a plant-based diet.  Their primary, repeated offense is to make scientific, or scientific-sounding statements, in public as absolute truth - yet they can not substantiate their statements when challenged; thus, they demonstrate a complete lack of intellectual or ethical integrity.

 

     Recently, I have discovered a blatant conspiracy between Jeff Nelson, Dr. William Harris, MD and Steven Walsh, PhD, the owner and two prominent authors, of Vegsource.com, which claims to be a source of "Friendly support 25 hours per day, 8 days a week for your healthy vegetarian lifestyle."  
     They are apparently conspiring to publish false information, both in fact and logic, about raw vegan diets and they refuse to respond to valid constructive criticism of articles published on that website in a professional or honest manner. They refuse to engage in public discussion or provide the public with alternative points of view on these issues.  
     The following lofty statement, that is intended to create the illusion of honesty and fairness: "In the years we've operated VegSource, we've received plenty of comments and criticism, and we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website.  It's a process of learning." has been proven to be totally false.  Their collective behavior that includes false accusations, personal pejoratives, distortions of my e-mails, and their collective refusal to respond to important issues I raise in an intellectually-honest manner is quite characteristic of that of ideologues who do not have the honesty or courage to engage in honest discussion.
     This from "people" holding themselves out to the public to be vegetarian/vegan educators, experts in human nutrition, yet they refuse to correct their factual or logical errors, and refuse to engage in honest dialog.
     They have taken a collective position that a raw diet, which our species evolved on, just as every other species of Life on this planet continues to evolve on, is inadequate for the human species.  Thus, they are collectively asserting, without the slightest bit of scientific or rational support, that Nature is wrong!
     One can only wonder what their motives are.  Wonder -- because they will not respond!

=====

And, more unsolicited evidence of the less-than-ethical tenor of Nelson, et. al.

To: laurie@ecologos.org
Subject: vegsource
Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 20:34:32 -0700

Laurie,

My husband and I (and others) have had dreadful experiences with jeff nelson and his crew.
Not of the nature of yours, just down to earth customer service issues.
"Friendly service 25 hours a day 8 days a week." Not!

Just fyi.
C..., J..., R...& L...

A critique of:

Raw vs. Cooked

by

William Harris, MD

     On AUG 10, 2002, I sent Jeff Nelson, founder of Vegsource.com, this site where the grossly inaccurate Harris article disparaging raw foods and raw fooders is posted, an e-mail saying: "In keeping with your stated policy: 'In the years we've operated VegSource, we've received plenty of comments and criticism, and we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website.  It's a process of learning.', I suggest that you add the following commentary to "Raw vs. Cooked" by William Harris, MD.
     The answer arrived AUG 28

JN>  "Hi Laurie: I did get it earlier but have been quite busy.  I'm not going to append this to Dr. Harris' article.  First of all, that's his article, not someone else's.  Secondly, you make a number of incorrect assumptions about Dr. Harris and his background and qualifications, and you do so in a disparaging tone which I find inappropriate.  If you have comments for Dr. Harris, my suggestion would be to write him directly to share them.   Jeff"

     To which I replied: "I did not make any assumptions, I got that information off the Internet, and the truth can never be a "disparagement".  Most importantly, Harris makes several fundamental errors in his claims about science, biochemistry, and -he- disparages raw food experimenters with ignorant prejudice.  It is a travesty that your scientific standards are not such to require accurate statements about scientific principles.
     Sure, I'll write him, what's his address??"

=====
And then, on SEP 2:

JN>> I'm not going to append this to Dr. Harris' article. First of all,
JN>> that's his article, not someone else's.
     It does not have to be "appended"; but it should be made available to the public to point out the gross errors and biases in it, to conform with your stated policy: "we've received plenty of comments and criticism, and we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website.  It's a process of learning."
     It can be made available as a critique, rebuttal, or simply a different point of view from someone who, quite unlike Harris, has a detailed conceptual and experiential understanding of the topic.  What it is called is immaterial -- the important issue is to present a more reasonable and accurate conceptual model to the public.
     As the operator of a website that presents to the public dietary information substantially different from the "orthodox" paradigm, and with your apparent knowledge that the average person dies decades earlier than necessary, and that most human diseases are caused by the fact that the public has not been given accurate information about diet, it would seem to me that you have an ethical obligation to be very careful about the credibility of the content of your pages, and to correct errors per your stated policy, above.  Do you agree?  I am giving you this opportunity; we are both on the same side here: win-win, remember?
     If, however, you and Harris have some inherent prejudice against the very concept of raw food, in spite of the fact that ALL species of Life on this planet, including our own, EVOLVED on a totally raw diet, then I'd appreciate an honest admission of that fact and this should also be made public on your site.  I am trying to support your claimed "process of learning", and part of learning is presenting scientifically-credible information, refining one's understanding, and the willful correcting of errors.

JN>>  Secondly, you make a number of incorrect assumptions about Dr.
JN>>  Harris and his background and qualifications,
     This information comes from the Internet, and there may indeed by more than one Dr. Harris; since you know him personally, you, or he, could supply the correct details.  I notice that his "background and qualifications" are not presented in his section of your site, or did I miss them??  If they are on your site, please provide a link.

JN>>... and you do so in a disparaging tone which I find inappropriate.
     Fine, why don't you point out ALL instances of the "disparaging tone", and I will alter the wording to suit your particular style.  It is important to deal honestly with the content, and I will happily adjust the form to your standards.
     Laurie

=====

And on SEP 6:

Dr Harris

     I have attempted to communicate with Jeff Nelson and asked him to make available a rational critique of your article: "Raw vs. Cooked" that appears on his site.
     He has refused and used false statements and/or his own misunderstanding as a basis for his refusal; this in direct contradiction to his stated ethic: "In the years we've operated VegSource, we've received plenty of comments and criticism, and we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website. It's a process of learning."
     He gave me your e-mail address, and side-stepped the ethical issues involved by suggesting I contact you directly.
     So, would you be so kind as to correct any error(s) concerning your background (since this is not on VegSource) and write a line-by-line commentary on my critique at http://www.ecologos.org/harris.htm?
     Many thanks...
     Laurie

=====

     Apparently the above quote of Jeff's " ... we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website.  It's a process of learning" has been demonstrated to be false.  Stay tuned...

