What is the science behind raw food? Why does everyone eat raw?

[lorenclayton]

Hello

I've had IBS all my life but recently found a complete remission of symptoms by the following diet:

Breakfast: steamed green beans, carrots, pumpkin & zucchini. A pot of black tea.
Lunch: salad vegetables: cucumber, gherkins, olives, cherry tomatoes, carrot
Dinner: beef bone broth with 1 piece of liver with carrot, celery, carrot, green beans

I had complete evacuation with this diet the next day and no IBS symptoms at all. I'm guessing the cause of my IBS is low stomach acid. Salads and vegetables generally are cellular, watery foods. Francis Pottenger theorised that digestive juices are hydrophilic and are attracted to cellular foods, as well as to gelatin, but I can't actually find any other scientific studies to back this up. 

Does anyone know of any formal studies that show a definite connection between raw food / vegetables and ease of digestion?

Thanks.

[goodsamaritan]

Congratulations on your remission of IBS!

Why raw?

Just like in your experience, there are shared experiences, and sometimes it comes down to an art and a science.

Remember that some of the studies are $$$$$ profit driven, so verify with your own personal experiments.

And if those experiments come out well, then who's to argue with success?

Some people get well from disease.
Then they continue to get better, stronger.
Then they continue to look younger, stay younger.
If it is working for the individual, then hey, good for him / her.

[TylerDurden]

Scientists doing food-science studies are mostly in the pay of the big corporations, and  big corporations hate raw foods as they have a much shorter shelf-life than overly pasteurised, overly-processed precooked foods. Also, a scientist doing a study on raw-meat-eaters would generally be foolishly terrified of future  lawsuits in case the patients in the study had food-poisoning and started lawsuits etc., which is why they are so thin on the ground.

On the other hand, there are 10s of 1000s of scientific studies showing the harm caused by eating cooked foods. Here is a small sample thereof:-


http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/important-info-for-newbies/info-on-toxins-in-cooked-foods/