And now for something completely different

interesting. a friend of mine got prostate cancer in his 30s. since recovering he has a Japanese diet and swears by it. been fine since. n=1 😉

Very convincing, and thought-provoking. I frequently consume the foods and spices David mentions, with the exception of soya. A favourite (and cheap) dish is dhal – lentils cooked with turmeric, chillies and ginger. Fingers crossed then.

David,
A very interesting analysis, and one I am in no position to dispute. I will just state that in my opinion, the statistics being cited are being done in an overly simplistic manner. For example, you can’t discuss cancer mortality and morbidity without controlling for life expectancy differences between cultures. So yes, the differences appear dramatic (and thus likely are real), but I believe the analysis needs to be a bit more careful.
Having said that, thank you. Cancer touches almost all of us in one way or another during our lifetimes.
Kerry

Go here for David Archibald’s Patent Applications in USA:
http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=16&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PG01&s1=Archibald.IN.&s2=David.IN.&OS=IN/Archibald+AND+IN/David&RS=IN/Archibald+AND+IN/David
http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=9&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PG01&s1=Archibald.IN.&s2=David.IN.&OS=IN/Archibald+AND+IN/David&RS=IN/Archibald+AND+IN/David

I knew this high school student that had stage 4 cancer in the digestive region. Her doctor had her taking 10,000 IU of vitamin D3 a day to compliment chemotherapy. She beat it last spring.
Here’s the background on how vitamin D3 prevent/fight cancer – http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/health-conditions/cancer/
http://grassrootshealth.net/media/download/london032311.pdf
I only take 5,000 IU a day just to prevent cold, flu and especially sinus infection. It works perfectly for 4 years now. It’s like your universal vaccine against cold and flu. Apparently, cancers too.

Or is that what the “age standardized” accounts for?

Pigs and dogs make their own Vitamin C, and presumably some precursor ape to humans had the ability to make it. Humans must have lost the ability for an evolutionary advantage.

Not necessarily. Millions of years living with a diet that had no vitamin C deficiency may have allowed the ability to create vitamin C to be lost with no downside, so it could have been lost by chance mutation with no evolutionary consequences (at the time).

Pho Bo and Pho Ga are iconic dishes of Vietnam, but most meals are probably rice, chicken or fish, fresh vegetables and vegetable soup, accompaniment of herbs, with chilis and lots and lots of fish sauce. The Vietnamese eat lots of fish. Typically, the dishes are simple, fresh and untouched by preservatives. However, pesticide contamination is a concern.
There are other factors that may affect the average Vietnamese person’s overall well being besides a great diet. Their positive happy go lucky culture with an uncomplicated and comparatively low stress way of life (to a degree).
Also sadly the fact that probably many die of causes that were never properly diagnosed (or even any attempt at a diagnosis), records are simply unavailable and individuals are unable or unwilling to seek healthcare that they cannot afford. The health system is can be indescribably bad, being involved in a significant amount of charitable work in Vietnam, we have seen what the average Vietnamese family faces first hand.
I would not believe any statistics from the region. Health issues are simply unquantifiable.

an interesting post – I must start eating more chillis and stuff!
I wonder has anyone actually produced a reasonably scientific list of proven or ‘highly likely’ anticancer type foods?

I’ve remarked (OK, ranted) to people before how odd it is that people who rant about phthalates then consume soy milk.

So, are you saying I should eat more bean sprouts and chilli peppers?

It would be great if this relationship continues to build empirical evidence and we can defeat the twin scourges of prostate and breast cancer. However, this article tends to gloss over some significant hierarchical uncertainty, specifically the tortuous path between a metabolic effect and a statistically signficant effect on the stochastics of cancer nucleation. Is there better empirical evidence that soy prevents cancer than, say, the evidence that continued CO2 emissions will lead to catastrophic global warming?

Very interesting, and it tends to fit our knee jerk reaction to ‘commercial food’…but…..before we rush off to a life eating vegetables and living in a eco-dwelling…can we be sure of the statistics? If I put on my ‘McIntyre’ hat for a mo, I’m always suspicious of comparing disease records from one country to another? I’m worried that we may do what we criticise climate alarmists for, and just assume that because this ‘solution’ fits our general consensus about western diet it is indeed the answer. And in our naivity we use iffy data to convince ourselves we are right?
I’d love to believe its true, that diet can reduce this, but having seen how data can be ignored/fiddled etc to make a case for climate alarm, I’m skeptical of all statistics on anything these days. Is anyone out there super confident of the data being shown here (no offence intended Mr Archibold).
??

Two possibilities: a) There are age differences in the populations that have not been taken into account, cancer, to all intents & purposes with a few rare & sad occasions, is a primarily a disease of old age, prostate cancer being a typical example,& b) They don’t have vast armies of medical bureaucrats telling them they have to constrain what they eat to so many mg of this & or that per day, as we have in the western world, inflicting ever increasing scare stories upon us!
Still, it is very interesting reading & there may be something in it for sure!

Gosh..in the time it took to compose my comment many people had already said the same thing, but more eloquently. So apologies for repetition. I’ll get my coat…

I encourage skepticism. My feverent hope would be that something as simple as this could prevent cancer. But there are a number of “holes” in the theory. For exaample Japan has a cultural difference in the way they treat the seriously ill. That is you could go to a doctor who might diagnose you with breast cancer but his culture would proscribe that he not tell you. The reason is that you are going to die and he feels it is more human to allow you peace in your last days. Second point is that until recently Japan did not have the massive modern medical practice that the U.S. has. They often did not diagnose serious illnesses and the Japanese people dutifully died conveniently at home and as a result the cause of death was “old age”. Third in many countries and Japan is not exempt from this, even when the real cause of death is know it is not used officially out of cultural norms and/or to protect the patient. The bottom line is many/most countries have poor statistical data on disease, cause of death and even birth problems. This makes it problematic to compare their data to a country like the U.S. which is “anal” in their collection of data.
Japan has stomach cancer as a cause of death roughly 10 times greater then the U.S.
Japan has stroke as cause of death twice the U.S. rate.
Japan has influenza as a cause of death 3 times that of the U.S.
Japan has almost twice the rate of colon-rectal cancer over the U.S.
Japan has almost six times the rate of liver cancer over the U.S.
Japan has higer rates of kidney disease and pancreas cancer over the U.S.
Were these higher rates caused by higher isoflavones??? Are the causes of these higher rates of disease obviously dietary??? Can all these things be cured by a simple thing like tumeric and black pepper???

Really glad you posted this Anthony – thanks. As a practicing biomedical scientist for half of my professional life I have always had a healthy respect for nature’s medicine cabinet. I also did a lot of business in Japan at one time, and always came back from each trip feeling fitter and healthier following 2-3 weeks of oriental cuisine. I will purchase this book and read it with interest.

Adding to the interesting links, in those animals in which vitamin C is synthesized, it is synthesized from glucose. The presence of the test for sweetness is in the DNA of virtually all animals, and the section of our tongues with those receptors is well researched. The craving for sugar has a deep biological root. It is not so far fetched to suggest that our sugar craving is driven by a relative lack of vitamin C.
Research in the area of vitamins at the University of Texas in the 1960’s led to a suggested minimum daily intake for vitamins based on body weight for the primates to keep them in optimum health. For vitamin C in particular, the level was between 1500 and 3000 mg per day for adult humans. This is from the research of Dr. R. Williams at UT. It is obviously many times higher than our current RDA. Given that our kidneys have a reclamation process for vitamin C to reclaim it from urine, it’s that important, a little more thought on our recommended intake would seem advisable.

Thank you very interesting, another glimpse into our ignorance and the possibilities that abound when we take the time to look.
Maybe once the climate hysteria is subdued we will see blogs like this , crowd source this kind of research and see if we can sort the wheat from the chaff.
There is something here numbers don’t lie, but what and how many synergies is yet to be seen.
Saw an article, you are what you eat, maybe at the Chiefio’s site, and it opens up the cancer-food interconnections a little farther.

@ krischel says: December 12, 2012 at 8:48 am
Thanks for the explanation of Vitamin C. I was always curious how people in the colder climates managed to get a sufficient amount of them. I am aware that some vegetables have small amounts as well, but the concentration was in the citrus fruits – and those were not universally available.