=====

SEP 8 to WH

----- Original Message -----
From: "William Harris" vegidoc@compuserve.com
To: "Laurie" laurie.@the-beach.net
Cc: "Bob Avery" rwavery@juno.com; "Jeff Nelson" jnelson@vegsource.com
Sent: Saturday, September 07, 2002 9:12 PM
Subject: a rational critique of Raw vs Cooked

LF>>     I have attempted to communicate with Jeff Nelson and asked him
>> to make available a rational critique of your article: "Raw vs. Cooked"
>> that appears on his site.
>>     He has refused and used false statements and/or his own
>> misunderstanding as a basis for his refusal; this in direct
>> contradiction to his stated ethic: "In the years we've operated
>> VegSource, we've received plenty of comments and criticism,
>> and we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve
>> ourselves and/or our website.  It's a process of learning."
>>     He gave me your e-mail address, and side-stepped the ethical
>> issues involved by suggesting I contact you directly.
>>     So, would you be so kind as to correct any error(s) concerning
>> your background (since this is not on VegSource) and write a
>> line-by-line commentary on my critique at
>> http://www.ecologos.org/harris.htm?
>> Many thanks...
>> Laurie

***********

WH> I appreciate neither the ad hominem tone ...
     There is NO "ad hominem tone", just a presentation of facts and logical counter-arguments to the many errors, and your collective insults to raw fooders and the very concept of raw foods.  However, it is a common, self-disparaging, and shoddily-evasive tactic to feign non-existing insults from others in order to avoid honestly dealing with the content of the constructive criticism.  I am not fooled by such juvenile trickery.
     If, OTOH, you would be so kind as to provide a list of quotes that you claim are "ad hominem" with supporting reasons, then I will be able to respond to specifics and modify the verbiage if you make a reasonable case on a point-by-point basis, but your blanket, unsupported, false accusations are not in the interests of honest communication or intellectual integrity.

WH>... nor the substance of your syntactical seizure at ...
WH> http://www.ecologos.org/harris.htm
     Now WHO is employing "ad hominem"??

WH> ... and see no reason why Jeff should put it up at Vegsource ...
     Why??  To be consistent with his, as yet to be demonstrated, claimed ethic: "... we've received plenty of comments and criticism, and we've always looked at it as a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website. It's a process of learning."  So far, his lofty ethical proclamation has been disturbingly false.

WH> ... or why I should answer it.
     It is simply a matter of intellectual and professional integrity, and I am somewhat surprised that this must be explained to you; but since you asked...
     You, Jeff, and VegSource, hold yourselves out to the public as some sort of authority on human diet/nutrition, yet in your "Raw vs. Cooked" article you made several sweeping, pejorative, totally-unsupported, incorrect statements and implications about raw-fooders, simple biochemistry, and the very concept of raw foods itself; which, by the way, our species EVOLVED ON, as did ALL species of Life on this planet.  You did not even attempt present the slightest bit of support for your numerous erroneous claims.  I am simply asking that you present scientifically-credible support for your claims; or, failing that, be honest enough to politely withdraw your unsupportable and prejudicial claims from public view; this, I believe, is the standard in polite academic discourse.  A little apology to the public might be in order, too.
     To refuse to correct your errors, or provide scientifically-credible support for your claims would be simply dishonest.  All this should be quite obvious, but thank you for asking; if you need further explanation, please ask.

WH> If you had bothered to read to the bottom of my article at:
WH> http://www.vegsource.com/harris/raw_vs_cooked.htm
     Now, you are claiming magical powers of mental telepathy by falsely stating that you know what I read, or did not read; and this from a physicist-MD??
     I submit that you have no such powers.

WH> ... or to comprehend the graph ...
     Oh yes, the graph.  This in itself reveals that you do not comprehend the concept of calories; in fact, the concept is universally misused and is intentionally misleading in orthodox nutribabble.  I did not comment of the falsity of this graph to spare you additional embarrassment; that clearly was an error, which I hereby correct.
     If you would like to refute this analysis with facts and logic, not false accusations and ad hominems, please do so.  You will fail; in fact you will not even try.
     It would seem to me that a real physicist should be able to comprehend the calorie concept, and, simultaneously, that all nutrients are NOT burned to completion in high-pressure oxygen; the latter being how the "calorie content" of "foods" is determined.  Clearly, burning things in pure, high-pressure oxygen and human digestive biochemistry are quite different chemical processes.  Clear, at least to those who have some fundamental grounding in chemistry.
     And, your false statement about my ability to "comprehend the graph" is in itself an ad hominem, so apparently you participate in that which you falsely accuse others of doing.  Again you invoke your falsely-claimed powers of mental telepathy to allege to know what I do, and do not, "comprehend"; what arrogance!  Is there any mystery why the public perceives MD's generally to be arrogant, narcissistic, self-appointed demigods?
     I understand the graph perfectly, but it is based on misinformation and your personal, profound misunderstanding about calories. 
     It makes as much sense to try to classify and/or quantify "foods" by their density, color, refractive index, shape, electrical conductivity, pH, heat capacity, tensile strength, compressive modulus, sheer modulus, melting point, boiling point, thermal conductivity, dielectric constant, absorption spectra, dipole moment, optical rotation, solubility, surface tension, thermal expansion, vapor pressure, viscosity, reaction kinetics, or any other -totally irrelevant- physical property as their "calorie content".  Calories are totally irrelevant to nutrition since ALL nutrients are NOT utilized to produce heat.  QED.  This is simple high school physics!

WH> ...you would realize that I endorse the raw vegan diet,
     IF you had read my logical analysis of your shoddy, pejorative article, YOU would realize that I commented on exactly that point.  Again, your falsely-claimed ability of mental telepathy has been proven to be a lie.

WH> ... just not your particular catechism of convictions.
     You have NO idea what MY convictions are, other than those stated rather clearly in my critique, which you are assiduously avoiding; again your mental telepathy has failed miserably.  I HAVE presented some of my "convictions" in my critique, and you have willfully failed to respond to them in an honest way concomitant with normal standards of professional and intellectual integrity.  You have even failed to be polite.

