I know a girl that is a fervent supporter of the Hunter-Gatherer meme. She believes fully that in paleolithic times everything was better because back then we didn't pollute as much as we do and the people that are currently in power would not be. Everybody was healthy and lived long and carefree lives, flowers braided in long hair, snatching the occasional berry of a brush and once in a half year butchering a rabbit.<p>When I argue with her about this I can't seem to get the point across that in paleolithic times she'd most likely be dead already, and that even though we may have missed the path to some kind of nirvana in our local maximum limited hill climbing algorithm we are <i>very</i> much better off than anybody, even the most healthy and lucky person in the long ago past.<p>Hunter-Gatherer fitness is not a thing to strive for in isolation, the utility of the energy expense is not balanced by anything you really need to have (say, the ability to outrun a predator) in our modern society.<p>That said, there is also no reason to let your body go to pot.
And why would I want "hunter-gatherer fitness"?<p>Running slowly for long distances is not the epitome of top-health. In fact it reduces body fat (good) and muscle mass. Just take a look at any marathoner, compare it with short-distance runners.<p>This looks like "Paleo diet" for exercise. And similarly to it, some aspects make sense, but others don't.
I'm pretty sure that once we subject current human population to natural selection that was in effect in paleolithe, everyone who survives a year later will be pretty fit.
My understanding is that, ignoring infant mortality, life expectancy for paleolithic humans was around 50 years.<p>Does it not follow that the genetic fitness argument can only work if you're some way below that age? The article doesn't seem to address this at all.<p>Disclosure: I know next to nothing about this subject so I appreciate my argument may be naive to the point of laughable.
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Anyone who is glorifying hunter-gatherers needs to look at the hard evidence, of which we actually have. There are plenty of recorded evidence of hunter gatherers societies and there are still many that exist, such as in Papa New Guinea for example.<p>Their lives are full of incredible violence and murders happen all the time. There is a reason that the populations do not exceed a certain capacity. Because they kill each other. (Sometimes it's because there is only so much food in a certain area to support them) There are plenty of sources. Guns, Germs, and Steel is a great book that can explain some of this.
Food, yeah defiantly (and definitely).
The rest? Meh not so much. Just stand up more than sitting and you'll be alright.<p>But I genuinely believe we had less carbohydrates (regardless of complexity). A single slice of bread is too much for the average person.<p>With "normal" food, I only lose weight if I run 5k every day.
Otherwise I rise to the point where my kcal requirement increases because of my weight and it "evens" out.<p>My definition of "normal" includes bread, rice, pasta and stuff like potatoes. Even whole grain.
The main problem with this is how you conceptualize "hunter-gather" exercise. Hunter-gatherers comprise ancient societies spread across the planet in a huge range of ecosystems, from the Arctic shore to African deserts. Most of the remaining hunter-gatherers live in very marginal or sensitive environments that are difficult to sustainably convert to agriculture, like deserts or deep rainforest. As with most articles of this type, I fear that the authors are assuming an overgeneralized and not-very-empirically-grounded overview of "the" hunter-gatherer lifestyle and exercise regimen. Their sources to characterize hunter-gather lifestyle include things like <i>The Paleolithic Prescription</i> (and some paywalled journal articles).<p>There were hunter-gatherers where everyone walks thousands of miles over the course of the year, and hunter-gatherers where people stay near their villages, and hunter-gatherers where everyone travels great distances, and hunter-gatherers where the women stay at home, and societies where everybody stays at home and just pulls some fish or brazil nuts out of the river/forest when they're hungry, and hunter-gatherer societies so rich that they had hierarchical proto-states with leisured elites and slavery. And most hunter-gatherer societies disappeared so long ago that we simply have no real information about them, as far as questions like this go.<p>And frankly, looking at their Table 2, while it is true that the actual activities people may do on day-to-day basis may be different (carrying logs vs. carrying groceries) at the same level of activity, the premise that hunter-gatherers had very different exercise patterns may be exaggerated. Compare the discussion here: <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-human-beast/200910/how-much-physical-activity-do-we-really-need" rel="nofollow">https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-human-beast/200910/...</a><p>"Detailed research on two hunter-gatherer societies (or "foragers") allows us to calculate how active they are. These are the Ache of Paraguay and the !Kung of the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa. The !Kung are rather smaller (at about 100 lbs) and have comparatively low activity levels whereas the Ache are bigger (at about 130 lbs) and highly active thanks to their high birth rate.<p>A !Kung male uses about 2,200 (kilo)calories per day in total, almost exactly the same as a male office worker... Out of their respective total daily energy consumption, the !Kung use about 894 calories on physical activity (compared to 607 for office workers) whereas the Ache use a whopping 1772 calories this way.<p>Since the !Kung and Ache are so much lighter than Americans, it is important to take body weight into account. ...If Americans wanted to be as active as the !Kung, they would need to add the equivalent of 3.8 miles of walking to their daily activity. ...An hour-and-a-half of shopping with a cart uses about the same amount of energy as walking 5 miles."<p>Sure, the !Kung are exercising more, but only on the scale of say, walking/cycling instead of driving for short trips. Not on the scale of running daily marathons. It seems like an exaggeration to say: "Humans remain genetically adapted for a very physically active hunter-gatherer lifestyle. Many of the health problems endemic today result from lifestyle that is at odds with this evolutionary milieu."<p>Although to be fair they do insist that the difference does just imply a need for some more low- to moderate-intensity exercise.