Krischel,
I tend to agree with you, and have been on a low-carb diet for years. My doctor put me on it when I weighed 230 pounds and had high cholesterol levels. In six weeks I lost 15 pounds, and the cholesterol dropped 30 points, while I ate all the meat and cheese I could stand. I am now a steady 195 pounds for the last 15 years. That same doctor claimed to have cured certain types of diabetes in patients by getting them on a low-carb diet.
I’m sure, when comparing Vietnamese diet with USA, that the sheer carb intake is much lower in VN than here. The sprouts and chilis could be incidental at best.

Most interesting and cogent. It is good to think about other things besides climate. The scientific principles and methods used in science (not pseudoscience) are essentially universal. Most but by no means all life science seems to reinforce the old philosophical idea of the golden mean. Thanks Aristotle. It is always good to remember that natural systems tend to favor balance. Dynamic systems never achieve for very long but the tendency toward it is constant. The golden mean also suggests the need for balance and moderation. Both commodities we humans, at least of late, i.e. our experience base, are short of in far to many aspects of life.

Charles Tossy says:
December 12, 2012 at 8:14 am
I think that thousands of years ago people lived to be hundreds of years old. Then the agricultural revolution happened and life span declined up to 90% because the human body is not optimized for the new diet.

The basis for this is?

More info on Isoflavones
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isoflavones
All plants are chemical factories. Everything a plant “does” is chemical in some way. Isoflavones are just a tiny part of that story. We animals evolved along with plants, including our diets. The pre-agriculture (traditional) diets always included a wide variety of local plant materials. If half of your diet is local, fresh plant material, it makes sense that you would evolve to partially depend on those local fresh plant materials. Remember the hunter-gather diet was half plant, half animal based. Their health was good enough. Their life spans were limited by low calories and lack of infection control. If modern people ate the hunter-gatherer diet (in adequate amounts) they would live far longer and with better health compared to the sugar snack, potato chip diet people.

Cancer is driven by many factors, some inter-related, and no matter what you do – you can’t avoid the cancer risk entirely. Same goes for heart disease…. But you can try to reduce the risk or buy some time so to speak.
– Genetics
– Hormones
– Diet
– Stress
– Exercise
– Environment (Exposure to certain things…)
– Age
– Abnormal interrruption of natural health and reproductive cycles.
I’ve known about a dozen folks in my 44 years who have died from cancer of some kind. As I think back to them, several common variables stand out:
1. Avoidance of the sun – indoors, sun blocks and sun glasses. (This one dominates…)
2. Religious buy-in into the low fat high carb diet – and vegan diets. (This one as well…)
3. Sedentary life style – house chair, car chair, office chair. (Same as above…)
4. Night shift work, day time sleep, abortion, stomach stapling, hard core drug use, etc. (Varies among a few individuals…very anecdotal….)
The interesting thing is that #1, goes right to the point of the OP’s article.
Hormones…
Vitamin D ladies and gentlemen IS a hormone. Deficiency of Vitamin D as more and more studies are showing seems to not only have a cascading effect – but a cascading effect that branches out into all kinds of different areas of bodily health.
– Immune System (Flu and Cancer)
– Bone
– Cardiovascular (Heart and Diabetes)
– Respiratory (Flu, Pneumonia, Asthma)
– Mental Health (Sleep, Memory, Dementia)
As to myself, I’ve taken two steps in the past 4 years.
1. 3000-4000 IUs of Vitamin D per day starting back in November 2008. Since then my bones have felt fantastic. I’ve had one case of flu at the most though I still get colds. A couple nasty warts I had literally detached themselves and took a flying leap.
The downside? Short term memory loss. My mother, myself, and two friends all report the same exact side effect – short term memory loss. At first it’s bothersome – but then again we remind ourselves – Vitamin D is a hormone. So we stop whining.
The other downside is the return of dandruff…
2. Total abandonment of high fructose corn syrup. My diet is best described as a high fat high sugar diet.
I decided back in April to at the very least eliminate high fructose corn syrup from the sugar part of the equation. I literally went cold on it…
6 weeks later, IBS that I had been struggling with for a decade – vanished! Poof! Gone!
I’m still on a high fat high sugar diet – but at least now my sugars are relegated to sugar, corn syrup, and sugar via starches from chips, breads, etc.
Will I be free of heart disease and cancer for life? Doubt it? Have I bought some time? Probably.
The science seems to indicate that once past 40 – age plays a role as well. And I doubt there’s much we can do about that.
Wish me a happy birthday everyone…(12/11/2012)
=8-)

@brians356: Wow, great results for you! I only realized that the calories in/calories out trope was a bunch of hooey in 2007, so it’s only been around 5 years for me, but the dramatic reduction of carbohydrate, and recently the increase in fat intake (to try and get into nutritional ketosis), caused a huge change in my triglyceride/HDL ratio, blood pressure, blood sugar, and of course, the 50 pounds I’m not carrying around any more. Unfortunately, the HMO I work for still promotes the low-calorie/low-fat/exercise advice, and it pains me to see the deleterious effect it has on our members, but one day, people will look back at the calories-in/calories-out and realize that it’s a silly as the idea of controlling the thermostat of the planet with a trace gas used by plants to grow 🙂
Thus far, my experience has been about 80-90% of the benefit just comes from sheer carbohydrate reduction, and the last percent can be addressed by omega3/6 ratios (grass fed butter, baby), higher intake of fat (75-85% of calories), and some minor supplementation (magnesium, zinc). Jimmy Moore (notable low-carb blogger and zealot) got me clued into the whole nutritional ketosis thing (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc96Lk1VVS4).
I’m not sure if the world is prepared to sustain its entire population on healthy animal fats and meat, but I’m hopeful that one day, the powers that be will abandon their promotion of cereals and grains, and that our chronically increasing health care costs will fall dramatically as we avoid the “diseases of civilization” caused by our carbohydrate intake 🙂

“The difference in cancer rate is not genetic, it is obviously dietary.”
A false dichotomy. If it is not genetic, it is environmental. “Dietary” is part of environment, but not its totality. There are a gazillion cultural/environmental differences between Japanese and Americans, any one of which could cause a difference.

I have the beans and the chili in my customary bowl of Texas Red chili. Maybe I should add a pinch of mint to my recipe…

Krischel,
That original regime low-carb came in my 30s, I am now 58 and, while still maintaining ideal weight for my height, and excellent blood pressure, the LDL and cholesterol are not so easy to keep low, partly because I do eat more carbs nowadays than I should. Buy by cutting down on dairy fat (I can live on cheese and milk!) I am now reversing those lipid trends again as well. Doctor said “fat-free milk only!” but I cheat and mix 3:1 ratio of 0% with 1% milk, to yield “~1/4%” milk, no longer blue colored and has enough solids to satisfy the craving.

I wonder if the soy-based protein powders (e.g. Trader Joe’s brand) are a satisfactory source of whatever benefits soy has to offer? I mix that protein powder with a ripe banana and orange juice in the blender for a quick meal. Yummy!

All things in moderation, including D3.

The health food business is the last refuge of the old time medical quacks and they are thriving like never before, using words like isoflavines, flavinoids, anti-oxidants, and so forth. As for the rest of us, well, there’s a sucker born every minute. When it comes to pseudo-scientific BS, the health foods promoters are worse than climate scientists. A word of warning.

Charles Tossy says:
December 12, 2012 at 8:14 am
—
There is no archaelogical evidence to suggest that people lived longer thousands of years ago. The life of the hunter gatherer was brutal, and for the most part short.