WH> As for my background you can find it at: http://www.vegsource.com/harris/bio.htm
     Well, this proves that Jeff Nelson's statement: "... you make a number of incorrect assumptions about Dr. Harris and his background and qualifications..." is an egregious and self-serving lie.  I stated quite correctly that you have a degree in Physics and an MD.

WH> Don't bother writing back unless you first read the other articles at:
WH> http://www.vegsource.com/harris/
     What, indeed, does this command have to do with your avoiding an intellectually-honest discussion about the misleading, pejorative, and false concepts in your "Raw vs. Cooked" article??  Nothing!
     After you have demonstrated a reasonable level of professional and intellectual integrity by politely responding to the issues I have raised in my critique: i.e. rebutting them in a scientifically-credible manner or politely withdrawing them from public view, then I will be very happy to write a critique of all the other articles for you; and then you may respond to them, as well.  But, first things first.

     I am not surprised that you Cc: Bob Avery in your e-mail.
     Avery has, by his public behavior over the years, consistently shown himself to be a particularly dishonest, raw-food zealot who has totally abandoned intellectual integrity; worse, his irrational and highly erroneous public writings taint, denigrate, and embarrass the whole raw food community.  People like him are responsible for the pejorative term, "raw-food crazies" seen in vegetarian/vegan forums.  He compulsively makes scientific statements, or statements about scientific principles he obviously does not understand, that are totally false and demonstrate that he could not pass an 8th grade science quiz.  He consistently fails to even try to support his erroneous claims when challenged (sound familiar?), yet he steadfastly persists in propagating the same erroneous nutribabble incessantly in every forum he haunts.
     I have publicly challenged him for SEVERAL YEARS on some of the more ridiculous concepts he compulsively posts to discussion forums, including: "Brix = nutritional quality"; "living enzymes"; his frequent public endorsements of Howell's crackpot book about "living enzymes" -- published, not surprisingly, by the Avery Publishing Company; and time-sequenced, triangularly-concentric, non-mixing, individually-and-sequentially digested -layers- of food in the stomach, and he NEVER presents the slightest bit of scientifically-credible support when challenged.  "Birds of a feather ...", indeed.
     So, again, I am politely asking you to respond to all the points in my critique in a polite, detailed manner, consistent with contemporary standards of intellectual and professional integrity, while considering the permanent damage that you will do to your reputation and credibility if you continue to insult me, falsely claim to be telepathic, or refuse to respond.
     The public deserves an honest debate on these important issues.
     Do have the intellectual integrity necessary to participate in "a potential opportunity to improve ourselves and/or our website.  It's a process of learning.", or are you really admitting that your public writing is so weak that it can not stand the scrutiny of an honest public discussion?

     Laurie

NOTE: as of April 2005, there has been NO response to my emails or critique.

The critique:

     First, Harris has a degree in a real science, physics, and also is an MD.  Most MD's have either no background in nutrition whatsoever, or, worse, if they do, it is very brief indoctrination in the animal-product Big Four model.  Since the medical industry is not concerned with optimum human health, it does not research same; rather, it focuses on developing unique, patentable, always-toxic, synthetic chemicals that have never been in human biochemistry during our evolutionary process, and this is the reason for their ever-present, multiple 'side-effects' that include severe pathologies and even death.  In addition, the medical industry's own conservative figures indicate that it kills ~250,000 people in the US per year, and is the third leading cause of death.  Therefore, his medical background is totally irrelevant to discussing the optimally-healthy human diet.  Further, Harris has no personal experience with a raw-food diet, so he is totally unqualified to discuss it either on a theoretical or experiential basis, as his article clearly demonstrates.

     WH: "Raw food enthusiasts have always been a part of the vegetarian/vegan scene. Their core idea is that enzymes are still active in raw food whereas they're denatured, hence inactive, in cooked food. No contest."
     Although -some- people mistakenly believe in the self-digesting food concept, it is unfair and prejudicial to slur the entire raw food movement by claiming this is "their core idea".  This concept apparently started with a Dr Edward Howell, MD, in the early half of the last century, and was propagated by the Hippocrates Health Institute; however, other schools supporting raw foods have not mentioned this concept, so it is certainly not "their core idea".  In fact, there is no "they"; raw-fooders have widely differing diets, just as cooked-fooders do.

     WH: "Cooking is a form of predigestion in which heat is used to hydrolyze nutrients which would otherwise be hydrolyzed at body temperature by digestive enzymes. The end result is the same, ..."
     The end result is certainly not "the same", and no evidence to support this claim is given.  In fact, one can readily feel the difference between eating the same meal raw or cooked, after some initial stabilization on a raw diet is accomplished.
     Further, the orthodox biochemical and nutritional literature clearly indicate that the high temperatures of cooking reduces the bioavailability of nutrients, denature proteins and thus disrupt the normal stepped sequence of protein digestion, cause cross-linking of molecules, create Maillard Reaction chemicals not found in the original food, create dozens or hundreds of other non-nutritive or toxic compounds by pyrolysis, and create some of the most potent carcinogens known, nitrosamines, by the cooking of animal protein/fat.  These facts are always ignored in anti-raw propaganda.
     Digestion of dozens of nutrients is much more complex than simple "hydrolysis".  If it were simple "hydrolysis" (splitting by water), then we would not need -dozens- of reaction-specific enzymes in various locations in the body to support digestion, transport, and assimilation into the cells.  Cooking can not be considered 'digestion' or 'pre-digestion' from a biochemical point of view.
     The famous Pottenger Cat Experiment, demonstrates that the "end result" is certainly NOT the same, and anyone can verify this experientially in their own diet.

     WH: "Pro: Humans are the only species on the planet who cook their food, so cooking is unnatural..
     WH: Con: We're also the only species that build computers and write treatises. That's unnatural, too."
     This kind of sophomoric, prejudicial foolishness does not deserve a reply.

