Rev. Fisk has lost somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 pounds living this new carnivorous lifestyle, and is, according to his own testimony, the healthiest he has ever been.
He's even learning jujitsu now.
By contrast, I'm a fat guy who likes to eat sugar and sit in a chair. I get winded thinking about jujitsu. I knew that before I began reading the book, so I didn't need the hard sell to be convinced my lifestyle wasn't optimal.
It all seems to make so much sense, especially the way Dr. Baker lays it out. He is certainly spot-on in his assessment of how the pharmaceutical industry, along with food-processing corporations and animal rights activist groups, control what our diet looks like today. They all have interests in telling Americans and the world what to eat. That the developed world is being pushed toward a plant-based diet by the powers that be, as Dr. Baker discusses, seems obvious to me as well.
Even White Castle has a version of the Impossible Burger.
That this push toward a plant-based diet has its roots in the religious beliefs of the Seventh-Day Adventists is not as obvious, but the information is there for the reading. Dr. Baker points the reader in the right direction to learn about that interesting development.
The basic premise of carnivore is simple. Human beings don't need to eat plant material. We didn't evolve to digest fiber. All we need is meat, fat, water, and salt. Dr. Baker goes through the science of the carnivore diet theory. He answers common objections to the diet in a rational way, and casts reasonable doubts on the settled truths of the nutritional community. He also confronts vegetarian and vegan opponents head-on about the health claims they make for their respective lifestyles. I'm not going to get into all the arguments. I encourage anyone who is interested in these things to buy the book. It is interesting and worth the time to read.
There are a couple things I just can't get my head around, though.
Foremost is the issue that the human digestive system is more similar to that of cats and dogs, in that it isn't designed to process plant material (fiber). Along with that is Dr. Baker's belief in evolution being responsible for this. To be clear, Dr. Baker says that humans are able to extract some nutrition from plant material, but we weren't intended to use plants (i.e. fruits, vegetables, and grains) as our primary source of nutrition. That role is supposed to be filled by meat.
While discussing nutrition, Rev. Fisk said that it is amazing that God would use two things that are poisonous to us - alcohol and bread - to save us. Perhaps it is a bit of hyperbole and I'm just taking it too literally. Certainly, we eat too much carbohydrates. I'm not sure I am ready to classify bread as poisonous.
Clearly, plants, including bread made from grain, have been integral to man's diet throughout history. This is what scripture records both before and after the flood.
According to the Bible, man started out as a vegetarian. First, God put man in a garden after He created him. He gave Adam and Eve "the trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food" (Genesis 2:8-9; 16). After the Fall, because of the curse man had to eat the plants of the field by the sweat of his brow, "through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life" (Genesis 3:17-19).
After the flood, however, God gave man animals as food: "The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything" (Genesis 9:2-3).
God did, of course, give some rules for the eating of meat. But I don't think God's covenant with Noah indicates that we were changed so that we couldn't eat plants and had to only eat meat.
Notably, God feeds the Israelites with the bread from heaven, manna, while they are in the wilderness during the Exodus. He also gives them meat in the form of quail when they complain about having to eat the manna. This certainly was miraculous, and God could have also miraculously made them able to digest bread without a problem, just as He caused their clothes not to wear out. Maybe today's bread is different from our old-fashioned breads from Bible times. Obviously, manna is different from the loaf of pre-sliced Butternut white bread that we buy at Walmart. And, maybe manna is called the bread of heaven in a figurative sense, and it is really some other substance entirely. It is definitely a symbol of Jesus, who is the true bread from heaven. This is what He explains to His followers in John 6 that causes them to abandon Him.
Jesus also feeds the multitudes with loaves of bread on two separate occasions. Jesus calls Himself the bread of life. "I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world" (John 6:51). All of these things seem to indicate that, rather than changing mankind from being an herbivore to a carnivore, God made us omnivores after the flood. We are able to digest both bread and meat.
Is our American diet screwed up? For sure. Are we being manipulated to eat processed crap which isn't good for us so corporations and politicians can make money and have power? I think so. Is sugar a powerfully addictive drug? Yes. I had a much more difficult time quitting tobacco than going 24 hours without a candy bar, which was stunning to me (I wish that was an exaggeration).
Of course, if you believe, contrary to the laws of thermodynamics, that the universe created itself spontaneously out of nothing, and man evolved upward from a state of simplicity to states of greater and greater complexity contrary to entropy over a period of millions of years, you more than likely disregard what the Bible has to say about many things, including man's diet.
Anyway, if you are interested in nutrition things, check out this book. It was interesting. ###
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