“””””…..MarkW says:
December 12, 2012 at 7:52 am
Just to be anal about it, I see two mastheads, the first and more prominent states:
The world’s most viewed site on global warming and climate change…..”””””
Gee; “””””…..Commentary on puzzling things in life, nature science, weather climate change, technology and recent news by Anthony Watts…..”””””
Dammit Anthony ! this place ain’t supposed to be about climate change, until we run out of puzzling things in life, to talk about. You better shape up, or I’m leaving.
George

Elevated LDL cholesterol levels is a sign of ongoing irritation or inflammation. One major and frequently unmentioned cause is gum disease – yep, your dentist can help protect your heart. The reason is that inflamed gums are essentially infected, and that infection has direct access to your circulatory system, and thus the rest of your body. So, take care of your teeth and they will take care of you.
Also, it seems that the higher LDL levels in US beef are the result of feed-lot use of corn. “Corn-fed beef” was a major marketing ploy back in the day and has now become a fixture in the US consciousness – corn fed beef is special. But really, no, no it’s not.
“Corn fed” was used to help drive up the corn market. Industrially corn is far more useful than wheat for example, and it is immensely more productive per acre. However as cattle food, it isn’t a great idea. Cattle are ruminants (cud-chewers) and are evolved to eat and happily digest relatively low value feed such as grasses and forbes, breaking down the complex carbohydrates that comprise cellulose into simpler sugars. A diet weighted heavily to corn (the entire plant is a grass, but feed-lot cattle are fed a grain-heavy diet) is hard on the cattle’s health. It throws off pH in the rumen for instance, and is directly the cause of the increasing use of antibiotics in factory-fattened animals. That in turn is a major factor in emerging antibiotic resistant bacteria strains, either number one, or two with hospitals right next door. Grass-fed beef is lower in LDL (like bison in fact). It isn’t as fat, and if you prefer well-done beef, may be a disappointment.

As you stated in your note, Anthony, this article is entirely appropriate for your site. Personally I think it’s refreshing to get away from the climate aspect for a change. On that note, a critique of David’s article:
Scientifically speaking, if the theory, which is supported by the statistics, has not been supported by clinical trials then this has still been validated.
Although I agree with the premise that diet can directly affect cancer rates, I do not, and would not, dismiss the genetic connection. It is my profound belief that genetics is the primary factor in causing cancer, but it only signifies a predisposition to get certain types of cancers, not the inevitability of developing cancer. In order for cancers to develop I believe that the genetic predisposition for that type of cancer has to be present and there has to be exposure to some sort of environmental trigger. One environmental trigger is your diet.
One of the things that isn’t mentioned in the article is although the Japanese (compared to Americans) suffer from lower rates of breast and prostate cancers, they suffer from significantly higher rates of pancreatic, liver, and stomach cancers. These types of cancers have also been statistically linked to diet, in particular that the Japanese eat more foods which have been deep fried, or fried in soy oil. No clinical trials have been used to substantiate those claims either, that I am aware of.

Excellent choice of article, Anthony. And a Christmas prayer from here in Australia for your afflicted relative.

@ Duster says: December 12, 2012 at 11:41 am
Anthony, this IS a great blog!
Duster, I had always heard about gum disease and over all health, but NO ONE explained it to me. Thanks for more great information (I just endured the dentist, so now I know the pain is worth the gain).

Terry says:
December 12, 2012 at 9:50 am

Dr Weston Price studied healthy populations in the 1930′s. Populations with no so-called western diseases like diabetes, obesity, heart diseases, cancers, etc. The common thread amongst these many disparate populations was diet. Plain and simple. That is the cure for cancer. Diet.

Yes, and I’ll go you one better. The less you eat past the minimum necessary to survive, the healthier you will be.
Less is more.
Please refer to the work of Ancel Keyes. From the Wiki article:

His interest in diet and cardio-vascular disease (CVD) was prompted, in part, by seemingly counterintuitive data: American business executives, presumably among the best-fed persons, had high rates of heart disease, while in post-war Europe, CVD rates had decreased sharply in the wake of reduced food supplies.

Bad stuff for the prostate: Booze, animal fat, especially processed meat of any kind. Bad stuff in general: too much sugar, soda, artificial flavoring & coloring, most preservatives.
As I recall from reading his obit in the LA Times back in ’04 when Keyes died just short of his 101st, all diseases were reduced in post-WWII Europe among the nearly starving populations.
Finally, the golden wisdom about the prostate is this:
Many old men die with prostate cancer, but not from prostate cancer.

Steve Keohane said @ December 12, 2012 at 8:06 am

Anthony, thanks for posting this. If it’s science it’s all good! David, do you have a PDF version for those of us w/o Kindle?

Kindle Reader software is available for free for Windows. It automatically keeps my Kindle files in sync between my Kindle and desktop machine. Download from Amazon…
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?ie=UTF8&docId=1000426311

Tin foil hat time! A long time ago I stumbled across a site that claimed giving soya milk to young boys increased the chances of them becoming homosexual.
To be honest, I didn’t follow the arguments too well but it’s amazing how headlines stick with you. I’ve never touched soya milk since then – I had been looking for dairy free options for my wife – but it shows how certain scare stories, whether based on facts or not, can influence public opinion and get firmly embedded in the sub-concious (you all know what I’m talking about).
I’d actually pretty well forgotten about the soya story until this popped up.

This article is the worst kind of Junk Science. No controlled population studies. No controlling for age, genetics, socio economic status, different diagnostic techniques, and a myriad of other cofounding factors. This is hippie New Age crap. This is the same kind of lazy thinking that lead to the the Alar ban, the DDT ban, believing that that Sandy was caused by AGW, and a thousand other lazy thinking correlations. The lack of skepticism except by a few commenters above is an embarrassment. This is an article about modern hippie snake oil and most of you are waiting in line to buy it.
That said, there is nothing wrong with exploring nutrition as a means to better health and well-being but it is not a panacea for cancer prevention.

Michael Tremblay says:
December 12, 2012 at 12:02 pm
Although I agree with the premise that diet can directly affect cancer rates, I do not, and would not, dismiss the genetic connection.
===========================================================
The good doctor said, “For example, Japanese who migrate to the US go to the US breast cancer rate in a generation. The US breast cancer rate is five times the Japanese breast cancer rate. The difference in cancer rate is not genetic, it is obviously dietary.”
Note that he did not say that Americans who migrate to Japan go to the Japanese breast cancer rate in a generation. Without this, the “difference in cancer rate is not genetic” is mere speculation.

Charles Tossy says:
December 12, 2012 at 8:14 am
I think that thousands of years ago people lived to be hundreds of years old. Then the agricultural revolution happened and life span declined up to 90% because the human body is not optimized for the new diet.

Aren’t there aboriginal tribes that still live that way, or did until they were encountered by Western Civilization? There is no record of aboriginal peoples living so long. Childbirth and it’s complications is a major cause of death for women where modern medicines do not exist. In those societies, most people don’t live into adulthood. In the days before vaccines and antibiotics, diseases and infections killed many people.

When Japanese women go live in the US they are five times more likely to develop breast cancer.
And so the conclusion is that it must be the diet. Not differences in smoking, drinking, drug use, drug abuse, obesity, lack of exercise, diffences in medical surveillance, pollution levels, all sorts of stuff in the food…etc. No. It’s soy. Just like we had the infamous “french paradox” in the past, we now have the “asian paradox”. Likely the latter will prove as much based on shoddy statistics as the former.

The easiest way to add massive amounts of turmeric to your diet is by realizing that Gulden’s brand already has some in it, but not enough, so just quickly stir in more and use it to flavor your favorite comfort foods.

I think this is an excellent post.
Leland H Hartwell, Tim Hunt and Sir Paul Nurse won the Nobel Prize in Physiology in 2001 for discovering key regulators of the cell cycle. This was a well deserved Nobel (unlike the Gore/IPCC/EU nonsense) as it greatly improves our understanding of life and cancer.
It’s commonly known that when a cell in the body duplicates itself the DNA separates into two parts. Cancer starts when cells begin to grow abnormally. Recently Dr Mark Petronczki and his team of reaearchers have made significant progress in discovering more about the division of cells and had a paper published in Nature this year.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v492/n7428/full/nature11773.html
A belt forms around the middle of the cell and tightens to split the cell into two. The research team discovered that a protein is a key part of this process. Understanding cell division and why it goes wrong is essential for the development of treatments for cancer and finding ways to prevent cells dividing uncontrollably in the first place.