     WH: "Pro: We've only been cooking for a half million years so we're not well adapted to cooked food.
     WH: Con: On the other hand, one recent author suggested ..."
     The "recent authors" were writing in Current Anthropology, and unsupported anthropological speculation is simply not related to a rational discussion as to whether our species could "adapt" to cooked foods.  The increase in personal health experienced by people actually experimenting with a raw diet clearly indicates that no such 'adaptation' took place, just as the increase in health of meat-eaters, or dairy-eaters, who stop eating same indicates that our species did not 'adapt' to flesh-eating, or dairy consumption, as is also falsely claimed by anthropologists.  Anthropologists are simply not qualified to discuss genetic mechanisms or biochemistry, so they just make things up to fit their own cultural prejudices.

     WH: "Pro: A raw vegan diet rather reliably leads to weight loss and that would be great for the 30% of Americans who are either overweight or obese.
      WH: Con: What happens to the people who are already raw fooders but continue to lose weight from reduced Calorie intake?"
     The human species -evolved- on a totally raw diet until the recent past; nothing unhealthy happens to all the other millions of species of Life on this planet that have also evolved on totally raw foods.  The implication is unfounded in fact and intentionally prejudicial.
     A raw diet is not necessarily equated with a "reduced Calorie intake"; there is no evidence that people stabilized on a raw diet get too thin, any more than any other ape on its natural raw diet gets too thin.  This unsupported, pejorative implication, disguised as an unanswered question, is simply the cultural prejudice of an overweight person.
     In fact, looking at nutrient tables indicates that foods that can be eaten raw is much closer to real human nutritional needs than any "food" that must be cooked.

     WH: "Further food limitations on a raw diet: A raw diet places even further restrictions on the vegan diet. Among the first dietary restrictions would be grains."
     This statement is patently false, there are no raw or vegan restrictions concerning grains; people commonly sprout them and eat them raw.
     There are, however, serious scientific concerns about the consumption of grains (grass seeds), which are clearly NOT a 'natural' food for our species, but, rather, the result of very recent human cultivation.  They include excessive calories/starch, allergic reactions, enzyme inhibitors, anti-nutrients, and addictive opioid-containing gluten proteins.

     WH: "People have been pounding grains to insensibility as long as they've been around, ..."
     Not true, grains are a relatively recent perversion of Nature created by humans.  Humans do not intuitively eat mature seed heads on grasses.

     WH: "American grocery shelves are not by accident stuffed with white breads as far as the eye can see; many people do not like or even tolerate whole grain bread."
     The fact that people are allergic to whole grains is clear testament that they are not a natural food for our species.  The "core idea" of the raw-fooder is to consume foods that -can- be eaten raw in their natural state: fruits, nuts/seeds, leaves.
     Is Harris REALLY citing "American grocery shelves" as a valid indicator of the optimally-healthy diet for our species??

     WH: "On a raw diet, potatoes, a generally well tolerated staple, also go out."
     Meat, eggs, fish, fowl, crustacea, insects, dairy products, junk foods, alcohol, and tobacco are also "generally well tolerated staple(s)", in various human cultures, so this line of "reasoning" is totally invalid.

     WH: "Other casualties would be soy and many other beans."
     Clearly, many raw beans are edible fresh with the pod, e.g. snap beans, pole beans, string beans, etc.; however, discarding the pods, drying the beans, and cooking the then-concentrated protein presents significant problems, such as excessively concentrated protein consumption and denatured proteins.  The adult human needs ~1/3% protein in the overall diet, beans present ~ 27 times this maximum; there is no reason to believe the human body has 2600% excess protein digestive capacity built-in, just in case.
     One of the most common errors in entry-level vegetarian/vegan diets is consuming far too much protein, especially cooked protein.
     Soy products seem to present other problems, too.

     WH: "The raw food literature is rife with "life force", ...
     Pulling an unsupportable, untestable metaphysical concept from a small subset of raw food literature, and ignoring that most raw food literature does not mention it, is simply prejudicial and intentionally pejorative.  This concept does not refute the fact that science and epidemiology support the rational basis, and practice, of a raw diet, and that our species evolved on a totally raw diet, as did all Life on this planet.
     There is no doubt that one feels more "alive" once stabilized on a raw diet, and past the cleansing phenomena, so some non-scientist laypeople might conclude that the increase is due to something (energy) in the raw food.
     Modern String Theorists in the field of physics, in which Harris has a background, claim that there is no solid "mass" in the Universe, just 10-dimensional energy waves, and this is not any different than a primitive concept of "life force".
     Further, science can not detect "life" with its physical instruments, yet there is no doubt that Life exists.  Neither can science detect or measure thoughts, emotions, or consciousness, but they all exist.  Therefore, science can have no valid opinion on the existence, or non-existence, of that which it can not detect with its current physical measuring instruments.
     Thus, Harris is misrepresenting science's ability to refute the existence of any "life force".

     WH: "Perhaps ... metaphysics is for people too lazy to study physics, ..."
     Perhaps, criticizing the concept of raw food on isolated, metaphysical non-issues and groundless superstition is for people "too lazy" to study the biochemistry and epidemiology necessary to conclude that a raw diet is far superior to a cooked one??  Certainly, such mindless criticism from afar is much easier for those "too lazy" to actually experiment with a raw diet to personally experience the results!

     WH: "Things that are alive exhibit metabolism, the combining of food, water, and oxygen through enzyme-catalyzed chemical reactions in order to obtain energy for functioning."
     Have anaerobic entities suddenly disappeared??

     WH: "But pitching raw food on the basis that it is "alive" creates a semantic minefield for vegetarians."
     Actually, some raw foods are undeniably "alive", as you can plant a store-bought carrot, garlic, seed, bean/legume, potato (generally: any tuber, bulb, or corm), etc., and they will sprout leaves and continue their life cycle.  Thus, they are, indeed, "alive"; or would Dr Harris prefer the explanation that the Life Energy in the Earth magically resurrected them from death upon planting?

     WH: "Does that mean we should eat raw beef because it's "live food?""
     It would IF our species were adapted to eat flesh; however, this bit of juvenile ridicule underscores the author's prejudices against the obvious and irrefutable facts.  Our species evolved on a totally raw diet.

