Thanks Phil. I have been making my way through Lex's journal but it is very long and some of it is quite confusing without a basic foundation.
There are at least three basic threads I noticed in Lex's journal:
1) The way of the skeptical epistemocrat: Nassim Taleb defines an epistemocrat as ”someone of epistemic humility, who holds his own knowledge in greatest suspicion.” Due to following wayward paths in the past, Lex has learned epistemic humility. He puts ideas to the test and is slow to draw conclusions. He tries to avoid making assumptions or relying uncritically on the claims of gurus or "what everyone knows" and he recommends that others do the same rather than make a guru out of him.
2) The way of the emipiricist: Lex started the journal as a way of testing Gary Taubes' hypothesis that it is essentially impossible to become obese on a low-carb diet by eating an all-meat (including organs and animal fat) diet. Many low carbers treat Gary like a god whose rules cannot be questioned, but Lex instead put Gary's claim to the test and the results brought Gary's claim into question, at least in Lex's case. Lex also found that the all-meat diet worked well for him, so he stuck with it.
3) The way of the red path (simplicity and antifragility): Lex prefers simplicity, which his all-meat diet fits nicely with. Adding complexity, particularly unnecessary complexity, obscures one's view and increases hidden risk.
If what Lex or Nassim write doesn't make sense, then I recommend reading it again and again until it does. If it still doesn't, then I recommend asking them questions.
Yes, I read Tyler's info on high meats and have read about them before, but if I remember right you keep them in the fridge or at least stir them - you don't exactly bury them in the backyard. lol.
Believe it or not, traditional peoples actually do that, though they tend to use methods that are a bit more sophisticated than just dropping meat in holes and covering them with dirt. They tend to first seal the meat in the hide of the animal and bury it a bit more loosely in a hole covered with rocks, sometimes lined with grass. The rocks are mainly to protect the caches from other animals (which is also a reason that dogs bury bones--and there is evidence that dogs also bury bones to improve them, as they do it even when they have plenty of food--in other words, dogs may consciously make the bones and meaty scraps more edible). Bear in mind that the Arctic earth is a lot cooler than that of most of the world, so a refrigerator is probably a closer emulation than the ground in most areas.
Here's a past excerpt of mine on the subject of high meat:
http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/journals/a-day-in-the-life-of-tylerdurden/msg72756/#msg72756The traditional Inuit ... put the meat in the hide of the animal (I wonder if the hide allows a small amount of oxygen in through the hide?) and tied it with the animal's tendons or something and then buried it either under rocks (just so other animals couldn't get it I think?), or in a grass-lined hole covered with loose dirt.
High meats also are not for newbies it seems - even newbie doggies.
I agree. I don't know why some newbies jump right into making inept versions of high meat instead of trying out raw meat for a while and learning more about how to make and store high meat properly. We had one fellow do that recently. He paid no attention to the instructions about high meat, claimed he got sick from his so-called "high meat" that he left out on a warm day, blamed it on raw meat in general and gave up on the raw Paleo approach after just a few days. No surprise there.
I didn't see anything about that new mix on the Slankers website yesterday. I've been trying to read my way all the way through that too. I'll look more and then ask them before ordering.
You could ask Lex or Slankers themselves.
So - if you get a ground up mix with more bones than a human would naturally eat - it would seem that it might be too much calcium - no?
Probably so. I imagine it could be particularly problematic for people who already have high levels of calcium and those prone to constipation.
I have totally gotten over the bacteria fear when it comes to eggs and dairy through slow education.
I do recommend eating probiotic foods (which you do anyway) and having a plan in place if you do overdose on pathogenic bacteria. Better safe than sorry. I'm thinking of keeping an emetic on hand, such as anantmul (ipecac, sarsparilla) powder. I had bad nausea once (I'm not sure if it was due to some miso soup I ate or old fermented CLO I took that I had left out of the fridge or a combination) and found that clay and ginger tea and raw honey didn't help any and I didn't feel better until I vomited what I ate back out (and then I was fine), so I'm thinking that if I get bad nausea again I'll just make myself vomit to get it over with, rather than have to feel bad for hours. I'm thinking I would also drink fluid before taking the emetic, to make the flow easier and avoid choking. Of course, this probably wouldn't be a good plan for someone prone to bulimia, but that has never been anything close to an issue for me.
I wonder about AV's comments on how frozen meats do not help with cellular regeneration and all the other jazz he says.
AV's comments regarding frozen meats don't bother me. I eat both frozen and fresh meats. I understand that Lex eats mostly frozen.