http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/LRI-image.jpg
Survival rates for cancer have greatly improved over the years but far more money needs to be put into research into the different cancers to make significant progress.
If the money wasted on CAGW had been spent on medical research doctors would probably by now have better treatments for all types of cancer and other diseases, as well as replacements for antibiotics which are increasingly becoming becoming less effective.
Concerning food (apologies if already mentioned) onions and garlic are thought to contain powerful anti-cancer properties:
“Like many vegetables, onions and garlic contain antioxidants that can block highly reactive free radicals from damaging cell DNA and starting the cancer process. Laboratory studies have shown that onion and garlic compounds can increase enzymes that deactivate carcinogens in the body, enhancing our ability to eliminate carcinogens before they do any damage.
“Furthermore, in the laboratory onion and garlic compounds slow the growth and stimulate the self-destruction of cancer cells that form. Given this protective potential, the challenge now is to identify amounts that will provide optimal effects.
“Some research hints garlic and onion’s protective compounds may work more effectively when combined with other compounds that work through different pathways. For example, animal studies show even greater reduction in cancer development from garlic and tomato than from either alone.
“The protective effects of onion and garlic seem related to wherever cancer cells grow in the body and not to any specific tissue, such as breast or thyroid. That leads many scientists to say that although research offers more proof of onion and garlic’s impact on some cancers than others, they are likely to offer protection against a wide range of cancers.”
http://preventcancer.aicr.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=11136&news_iv_ctrl=0&abbr=pr_hf_

The subject is obviously an important one, I’m glad that David wrote it, and that Anthony went forward with it.
That said — although the isoflavone hypothesis may have some merit — human bodies are very complex, and there are many more differences between Asian and North American diets, among them the amounts of food we eat here, the amounts of refined sugars, and as a consequence, the climbing rates of diabetes and the high rates of heart disease. I seem to recall a couple of decades ago that the hypothesis at the time for differences in cancer rates (and rates of other diseases) was that Americans eat more meat, especially steak, often (at the time) in the form of hamburgers. Which of the many dietary differences (other than soy consumption) might also explain the much higher rates of hormone-related cancers (e.g., breast and prostate cancers)? I don’t know, but I wouldn’t want to say that we only have to eat more soy, or more fermented soy, and the problem goes away.

Diet and neutraceuticals raise complex questions that will not be resolved for a long time. My first exposure to the public health domain was a year in Nha Trang, as an Army health inspector during the war. Things have improved in the last half century, but one still cannot be confident about any statistic from a ‘third world’ regime.
On nutrition in general as preventive medicine, both extreme opinions are wrong — there are strong critiques for both the mainstream and alternative medical cultures. It would take a long time to go into that aspect. The short version is: The mainstream has conflicts of interest, regulatory capture, little or no support for substances that cannot be protected by a composition-of-matter patent, and a culture that is generally uneconomic. The alternative types are not doing appropriate research and sometimes lack educational qualification.
There is a lot of free information, however. For example, on Medline, enter
altern med rev [jour]
and get 507 hits, of which 478 are free pdf files that you can download. If the search term is neutraceuticals and the limitation or filter is free full text, there are still more than 10,000 hits. If you google the word ‘pubmed’ the first hit should have a link to the Medline search page.
There are also controversial or dissident doctors (regular MDs) who defend neutraceuticals. Two who are working today are Julian Whitaker and Jonathan V. Wright, see the wiki articles.
The classical dispute is ascorbate in high or massive IV doses. Antiviral effects were claimed in the mid-XXth century by Fred Klenner, MD, and a google search could find some of his early papers. They are too early for Medline, which also refuses to index papers from the journal of orthomolecular medicine. That can also be found through google, however. The late R. F. Cathcart, MD (d. 2007), still has a website
http://orthomed.com/
which has lots of links — and anger about the mainstream exclusion. Note the Belfield-Stone paper on animal therapy.
Dr. Thomas E. Levy has recently published a book on the extreme-dose ascorbate approach; the customer reviews on Amazon are mostly positive.
http://www.amazon.com/Curing-Incurable-Vitamin-Infectious-Diseases/dp/1401069630/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
There are other situations where a disease is said to be stabilized or a chronic inflammation mitigated by a neutraceutical. For example, one might try to stabilize Alzheimer’s Disease with a combination of alpha-lipoic acid and low-dose lithium, according to information that one can find on Medline or the Wright and Whitaker dissident websites. At the mainstream level, there are now Phase III trials of IV immunoglobulin, (IVIg, gamma globulin therapy), and there is preliminary evidence of efficacy. This approach would be very expensive — but, then, that is the idea.
Finally, the real disaster on a worldwide scale is the developmental and general health effects of micronutrient deficiency. The Copenhagen Consensus organized by the climate semi-skeptic, Lomborg, concluded that the best bang-for-the-buck in world improvement would be micronutrient supplements:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_Consensus
About two billion people out of the ~7 billion world population are brain damaged by micronutrient deficiency, my reading suggests. See also the Flynn Effect in the wikipedia and apply Occam’s razor to the fancier explanations.
Logan

David Archibald says:
December 12, 2012 at 3:19 pm
Matt Skaggs says:
December 12, 2012 at 8:29 am
There are four isoflavones: genistein, daidzein, formononotin and biochannin A. Your gut flora converts them to daughter metabolites. There is plenty of literature on anti-cancer effects of the daughter metabolites. Soy contains genistein and daidzein while chick peas have all four. The chick pea isoflavone profile is slightly better for osteoporosis than soy.
_________________________________
I am very happy to hear that. A favorite dish is TURKISH MOUSSAKA which contains chick peas.
Cinnamon BTW is thought to improves blood glucose, triglyceride, total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, and LDL cholesterol levels in people with type 2 diabetes.
I found it gets rid of the after meal crash common in hypoglycemia. It seems to “stabilize” blood sugar levels and also aids in weight loss when a low carb. diet quit working.
This is an interesting resource in what is in various veggies: http://www.phenol-explorer.eu/reports/40#onion-family vegetables

E.M.Smith says:
December 12, 2012 at 4:32 pm
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I agree whole heartedly. (So does my more recent blood work)
Animal fat also turns off hunger so you just do not eat as much. I think the rotten dietary habits are the main problem for Americans. Since WWII we have been eating more and more junk food. They even have candy and coke machines in the schools now and then want to put kids on Ritalin because they are bouncing off the walls.
Glad to hear about the lamb but I do not think my ram lambs will.

I eat Indian curry regularly which has tumeric and chili. Would be interested to see the condition incidence for the Indian sub-continent (incontinent!). 8% of the population will die of Introns. More than cancer and accidents. (mike Lynch KITP 1/2010). Also
Creating stem cells and predicting who will die of prostate cancer (free, stream on demand-Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics)
http://online.kitp.ucsb.edu/online/bblunch/levine2

i think boiling or cooking denatures dna, amirite?
stomach acid has a pH as low as 1.5, which also denatures dna, amirite?
unless somebody is mainlining corn, i’m not seeing a big threat.
on the other hand, starvation is serious, so there’s a good argument for increasing food supply, amirite?

Did you hear about Mad Salad Disease? It makes you climb into the bowl and toss yourself…

When evaluating the merits of foods, dietary practices, etc., one should always consider the effects on gut flora. Western maladies may be as much a result of medical and dietary insults to our inner “Whoville” (as in Horton Hears a Who) as to the presence or absence of nutrients, genetics, environmental factors, etc. Our little symbiotic friends are essential to health. They perform myriad beneficial functions including manufacturing vitamins, metabolizing otherwise indigestable nutrients, etc.
My interest in gut flora led me to begin brewing and consuming (with pleasure!) lactofermented beverages, particularly ginger beer, and therein lies a relevant anecdote. I had some commercial soda products lying about the house, leftovers from one of my sons’ social gatherings. Thinking I could turn the junk into something healthy through lactofermentation, I opened three bottles, let them outgas a bit, then inoculated them with some of my very active lactobacillus culture. Had they been mere flavored sugar water, they would have quickly begun fermenting and their sugar content reduced to be replaced by beneficial lactic acid compounds, etc. No such thing happened, even after weeks in a warm and dark environment. The likely explanation is of course that the sodas were “stabilized” by sorbates to prevent fermentation (“spoilage”). I couldn’t help wondering if sorbated commercial soft drinks might have the same effect in vivo, knocking our microbiotic friends– and thus our health– for a serious loop. Something to think about.
I also second the recommendation to check out the fascinating and sensible work of Dr. Weston A. Price (Nutrition and Physical Degeneration) and the organizations that follow in his footsteps: Price-Pottenger Foundation and the Weston A. Price Foundation. I also caution against an uncritical approach to the work of Ancel Keys, who I consider to be the Michael Mann of nutrition science, manipulating the results of his work in favor of low fat and vegetarian diets to the dire detriment of at least one generation’s health. For starters see