     WH: "Of course not; the cow had something the greens don't have, a nervous system, it's [sic] consciousness is gone forever, and that's what the whole ethical vegetarian case is about."
     The "whole ethical vegetarian case is about" consciousness??
     That's a news flash; generally, the "ethical" vegetarian/vegan is concerned with making personal lifestyle choices that reduce/eliminate the suffering of animals, not whether animals have consciousness or not, nor whether one's consciousness is really "gone forever" on death.  Harris is not qualified to comment on the post-death existence of consciousness; that is metaphysics again, totally outside the narrow, restricted realm of physics.
     Although Harris claims to have gone vegetarian and then vegan "primarily for ethical reasons", it is insightful that he apparently does not comprehend the "core idea" of "ethical" veganism.
     Worse, he simply does not comprehend Ethics either, because ethics is a purely idiosyncratic concept; that is, everyone simply is conditioned into a set of ethics, and/or makes up their own to suit their current belief system.  Therefore, anyone's ethics is as valid, or invalid, as any other set of ethics.  That is, unlike biochemistry and physiology, there is NO objective standard by which to measure any set of ethics; thus, discussion of the 'ethics' of diet, or the human treatment of animals, is purely nonsensical and it simply obscures the real nutritional, health, and biochemical issues at hand.

     WH: ""Live food" arguments really muddy the waters when you're trying to explain the ethics of vegetarianism to a meat eater."
     As explained above, "ethics" are not related to diet, whatsoever.

     WH: "All the foregoing sounds like a frontal assault on the raw fooders, but it's not."
     Correct, a valid frontal assault would have made an honest attempt to deal with the real nutritional, health, and biochemical issues that clearly support a raw diet above any cooked one, but Harris is not qualified to discuss these important issues, or apparently even interested in, or aware of, them.  Therefore, he relies on juvenile ridicule and focuses on some totally insignificant, and irrelevant, metaphysical beliefs of the minority, and thus tries to smear the whole concept of raw foods with this shoddy trickery.

     WH: "I agree with them that raw foods should be a major if not sole part of the diet ... because the foods that can be eaten raw (mostly vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds) coincidentally have enormously higher nutrient values than the foods that either have to be, or usually are, cooked."
     Although he finally concedes that a raw diet is best, this "enormously higher nutrient values" statement is not true.  Most cooked foods, such as grains, eggs, meats, seafood, beans/legumes, or tubers/roots have highly-concentrated and excessive contents of protein, carbohydrates, or fats: much more than any raw food, and that is why cooking supports obesity and raw-fooders look thin compared to a morbidly obese public on cultural diets.

     WH: "Summary: The Raw Fooders are probably right but maybe not for their stated reasons."
     Could it possibly be that Nature is right, and the raw-fooders have discovered this first??  Before orthodox medical research?  Before orthodox nutritional research?
     A little suggestion for Dr Harris: Physician, heal thyself.  
     Adopt a totally raw, properly combined, diet, go through the transition period and cleansing reactions, and then stabilize on it.  Keep exhaustive notes.  At that point, you will have some valid personal experience upon which to base your opinions rather than superficial nay-saying.

Steven Walsh of the Vegan Society

     He supposedly holds a "PhD in Process Systems Engineering from Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine and specialises in data analysis and mathematical modelling, and he is Vice-Chair of the UK Vegan Society and has a long-standing interest in vegan nutrition... He is a spokesperson for the Vegan Society in contesting inaccurate media reports on veganism and unsubstantiated health claims by the dairy industry."

     The following is a critique of his article: Raw Food: Healthy choices on raw vegan diets.

     SW> A raw food vegan diet may be defined in various ways, but usually entails at least 80% by weight being raw plants.
     A major flaw in the first sentance.  A raw diet is 100% raw, otherwise it is not raw.  Does SW really think a "vegetarian diet" is 80% plant-based and 20% animal-based?

     SW>  ...but there are too few long-term raw food vegans for direct evaluation of the success of raw vegan diets versus other diets.
     There are many, IF one cares to actually look.

     SW>  We can, however, evaluate such diets against known human nutritional requirements to gain a better understanding of the ways in which appropriate raw vegan diets could benefit health.
     Nonsense, "known human nutritional requirements" are fraudulent extrapolations of average cultural diets which produce the rampant "degenerative diseases" currently plaguing cultural diet eaters.  "Known human nutritional requirements" are not produced by legitimate scientific research into the optimully-healthy human diet.  In fact, there is little, or no, research into human health.  The fact that "official" dietary recommendations include meats, eggs, and dairy products clearly indicates that.

     SW>  Raw vegan diets comprise three key food groups: sweet fruit, high-fat plants and green leafy vegetables.
     There is no such thing as a "high-fat plant".  Nuts and seeds are not "plants"; parts of plants, perhaps, but clearly not "plants".

     SW>  Raw food authorities differ in the proportions recommended, some suggesting that 2% of calories from green leafy vegetables ...
     Here, SW falls into the calorie trap ; and worse, the "Percent of calories from xxx" trap, thus revealing his ignorance of what calories are in addition to simple biochemistry.  Apparently, he also believes that the recommended calorie consumption for grossly overweight meat-eaters is identical for raw-fooders.

     SW>  Green leafy vegetables and broccoli contain higher levels of zinc, calcium and protein than fruit
     Instead of using totally meaningless, non-quantitative, terms like "higher", let's look as some real numbers in order to make an honest quantitative comparison.  Someone who "... specialises in data analysis and mathematical modelling ..." should understand this simple arithmetic issue!

USDA SR-13
 Zn, mg/100g Ca, mg/100g pro
lettuce, iceberg 0.2 19 1.0
broccoli 0.4 48 3.0
appricot, dehydrated 1.0 61 4.9
avocado, Florida 0.4 11 1.6
currants, dried 0.7 86 4.1
currants, raw 0.3 55 1.4
fig, dried 0.5 144 3.0
olives, ripe 0.2 94 1.0
peaches, dried 0.8 38 4.9
prickly pear, raw 0.1 56 0.7
prunes, dehyd 0.8 72 3.7
raspberry, raw 0.5 22 0.9
roselle, raw -- 215 1.0

     It seems that several fruits, here shown with a green background, actually have considerably "higher" levels of zinc, calcium and protein" than "green leafy vegetables".  Since Walsh "specialises in data analysis and mathematical modelling", it would seem reasonable for him to be honest in a quantitative sense.

     SW>  Some people experience dental problems with a very high fruit intake.
     This is generally caused by eating acid fruit (citrus, pineapple, ...) out of hand, as the acid dissolves calcium out of the the teeth on contact.  It is best to avoid acid fruits altogether, but if one must eat them, it is better to juice them and drink the juice with a straw, thus minimizing contact with the teeth.  If you do not believe that acid fruit instantly dissolves calcium out of teeth, rub your teeth together and they will feel smooth.  Eat an orange section and rub again; they will feel rough because the acid etched the surface of the teeth on contact.

     SW> Many people will struggle to maintain weight if they do not include significant amounts of high fat foods.
     There is NO need to "maintain weight", especially since one is always overweight on a cooked-food diet.  This is simply the cultural prejudice of a cooked-food eater, who is totally ignorant of the effects of a raw diet, and it is remarkably similar to Harris' and Nelson's bizarre posturing and unsupportable cultural prejudice, revealed above.  The human species evolved on an all raw diet, until the very recent past, and the body will approach its natural ideal weight on a raw diet.  It is only living in a grossly overweight population that has produced this silly superstition.  As with Harris, we have another "expert" on raw food that has never actually personally experienced it.

     SW>  Olives, avocados, almonds, hazelnuts and macadamias are all dominated by monounsaturated fats, which are the safest fats to consume in large quantities.
     Recommending that people consume nuts/seeds is totally unjustified, as they provide far too much fat and protein to be digested properly.  Also, the fats in them coat the chewed particles, thus insulating them from the aqueous digestive system.
     Most raw-fooders, quite unlike pudgy cooked-fooders who have never tried a raw diet, come to learn this by personal experience.  We certainly do not need to "consume large quantities" of fats, although foolishly abandoning our proper, tropical ecological niche and moving into cold climates has resulted in an artificial need to consume more food just to stay warm.

  SW>  Bananas are a good energy food, being relatively low in fibre and high in potassium.

USDA SR-13
 energy, Kcal/100g K, mg/100g
banana 92 396
avocado, california 177 634
breadfruit, raw 103 490
custard apple 101 382
dates 275 652
durian 147 436
jackfruit 94 303
persimmon 127 310
plantain, raw 122 499
sapote, raw 134 344
tamarind, raw 239 628
     
banana, dried 346 1491
apricot, dried 320 1850

     Again, reliable figures, instead of meaningless, intentionally-deceptive, non-quantitative terms like "high" and "low" show that several common fruits are far superior (here shown in green) to bananas for the nutrients considered.  
     To get a free nutritional database program for Windows, get Jerry Story's DMAK, so you too can play "Spot the liar".

     SW> Oranges are rich in calcium, folate, potassium and vitamin C.
     Whoops, "Green leafy vegetables and broccoli contain higher levels of... calcium than fruit" he claims above.  Self-contradiction is a good quack detector, however.

     SW> Chimpanzees show particular enthusiasm for collecting and eating termites, which have high measured levels of B12
     Actually, some chimps eat termites, mostly during their swarming period, and since this practice is practiced mostly by females, and since they commonly use tools, this behavior is obviously cultural in nature, certainly not nutritional.  IF termite-eating were nutritionally imperative, then where did they get their B-12 before they invented "tools", rather recently??

     SW>  After capture, the blood B12 levels of most primates drops rapidly when they are fed on a hygienically grown and prepared plant-based diet. It is therefore not surprising that humans also need an external source of B12.
      Could it be that the B-12 in the exogenous bacteria is simply washed off the fruit and produce prepared for germ-fearing humans, and the hysterical hygiene is the problem, not a problem inherent in raw diets?  The B-12 issue is highly equivocal, and meaningful research has not been conducted.  Plant material has been shown to contain B-12, see Mozafar.  Bacteria are known to produce B-12 in the human gut, but it is argued that it is produced too low in the gut to be absorbed.  The question remains: does the cleaner gut of the raw-fooder, free from the high populations of competing, excess-protein-eating, putrefactive bacteria and their highly-toxic waste products common in the meat, bean, nut/seed-eater, produce absorbable B-12 in the human wise enough to not consume these atrocities?
     This is where research is sorely needed.  Until meaningful and extensive research is conducted on cooked-vegetarians/vegans and raw-fooders of all persuasions, B-12 supplements are the simple and inexpensive solution to this highly-emotional non-issue.

     SW>  Nori and spirulina failed to correct deficiency in macrobiotic children ...
     Macrochaotics consume no raw foods, so this is totally irrelevant to discussing raw diets!  But, bringing in true, but totally irrelevant, information is a common diversionary trick of the less-than-honest.

     SW>  Secondly, human exposure to sunlight at high latitudes and when spending most of the day indoors is greatly reduced compared with our evolutionary exposure.
      Not really, very little direct sunshine falls on the tropical forest floor.

     SW> During the UK winter...
      Humans are tropical apes, so should not be in either the UK, or the winter.  Voluntarily moving out of our proper ecological niche by several thousand miles, thus insuring our biologically-correct diet is unavailable, does not invalidate our proper biological diet.  Two wrongs do not make a right!

     SW>  Thirdly, the human gut is smaller overall than that of the other great apes and the human colon takes up just 20% of the digestive system compared with 50% in the other great apes. This results in a dramatically reduced capability to process fibre, indicating that humans are adapted to a lower fibre diet than the other great apes, who consume several hundred grams of fibre per day.
      What this means is that we are frugivorous apes, who should not be consuming tough plant fiber.  All the apes prefer fruit to other plant material, so do we.

     SW>  However, it is plausible that food processing, including cooking, played a major part in the changes in the human digestive system compared with the other great apes. Humans may have evolved to rely on food processing.
      There is no evidence that claims that human digestive physiology or biochemistry changes as a function of any particular diet; that is the archaic, Lamarckian view of evolution, the notion that organisms inherit the traits acquired during their parents' lifetime, and has long-since been discarded.  
     IF humans could 'adapt' to flesh-eating, then the rampant "degenerative diseases" caused by same would now not exist.  The fact that we have NOT 'adapted' is evidenced with the rapid gains in health resulting from adopting a plant-based diet.  And, the additional gains experienced by those who actually experience a raw diet, as opposed to those cooked-fooders who merely speculate foolishly about it, is evidence that we did not 'adapt' to cooking, either.  Cooking allow the eating of many items we would not be able to eat raw (flesh, grains, woody and toxic plant material) and is the main cause of the "degenerative diseases" suffered only by humans.