E.M.Smith says:
December 12, 2012 at 6:14 pm
@Gamecock:
Depends a bit on your personal ‘gut length’. I have a long one, so digest plants better. A friend had a very short one and what came out was a lot like what went in (expecially corn… he didn’t chew much either 😉
But generally, yes, we’re evolved toward cooked food. We’ll still get some out of the raw stuff (as we started from that pole) but not enough for full time…
===============================================================
This is seriously wrong. We have not evolved – or devolved – to anything. Our digestive abilities with cellulose date back 400,000,000 years.
“No vertebrate can digest the cell wall unassisted”
http://www.amjbot.org/content/93/10/1531.full

Iodine consumption is 75 times higher in Japanese diet versus US … Competing toxins bromide and fluoride block iodine uptake and build up in the glands. As extreme sugar consumption makes an acidic cancer-favorable environment in the body the severe deficiency of iodine interferes with glands doing what they do.
http://www.iodine-resource.com/

e.m.smith:
your response is a hodge-podge of inapplicable generalities. you’ve lapsed into mannian cya. you do that occasionally. it’s why i no longer frequent your place.
your sci fi fantasy might make a good script for The Day After The Day After Tomorrow
i flag your content as seriously misleading.
http://extension.entm.purdue.edu/GM/PDF/GMquestions.pdf
the cry protein is on a plasmid.
annealing doesn’t happen in acidic conditions.
that bacterium is everywhere and we’ve coevolved.
you could make a more credible case against polio vaccine.

Gamecock says:
December 13, 2012 at 3:25 am
….This is seriously wrong. We have not evolved – or devolved – to anything. Our digestive abilities with cellulose date back 400,000,000 years.
“No vertebrate can digest the cell wall unassisted”
http://www.amjbot.org/content/93/10/1531.full
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
As your link points out:

….The three digestive systems are the hindgut fermenters (HGFs) with relatively fast and variable gut passage rates and the foregut fermenters (FGFs), which are of two types: (1) the ruminants, with relatively controlled gut passage rates, which by regurgitating the food allow voluntary repetitive chewing of ingested food and (2) the non-ruminants, which can only chew the food at ingestion….
In small HGFs, which include many rodents and folivorous marsupials, there is selective retention of small particles in a part of the gut, the caecum, where fermentation of the cell wall by bacteria takes place…. Periodically, the caecal contents, rich in nitrogenous bacteria, are expelled, and the animal may consume the pellet and digest the bacteria in the small intestine. [They eat their own feces to recover nutrients gc]

I think all of us are aware of the bacteria in our gut that is absolutely necessary for the digestion of our food. Anyone dealing with horses vs cows is certainly aware of the difference four vs one stomach and cud chewing makes in digestion of plant matter.
Now back to what E.M. Smith said and evolution. There seems to be an update.

Evolution Of The Human Appendix: A Biological ‘Remnant’ No More
The lowly appendix, long-regarded as a useless evolutionary artifact, won newfound respect two years ago when researchers at Duke University Medical Center proposed that it actually serves a critical function. The appendix, they said, is a safe haven where good bacteria could hang out until they were needed to repopulate the gut after a nasty case of diarrhea, for example.
Now, some of those same researchers are back, reporting on the first-ever study of the appendix through the ages. Writing in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology, Duke scientists and collaborators from the University of Arizona and Arizona State University conclude that Charles Darwin was wrong: The appendix is a whole lot more than an evolutionary remnant. Not only does it appear in nature much more frequently than previously acknowledged, but it has been around much longer than anyone had suspected….
Using a modern approach to evolutionary biology called cladistics, which utilizes genetic information in combination with a variety of other data to evaluate biological relationships that emerge over the ages, Parker and colleagues found that the appendix has evolved at least twice, once among Australian marsupials and another time among rats, lemmings and other rodents, selected primates and humans. “We also figure that the appendix has been around for at least 80 million years, much longer than we would estimate if Darwin’s ideas about the appendix were correct.”
…..He also was not aware that appendicitis, or inflammation of the appendix, is not due to a faulty appendix, but rather due to cultural changes associated with industrialized society and improved sanitation. “Those changes left our immune systems with too little work and too much time their hands – a recipe for trouble,” says Parker.
That notion wasn’t proposed until the early 1900’s, and “we didn’t really have a good understanding of that principle until the mid 1980’s,” Parker said. “Even more importantly, Darwin had no way of knowing that the function of the appendix could be rendered obsolete by cultural changes that included widespread use of sewer systems and clean drinking water.”
Parker says now that we understand the normal function of the appendix, a critical question to ask is whether we can do anything to prevent appendicitis. He thinks the answer may lie in devising ways to challenge our immune systems today in much the same manner that they were challenged back in the Stone Age. “If modern medicine could figure out a way to do that, we would see far fewer cases of allergies, autoimmune disease, and appendicitis.”….

Article says more at : http://www.dukehealth.org/HealthLibrary/News/evolution_of_the_appendix_a_biological_remnant_no_more
but the link dumps you to the main page so I wonder if the original research was retracted. Would not be the first time.
Other links:
http://www.darwinthenandnow.com/tag/william-parker/
Actual paper: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?orig_db=PubMed&db=pubmed&cmd=Search&TransSchema=title&term=%22Journal+of+theoretical+biology%22%5BJour%5D+AND+Biofilms+in+the+large+bowel+
———
In browsing through the Duke Health library I came across this on cancer
Alphavirus-Based Vaccine May Slow Some Cancers
http://www.dukehealth.org/health_library/news/alphavirus_based_vaccine_may_slow_some_cancers
An experimental vaccine based on a virus that causes encephalitis in the wild appears to block tumor growth in some cases of advanced cancer, according to researchers at Duke University Medical Center.
Updated: July 28, 2010

more soylent green! says:
December 12, 2012 at 9:45 am
Charles Tossy says:
December 12, 2012 at 8:14 am
I think that thousands of years ago people lived to be hundreds of years old. Then the agricultural revolution happened and life span declined up to 90% because the human body is not optimized for the new diet.
The basis for this is?
, This is an opinion. If your species exists for millions of years on one diet then suddenly over a few years the diet completely changes, will the new food contain the micro-nutrients that the body is optimized to use?

Am late to the party but REALLY appreciate the post. It made me realize 2013 is a good year to do some fasting. Build up the energy to get through it. There’s nothing like it, when you learn how to tap it. Makes you feel like 100 years old is certainly possible.
http://www.allaboutfasting.com/index.html

I did my M.S. on increasing nodulation of soybeans with flavonoids. Prior to initiating the study and while writing the thesis, I was forced to do a significant amount of background reading (of course!). One of the studies I read that caught my eye concerned the higher incidence of stomach cancer in Japanese compared to Americans. The study involved feeding varying amounts of soy sauce to rats, under the hypothesis that soy sauce caused stomach cancer and the Japanese ate more of it. The results were counter to the hypothesis, in that there was lower incidence of stomach cancer in rats fed soy sauce. (As an aside, I tend to have more faith in studies where the results are not what was expected). As part of my research I developed an HPLC program that seperated flavonoids (nols, ones, etc) quite well because some flavonoids I wanted were unavailable commercially. In my thesis studies, flavonoids significantly (2-3X) induced nodulation in soybeans. So for some fun I ran soybean sauce through the HPLC. Apparently the fermentation process concentrates flavonoids as the level was very high.
So label me a believer. Do some web surfing, then eat cucurbits or broccolli with tumeric and drink red wine to live forever.
(Understand, there is also unquestionably a genetic predisposition for cancer)

@Tim Clark: Actually, I’d completely reverse what your mom said 🙂
For the cancer side of things, in general, cancerous growths are simply unavoidable in humans. That being said, they don’t start going really haywire until you give them a high blood sugar environment to live in. Cancer cells *literally* have a better ability than normal cells to process blood sugar – http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/06/120626131854.htm
Funny, though, instead of just advising you stop eating whatever is increasing your blood sugar levels (starches and sugars), they’re focusing cancer research on stopping cancer from taking advantage of high blood sugar (as if it must simply be a given that that happens). It’s like, no matter what their research discovers, they simply tweak their model to avoid concluding that cereals, whole grains, and other sugary fruits are bad for you 🙂

Gail Combs says:
December 13, 2012 at 8:08 am
I think all of us are aware of the bacteria in our gut that is absolutely necessary for the digestion of our food. Anyone dealing with horses vs cows is certainly aware of the difference four vs one stomach and cud chewing makes in digestion of plant matter.
==============================================================
This has nothing to do with humans.
“Even though humans eat cellulose, the contribution to cellulose digestion by both the human caecum and its associated appendix is negligible.”
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/vestiges/appendix.html#background
Additionally, attributing wonderful functions for the human vermiform appendix, such as special contributions to the immune system, is bogus.
http://surgeonsblog.blogspot.com/2007/02/god-of-appendix-of-truth-and-worms.html
My original comment concerned E.M.Smith’s statement:
“But generally, yes, we’re evolved toward cooked food. We’ll still get some out of the raw stuff (as we started from that pole) but not enough for full time…”
Reduction of the caecum and appendix in primates to vestigial state precedes cooking by millions of years. We aren’t the only apes with vestigial appendixes. To my knowledge, none of the others ever cooked.