     SW>  Cooking increases the energy available from starchy foods such as potatoes and grains ...
      It does not increase the "energy available", it makes about 10 times the starch accessible to digestion as would be by the rather inefficient, natural mechanism of chewing to break the cell walls, and thus leads directly to the common obesity of cooked-starch eaters.  Sumo wrestlers put on hundreds of pounds of fat by eating lots of white rice; they do NOT get "more energy", they get more fat.  Excess fat is not healthy tissue.  Overweight and pathologic obesity is rampant among cooked-fooders, since cooking is the cause.

     SW>  Whether such foods belong in an optimal diet remains to be established.
      It has been well established by Nature; cooked foods were not in our evolutionary diet, until the very recent past, and they have resulted in the pandemic "degenerative diseases" seen in the only species that cooks its food.

     SW>  The longest-living population in the world, the Japanese Okinawans, make extensive use of cooked grains, sweet potatoes, vegetables and soy products and little use of raw fruit. However, there is no large group of long-term raw food vegans to provide a direct comparison.
      Therefore, we will compare apples and oranges, by falsely claiming that apples are not good simply because we can not find enough of them, and conventional research ignores them??  This from a PhD??

     SW>  However, higher consumption of whole grains is associated with reduced risk of heart disease and diabetes, so this evidence suggests that grain should be consumed in unrefined (whole) form rather than eliminated altogether...
      First, grains are a human invention; created only very recently in our evolutionary time-scale by genetically-manipulating natural grass seeds.  How many people have ever seen a mature seed head on wild grass and said: "Mmm, lunch!"  None.
     The apparent reduction of diseases associated with consumption of whole grains might be well related to the shorter transit times caused by the indigestible husks (fiber) and the lesser free carb content of whole grains compared with an equal amount of refined grains.  Whole grains also have more nutrients than refined grains, but that does not mean that they are a suitable food for our species.
     See: Opioid Residues in "foods".

     SW>  As a raw food diet is often a gluten free diet, it is possible that some of the people finding such diets particularly beneficial may be gluten intolerant in varying degrees.
      Let's see; our species evolved on a totally raw diet, but this "expert" suggests it is best only for the "gluten intolerant"?  Not really, gluten would be totally absent in our natural diet!  Like Harris and Nelson reveal above, Walsh is obliviously harboring some personal, irrational, totally insupportable, blindly-superstitious bias against our evolutionary diet?  One must ask: "Why?"  Ask, but they won't respond!

     SW>  On the other hand, raw food often requires long-distance transportation and commercial banana production is an environmental disaster with high pesticide use affecting plantation workers and local rivers.
     Commercial indiscretions and rampant ecological abuses do NOT relate to our natural diet.  
     Commercial "food" production, both plant and animal, produces ecological disasters.  The method of production is at fault, not the crop, itself.  The "long-distance transportation" is the singular result of humans abandoning our proper ecological niche; our biologically-correct diet is not at fault, yet notice the constant implications that our natural diet itself is somehow at fault.  This is propaganda, pure and simple.

     SW>  The trade-off is not clear cut. It is likely that local sourcing of cooked foods (e.g. Scottish oats) has the environmental edge over Jamaican bananas or airlifted strawberries, but seasonally available local fruits and nuts have the edge over both.
      This type of "reasoning" is meaningless, especially when one has moved 5,000 miles from the proper ecological niche for our species!

     SW>  One universally recognised effect of a high raw diet is weight loss, and many leading exponents of raw diets report being overweight on a conventional diet but achieving a desirable weight on switching to a raw vegan diet.
      What a surprise: cooked food produces obesity.

     SW>  A common reason for abandoning raw food diets, however, is excessive weight loss.
     And just how is "excessive" measured?  
     A comparison to a grossly overweight, cooked-food, degenerative-diseased, dominant population?  Since 61% of the US population is overweight or obese, and there is no reason to think those in the UK are doing any better, just where is the objective standard to measure by?  It doesn't exist.  
     Since obesity is clearly a cultural manifestation, Nature, as usual, knows best.

     SW>  However, evidence to date does not justify a general recommendation of raw vegan diets in the sense of more than 80% of food being consumed raw, particularly for children who need a relatively high calorie density.
      Now, just how do the other apes' offspring thrive on an all-raw diet?  How did all humanoids do it before cooking was invented rather recently?  Isn't it entertaining to see a PhD claim that Nature is wrong??

     Given these rampant errors in facts and logic, perhaps Walsh should invest less time "contesting inaccurate media reports on veganism" and correct his own severe errors and prejudicial, non-experiential, superstitions and silly biases against the very concept of raw-foods, on which our little ape species evolved quite successfully until the recent adoption of cooking.  
     Perhaps, he could provide some convincing evidence that Nature was, after all, completely wrong for billions of years??!!

 

     Besides embarrassing himself by presenting false, personal, prejudicial, perfunctory, pernicious propaganda against our evolutionary diet, what other expertise does Walsh exhibit?

     Apparently, he is employed by Imperial Chemical Industries, a global chemical conglomerate which, in addition to being a global polluter, produces industrial adhesives, specialty starch, fragrances, flavors, food ingredients, specialty process intermediates, and paints.  It seems that supporting a major global polluter and ecocidal organization would be in direct opposition to his alleged "ethical vegetarian/veganism", since pollution and unnatural food additives kill, or weaken, humans and all other animals, but when did ethical dissonance ever get in the way of propaganda?

     It seems Walsh is also quite adept at embarrassing himself in public by intentionally disrupting other people's lectures by shouting "Liar!" and other epithets at the speaker, repeatedly, as he did in England while Robert Cohen, the Notmilkman, was lecturing.  And another lecture.

     In Wash's alleged criticism of an article by Robert Cohen, Walsh is complaining about an article that does not exist, another insight into his, and Nelson's, respect for accuracy in his own writing.