Important to note that there is no such thing as an ideal universal human diet; there’s simply too many different types of humans. Most SE Asians lose the ability to create the lactose digesting enzyme before reaching adulthood. Some Mediterranean folk are severely allergic to broad beans (AKA fava beans) though not everyone with the genetic defect causing this is so allergic. And so on…
Best book on food I’ve read in a long time: Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human by Richard Wrangham.

@The Pompous Git: “Most SE Asians lose the ability to create the lactose digesting enzyme before reaching adulthood.”
Fun fact (albeit n=2) – reducing my carbohydrate intake eliminated my lactose intolerance. Even worked for my wife. I had never been able to eat cheese or dairy without severe intestinal distress, and that just plan *vanished*. Never would’ve thought it possible, but it would be fascinating to see that sort of “off-label” treatment studied.

I was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer about 11 months ago. At that point my PSA reading was 56. Cancer had metastasized into my ribs and pelvis. Oncologists put me on their standard protocol of Luperon and Zometa. It was recommended to me that I supplement with AveMar Ultra, taken with Pomegranate or Cranberry juice. AveMar Ultra is fermented wheat germ. After measuring 56, my PSa dropped to 23, then 16 and has been in a range between 8 and 10 since then. I’m 74 now and feel well enough that I think I’ll die of something else before the cancer gets me. I would love to hear from others who have been supplementing with AveMar Ultra.

Zeke said @ December 14, 2012 at 10:33 am

The study is meant to have a little slightly retaliatory fun because I get tired of having studies thrown at me all of the time about what I should do with my life down to the last little watt and rice grain and air molecule.

If what you say is tongue-in-cheek, perhaps you should say so. Sorry for not immediately seizing on that you were making fun. As it happens, I too tire of people telling this libertarian what to do (and think).
However, you have failed to provide support for your thesis regarding being forced by law to purchase and consume organic produce at twice the price you are prepared to pay. The link you provide is to agreements regarding low-input sustainable agriculture (LISA) and this is not organic agriculture as defined by law. LISA advocates use artificial fertilisers, synthetic pesticides and herbicides eschewed by organic practitioners. However, I’m happy to play your little game.
Back in 1980 if memory serves, we had an agricultural conference in Adelaide under the auspices of IFOAM. It was well attended by farmers of every ilk and we had many interesting farm walks on LISA and organic farms. Attendees from overseas remarked on how well we all got along as similar events in Europe and North America had the various camps all at loggerheads with no serious communication occurring.
Sam Jericho is a LISA farmer on the Eyre Peninsula of South Australia where he grows wheat using no-till. The wheat is drilled into sod killed with herbicide, rather than killing the sod by mechanical ploughing hence it’s often called chemical ploughing. As well, Sam’s father had planted out many shelter belts of trees, commencing this in the 1920s.
The ABC radio reporter who was on the walk with us asked Sam if he would have made more money farming the way his neighbours had. Sam said it was likely he would have, “…but I’d only have spent it!” It’s of note that, in this particular season, the area was deeply drought affected and Sam’s neighbours didn’t have a crop worth harvesting, sending some into bankruptcy. Sam had a 30 bag/acre crop to harvest. Yes, Sam’s neighbours’ crops were heavier than his in a good year, but Sam had a crop to sell when prices were at their highest due to drought when they had nothing to sell.
You see Zeke, maximum yield of crop per acre is not the farmer’s goal. His (or her) goal is to have more money in the bank at the end of the year than was there at the beginning. The goal of the agro-chemical industry is to maximise its profits at the expense of the farmer. As for LISA and organic farmers having a crop to sell in difficult years rather than no crop at all, I fail utterly to understand how this “doubles prices”. I also note that almost every organic farmer I have talked with has been proud of their low level of debt. Almost every conventional farmer I have with has been heavily in debt and suffered badly during the world financial crises during the last 30 years.

Don says:December 13, 2012 at 12:04 am
[…]The likely explanation is of course that the sodas were “stabilized” by sorbates to prevent fermentation (“spoilage”). I couldn’t help wondering if sorbated commercial soft drinks might have the same effect in vivo, knocking our microbiotic friends– and thus our health– for a serious loop. Something to think about.
Brings to mind ruminations regarding the effect of chlorine in the drinking water. Obviously the overall result is beneficial to health with regard to harmful bacteria and viruses. But what is the effect on the gut?

Hey just wanted to give you a quick heads up. The text in your post seem to be running off the
screen in Chrome. I’m not sure if this is a formatting issue or something to do with internet browser compatibility but I figured I’d post to let you know.
The layout look great though! Hope you get the problem solved soon.
Cheers

Rick said @ December 14, 2012 at 9:02 pm

It has been conservatively estimated that eliminating modern farm practices like using chemicals and fertilizers would cut world food production by 1/3 and would increase food prices by 50%. Billions of people around the world are struggling to maintain food security now. Imagine the predicament the world would face with food price inflation of that magnitude.

Apart from the ecoloonies, agrochemical companies, and people like you and Zeke nobody is contemplating “eliminating modern farm practices like using chemicals and fertilizers”. All farmers, organic, LISA, as well as conventional use fertilisers, pesticides, tractors… Here’s a few of the industrial chemicals used by organic farmers:
Copper sulphate, basic slag (byproduct of iron smelting), sodium silicate, sodium bicarbonate, potassium permanganate, potassium stearate, iron chelate… Oh dear, not so “chemical-free” is it?
The single most important crop-limiting factor is water. If you are worried about food security, worry about that! As it happens, there is, as Willis has pointed out elsewhere on this site, no looming world food shortage. The world’s food problems are those of distribution (the poor got no money to buy it) and overproduction that keeps prices low so farmers make sweet fanny adams in the way of income without subsidies from the government. That is, you pay less for your food at the shop, but more in taxes to the government. And guess what the government record is like in this regard. This attempt at scary shit is worthy of.. oh, an Al Gore, a Micky the Mannikin?
And just for the record, I have inspected the results of many agricultural trials, including in some cases withheld data. The agrochemical companies only allow the publication of the results they want promulgated. It’s widely known in farming circles that herbicides reduce cereal yields/acre. As I wrote earlier, it’s not about yields/acre, it’s about the excess of income above expenditure. And even that might not be obvious from a short-term trial.
Back in the mid 80s I came across two 30 year long cereal trials in Europe. The control plots received no fertiliser nor were crop residues handled organically. The fertilised plots were fed the recommended rate of artificial NPK. Yes, there was a yield increase (15% IIRC), but that was insufficient to pay for the fertiliser, never mind the cost of applying the fertiliser!
I note with somewhat grim amusement that some years ago the vegetable growers on the North West Coast of Tasmania were persuaded to use high-analysis fertilisers. Naturally they cost a lot more per unit of N, P & K than the ordinary fertilisers they were used to, but they were assured that because they would spend less time applying the much smaller volume, they would be ahead financially. Unfortunately, the crop responses to the new fertiliser was to say the least, disappointing. Turned out that most of the crop response to the old superphosphate was down to its sulphur content. There being no sulphur in the high-analysis fertiliser, yields went down. There’s nothing quite like a good plummet, I always say.
I live among farmers, on a farm, so I have a different perspective than city-slickers who, by and large, are completely clueless when it comes to farming Frankly, you and Zeke are no better than the woman who phoned me to ask what organic sprays to use for organic apple production. When I explained that it was much more than sprays, it was an integrated approach requiring attention to fertilisers, varieties and past land use, she interrupted me to say she wanted to tell her neighbour what to use so she wouldn’t have to put up with his nasty chemicals. I asked who her neighbour was and when she told me I fell about with laughter. Her neighbour was an organic orchardist! So it goes…

Re: WordPress and Chrome: I’m using Chrome and this site has always looked fine to me!
Re: Pompous Git and Lentillists: **LOVE** it! :>
Re: Chlorine in our water: Did you know that suburban neighborhoods that allow swimming pools expose their children to 1,417% more deadly chlorine gas (Outlawed in war by the Geneva conventions!) than suburban neighborhoods that ban swimming pools? Do you love your children? Join Ban The Pools today!
;>
MJM
P.S. Yes, I made up the 1,417% number… but it could well be true! Play it safe: live with hippies who don’t take showers!