     Further, Walsh is generating an accurate characterization of himself by attacking others' legitimate research with his own peculiar brand of pseudoscience:

Date: Sun, 06 Apr 2003 09:19:23 -0500
From: T. Colin Campbell tcc1@cornell.edu
To: stephen_walsh@vegans.fsnet.co.uk
Cc: egoldman@umdnj.edu
Subject: Your commentaries

Stephen:
  I have seen several of your commentaries on the China Project and related bits of research information from time to time.
  I must be honest to tell you that you have no idea what my views are or how I interpret the China data, especially in reference to our other work prior to the China Study as well as in reference to the work of others since that time.  You continue to distort, distort, distort.
  I am sorry that I do not have the time to even try to answer what I consider to be some tortuous and highly reductionism arguments that you use to make your point.  Trying to use cross-sectional data that are comprised of multiple variables to make definitive conclusions about specific variables is not acceptable science.  This is a not a matter of my or your views on plant-based diets, but rather your ability to interpret data.
  Because others have pointed out to me that they believe that you have another agenda, could you tell me whether or not this is true?  In brief, what are you [sic] credentials?

Colin
--
T. Colin Campbell, PhD
Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY 14853

  Dr. Campbell is a principal investigator in the Cornell-China-Oxford Project on Nutrition, Health and Environment, a massive survey across the far reaches of China that investigates more diseases and dietary characteristics than any other study to date. : 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Loren Lockman and the
Tanglewood Wellness Center

     Loren Lockman holds himself out to the public as an expert on fasting and runs a fasting center near Washington, D.C.
      I have had several opportunities to attempt to discuss his beliefs on various public discussion forums, and I have repeatedly challenged his "no enemas while fasting"/"enemas are not natural"/"enemas cause damage" dogma, yet he can never support his beliefs with facts or logic.  He makes such absurd, unsupported statements as enemas create "20 pounds pressure", when 20 pounds per square inch hydraulic pressure in the colon would cause people to explode!  He repeatedly claims that enemas cause "damage to the bowels", but he can not explain specifically what damage is caused, nor how it is caused.
     I personally know a long-term vegan woman who had fasted successfully several times for a month, with enemas, who decided to try one without enemas, per Shelton's dogma, and against my advice.  
     Within three weeks, she changed from a happy, high-energy, conscious person into a smelly, physical wreck who was in constant pain, was so weak as to be almost paralyzed, could not walk to the bathroom, and who was so toxic that she could not carry on a simple conversation.  
     Eventually, the pain got so bad that she wisely relented and spent about 4 hours on a colonic table with the colonic lady digging dried, hardened, impacted feces out of her colon with a finger, followed by repeated colonics.  Immediately after the colonics, the faster returned to her normal happy, high-energy, clear-consciousness state.  She recovered instantly, both physically and in consciousness! There is no doubt that the lack of spontaneous bowel movements during a fast caused toxins to accumulate in the lower colon and then be absorbed back into the blood stream which consequently caused all her totally unnecessary and horribly painful symptoms.  Removing the impacted feces immediately removed the symptoms, because their cause was eliminated.  If she had not abandoned the "no enema while fasting dogma", she would have died and the headlines would have screamed: "Vegetarian dies while fasting!"
     The reason for this is simple.  Indigestible plant fiber, ("bulk") is necessary to trigger bowel movements by stretching the tissues in the colon.  When fasting, i.e. consuming only water, there is absolutely no fiber passing through the system, therefore bowel movements quickly stop.  Toxins from the body are dropped into the colon, where normal fecal/fiber flow would flush them out of the body.  However, since there is no fiber flowing thorough the colon while fasting, bowel movements stop, thus the toxins putrefy in the colon and produce more and different toxic compounds that are absorbed into the blood stream to cause the headaches, weakness, lowered consciousness, and other problems.
     Apparently Herbert Shelton, the author of several books on fasting, one of the "no enema" dogmatists, had a fasting death at his San Antonio fasting clinic, was sued, and that was the end of his Health School and the beginning of the end for him.
     ================================

     Finally, good news.  
     "The Maryland Board of Physicians has issued cease-and-desist orders against Loren Eric Lockman and Timothy Scott Trader for practicing medicine without a license and representing to the public that they were authorized to practice medicine. Loren was fined $320,000 for seven violations, each of which reflected what had happened to one client. Trader was fined $70,000 for two violations related to two of the clients. Lockman founded the Tanglewood Wellness Center, which operated in Maryland until 2005 when he relocated the facility to Panama."

More...

Final decision and order.
Final decision and order of henchman.

"Ethical" Vegetarian/Vegans

Vacuous, not Vicious
     One of the more embarrassing and meaningless concepts bouncing about in the alternative diet movement is that of "Ethical Veganism", or "Ethical Vegetarianism", wherein the argument for a plant-based human diet is supposedly founded on "ethical", or "moral", principles.
      What its proponents, and opponents, alike clearly do not understand is that "ethics" is highly idiosyncratic; that is, "A structural or behavioral characteristic peculiar to an individual or group.", or "A particular strange or unusual habit, way of behaving, or feature that someone or something has".  
     Thus, an individual's personal sense of "ethics" is originally the result of early, parental conditioning: (Do this!  Do not do that!), and later, "ethics" are just made up to suit the particular circumstances as one's world view changes and, hopefully, matures.
     That is, there is no objective standard of "ethics" against which one can test or measure one's own "ethics" to determine their validity, or lack of validity.  Therefore, any particular set of "ethics" is equally as valid, or invalid, as any other set.
     The obvious consequence of this is that any discussions of "ethics", especially those always-humorous ones between vegetarians/vegans and meatarians, wherein each falsely tries to convince the other that their "ethics" are wrong or inferior, are simply a waste of time.
     Similarly, any discussions of "animal rights" vs., or related to, "human rights" are totally nonsensical for the same reason: there is no objective standard of "rights" whatsoever, they are just made up for personal convenience.
     Sincere vegetarians/vegans would do well to abandon all such meaningless discussions and devote the energy saved to some useful organization that is actually doing some tangible good, such as Greenpeace or EarthFirst!.

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