Rick said @ December 15, 2012 at 7:46 am

“It’s widely known in farming circles that herbicides reduce cereal yields/acre.”
Could you please link to the sources that would support that statement. How do herbicide companies remain in business when the use of their products reduces yield?

Since Googling “herbicide grain yield” seems beyond your Googling ability:
http://www.daff.qld.gov.au/documents/PlantIndustries_FieldCropsAndPasture/Sensitivity-barley-wheat-cultivars-herbicides.pdf
As with most research, the questions that arise are interesting. How did they obtain weed-free ground for the control plots? Methyl bromide? What is the history of herbicide use in these plots? Glyphosate (Roundup), for example, accumulates in the soil leading to long-term disease problems in wheat crops.(smut, rust, bunt etc.) Fungal diseases are more prevalent in some years than others; some are controllable, but at the expense of spraying fungicide; some are controllable by changing to another variety, but different varieties differ in yield.
Herbicide companies remain in business because, unlike you, they know that the farmer is not at all interested in maximising yield. Here’s a link to the world record tomato grower Charles Wilber:
http://home.comcast.net/~pobrien48/Tomatoes_World_Record.htm
Now, ask yourself: “if maximising yield is what it’s all about, why don’t all tomato growers use the same technique as Mr Wilber? Why do they tolerate yields of less than 5% of Mr Wilber’s crop?” See my previous comments for the answers.

Zeke said @ December 15, 2012 at 11:01 am

Corn yields in bushels per acre since WWII have increased by a factor of 5. Countries that were unable to grow enough wheat to support themselves have become net exporters of wheat after the Green Revolution. This includes the use of dwarf varieties, the use of chemical fertilizers, and the use of pesticides. Wheat rust is a nasty disgusting beast – including 100′s of varieties – that has been vanquished largely due to the scientific genious and vison of Drs Stakman and Borlaug, and to allow it to come back because of this misplaced faith in the glories of organic farming would be a devastation to the grains on which so many lives depend. I have no problem with other people sticking to their own diets. I never, ever buy organic and the food I prefer often comes from several continents. We are each paying an additional 1,000 bucks a year in higher gas prices, and food prices are climbing, while taxes are increasing and power bills are also getting higher. Respect my decision not to eat organic, as I respect others’ decisions to go on a Paleo or a raw food diet or an organic regimen. Reading this thread is sufficient to illustrate that no one agrees, and the science is not settled, on the best diet or the best way to treat any given disease. Preserving individual liberty is the best default in this case.
I am speaking because the Sustainable Agriculture push is beginning right now, and is being carried out, like the co2 regulation perpetrated on us by the EPA, by unelected, unaccountable offices and officials in the EU and in the US.

What makes you think that organic grain farmers don’t use modern varieties wheat? Are you aware that an estimated 15% of that increase has come from the increase in atmospheric CO2?How do you avoid eating organically grown food? Do you avoid eating in restaurants?
http://www.rickstein.com/Eggs.html
Currently I’m quaffing some very excellent 2008 Viking Grand Shiraz. It comes from a vineyard that is biodynamic (even more organic than organic according to its practitioners). The grapes in Viking used to be sold to Penfolds where they were included in the justifiably famous Grange Hermitage. I note that the same vintage Grange is selling for nearly $4,000 a case overseas. I paid $240/case for the Viking. Is the Grange a superior wine? Yes, but not by very much. When you buy your Grange (or equivalent), how do you know that it doesn’t contain any organically grown grapes? Is $4,000 really only a little over $240? Hint: the rapidity of conversion to organic by Australian grape growers has amazed me, though since I know why they are converting, it shouldn’t: higher yields and an increase in quality.
In my fridge is a piece of Italian ham (prosciutto) from Italy, a country in a different continent than Australia. As it happens, this too is organic, though it’s not labelled organic. How do you avoid this problem of food that’s organic, but not labelled as such? Are you psychic? Or do you just avoid high quality food? Note that just because the food you buy is from a different continent doesn’t mean it’s necessarily conventionally grown. I’m not alone in growing organically, but not bothering with organic certification required if you want to label your produce as organic.
Yes, food prices are rising, though I note not as fast as energy prices and they impact all farmers! This has absolutely nothing to do with the move towards more sustainable agriculture that began several decades ago. LISA was and is about reducing costs and improving the farmer’s bottom line. And, once more, LISA does not equate to organic. Examples:
Broccoli growers in the Lockyer Vally, Queensland were experiencing increased resistance to synthetic pesticides by aphids. The solution adopted was to alternate rows of broccoli with rows of rape. The rape wasn’t harvested; it was grown because it was particularly attractive for predators that consumed the aphids. While yield/hectare went down, the cost per kilo to produce the broccoli fell even more, so the farmer’s bottom line improved.
My neighbours are apple growers and during a Christmas party conversation many years ago, one asked me what I’d use to control Light Brown Apple Moth. I told him that I would use Dipel (Monsanto’s brand of Bacillus Thuringiensis var. Berliner). I also told him that it would cost a lot more than malathion, but it was available in bulk from the local rural supplies store. It wasn’t until a couple of years later that I got around to asking my neighbour if he’d tried using Dipel. His face broke into a large grin as he told me that far from being more expensive, because he only needed to apply it far less often than malathion, it worked out far cheaper in use. He also liked that he didn’t have to wear his “space-suit” while applying it.
While you might wish to dictate to farmers what they should, or shouldn’t use, I have only ever told my neighbours what I thought when they requested it. As one of them told me years ago, about a decade after I bought the farm, “We just watched what you were doing and ended up copying you.” His brother came to me several years later and showed me the results of a petiole analysis from one of their orchards. He asked me what fertiliser I’d apply based on the result. I said: “Nothing.” He replied: “That’s what I was going to do.” The yield from that orchard was a record crop. The following year was almost a complete repeat: the second biggest harvest ever. The goal in orcharding is producing fruit, not wood and leaves at the expense of fruit, which is what applying fertiliser, organic or artificial, would have achieved.

Rick said @ December 15, 2012 at 2:43 pm

Southern Queensland Australia must be a fertile farming area or they wouldn’t be testing and selling herbicides.
…
If these test plot results are the smoking gun against herbicides for this area in Australia why do farmers continue to purchase these products in this area?
In our neck of the woods, organic farming is not exactly mainstream and I’m guessing that Southern Queensland Australia is no different.

Perhaps you should have read what I wrote above more closely. “As with most research, the questions that arise are interesting. How did they obtain weed-free ground for the control plots? Methyl bromide?” Some method of preplant weed suppression would appear to have been used. If it was methyl bromide, or steam sterilisation, then that would have suppressed yield. In that case, what was being compared was one yield-suppressor versus a different weed-suppressor.
What I was thinking of when I passed the original remark was the conversation that occurred between conventional and organic wheat/sheep farmers at the IFOAM conference in Adelaide in 1980. The conventional growers asked the organic growers “what do you do about smut, rust, yellow-spot?” etc. The organic growers all reported no problems. Note well that this does not mean these diseases were necessarily entirely absent; just that controlling them was economically unviable because they were occurring at such a low level.
When farmers conduct trials on their own properties it’s in the context of their individual whole farm operation. The farmer isn’t just applying herbicide to a crop, they are also applying fertilisers, often including foliar nutrients, organic and inorganic as well as pesticides. Unsurprisingly, they all interact and often in unpredictable ways. At Grove, the agronomists identified thirteen variables affecting the results from apple thinning sprays. I don’t know of a single orchardist who ever even attempted to evaluate their use of thinning sprays on the basis of those thirteen independent variables.
I became aware of the downside of soil sterilisation when there was a trial of specific transplant controls here in the Huon Valley. When you transplant a young tree into existing orchard it will not thrive. The “traditional” method was to sterilise the soil with methyl bromide. The study looked at that versus a commercial compost called OR90 and a commercial pelletised poultry manure product called Dynamic Lifter. I told the agronomist the orange ruffy (a fish) had shown herbicidal properties when used on pasture at a friend’s farm. Indeed, it exhibited similar properties after having been composted with eucalyptus bark, that contains a natural herbicide, Anywho, the first year the methyl bromide and poultry manured trees were neck and neck, both well ahead of the control and OR90. By the third year, the poultry manured trees were way ahead. SE Queensland agronomists replicated the trial a year, or so later.
Yes, you can kill everything in the soil: earthworms, actinomycetes, mycorrhizae, etc, but there’s a cost to this as there is to everything.

In terms of diet and cancer, remember that “there is no safe level” for any Class A Carcinogen, including such things as sunshine and ethyl alcohol. The latter element is present in quite measurable quantities in orange juice. If you give your child a nice glass of OJ every morning, by the end of the year you’ll have given then the rough equivalent of a pint of Guinness Stout.
So not only are you getting your little children drunk, you’re giving them cancer.
Of course my REAL point is that worrying about such things is simply neurotic.
– MJM

Zeke said @ December 15, 2012 at 6:35 pm

“While you might wish to dictate to farmers what they should, or shouldn’t use…”
I have communicated precisely the opposite and have repeatedly emphasized individual decisions in matters of diet and medicine on this thread, which is on topic because the study here is about a potential link between diet and cancer.
I am defending because I know it would be disastrous for the USDA to begin to systematically take away food choices and reverse agricultural advancements, and drive up prices by implementing Agenda 21/Sustainable Ag/Rio +20.
I wish more students would learn about Lysenko, Stalin, Mao, and the disastrous effects of government using science to destroy the food supply.

Discussed this with some friends. Their take was that US and European farmers are on the government teat and so likely will reap the consequences; he who pays the piper calls the tune. Australian farmers are not subsidised by government.
Your original claim was that organic and LISA would lead to a dramatic decline in food production. I demurred and pointed to the examples of the world record tomato grower and Sam Jericho having a worthwhile harvest when his neighbours didn’t. You have provided no counterexamples. I do agree that implementing ecoloony policies would be a disaster. The fact that they promote organic/LISA doesn’t mean they understand what organic/LISA actually entail and you conflated the two concepts yourself. I can remember one ecoloony who wrote to me that they favoured biodynamic agriculture because “it’s animal-free”. BD is centred on the use of preparation 500 manufactured by filling cow horns with cow manure and burying them over the winter!
On your latter point I agree. But be aware that it was the overzealous promotion of synthetic pesticides, fertilisers and herbicides led to a backlash among farmers and agronomists that peaked here several decades ago here. Growers didn’t take up the then new methods of LISA/organic/IPM because of government mandates; they did so because they gave improved profitability and other benefits. The researchers at Grove here in the Huon Valley told me in the late 80s they had ceased chemical research back in the 60s in favour of research into biological controls for pests such as the introduction of predator mites and methods of avoiding killing pollinators by selecting appropriate insecticides and alternate row spraying.
I became involved when James Wong developed a new spray regime that substituted agricultural lime for most of the fungicidal sprays then used in the apple orchards. The optimum result was the traditional copper, followed by one (sometimes two) conventional fungicide applications and after that several applications of lime solution. The organic producers merely omitted the conventional fungicide. Or, as in my case, used sodium silicate. Incidentally, the lime spray also eliminated codlin moth as the newly hatched grubs, like the fungal spores, couldn’t tolerate the high pH on the apple surface. Despite your assertion that the organic producers should have been harvesting only half what the conventional orchardists were, I never saw any evidence of a significant difference in yields. As I pointed out early in this thread, the major crop-limiting factor is water.
At that time I was asked to deliver papers to conferences held by the Australian Institute of Agricultural Scientists and Australasian Institute of Plant Physiologists among others. They were well-received The only hostility I experienced came from the ecoloons who claimed that I was “rubbing shoulders with the enemy”. A couple of years ago I was invited to undertake a doctorate in agriculture despite my lacking a relevant degree. I demurred because I find my more recent research into the history and philosophy of science more fascinating.
The new improvements to orchard practise led to pack out rates of between 90 and 95% compared to 60% of the previous decade. Unfortunately, world markets have changed since then and this is the first year that Tasmania (The Apple Isle) hasn’t exported any apples overseas. The largest orchardist went into receivership a couple of years ago and many have had to leave the industry. The organic growers who rely on local markets continue to increase their market share and remain profitable. A similar story applies on the North West Coast where the major vegetable processor relocated to New Zealand. The rubbing of hands among the NZ growers didn’t last long as the vegetables being processed are imported from China. So it goes…

@ michaeljmcfadden
The Git delights in teasing the ecoloons with the following observation. There is a demonstrated link between stress level and incidence of cancer. By frightening people about potential carcinogenic properties of agricultural chemicals ecoloons are definitely increasing the cancer rate in the general population, directly contradicting their purported desire to reduce cancer rates. When I was on the Aerial Spraying Implementation Group, we had the Menzies Institute conduct a literature search on agricultural chemicals and cancer. All they came up with was a potential link between non-Hodgkins Lymphoma and agricutural workers who applied glyphosate (Roundup) more than 20 times (IIRC) per annum. Apparently this cancer is rare, so the result may not have been statistically significant. Given that all the research into the negative effects of glyphosate appear to arise from the surfactant used with glyphosate it would seem sensible to discover a safer surfactant than to ban the use of glyphosate.

My late friend Bert Farquhar owned 30,000 ha of pastoral land in NE Tasmania. Mike Temple-Smith from the Department of Primary Industry assisted Bert to introduce earthworms into the paddocks at Wyambi/Rushy Lagoon increasing the fertility of the soil by 25%. Following his acquisition of the property for a record (in Australia) 10.1 million dollars, Bert also built a 128 km long irrigation scheme that ultimately doubled the stock carrying capacity. According to Zeke & Rick, the stock carrying capacity should have halved. A brief summary of Bert’s life here:
http://www.abc.net.au/rural/legends/stories/13_2.htm
While the pine plantations Bert established get a brief mention, the Forestry Commission were also planting pinus radiata back in the day. Bert’s thrived and the Commission’s pines failed to. Bert would take a walnut-sized lump of soil from under a mature thriving pine and put it into the planting hole with every pine seedling. According to Forestry, this was “muck and mystery” and “unscientific” so for a decade the Forestry Commission wasted much taxpayers’ money planting out trees to die of starvation regardless of the amount of fertiliser applied at planting.
These days we know that what Bert was doing was inoculating the soil with a mycorrhizum, a beneficial soil organism that plays a vital role in organic production systems. Mycorrhizae trade phosphorus from the soil for carbohydrates from the plant’s roots.

Zeke said @ December 16, 2012 at 2:23 pm

Pompous Git:
I did bring up the most deadly pathogen, rust, and neither have you responded to how your existing system will protect against 300 varieties of constantly interbreeding, migrating wind born varieties of this deadly killer. Likewise, as can be seen by the potato famines, one single plant infected with blight is sufficient to infect thousands of local plants, as well as plants at very great distances. These are both very genetically diverse and have claimed many lives.
The organic approach is fine for small areas of voluntary participants, but as a national policy would lay our country open to previously vanquished smut, scab, rust, blast, blight, bunt, wilt, mildew and the rest. We know that malaria was at one time nearly eradicated, claiming at its lowest point 50,000 deaths in the world. Malaria now takes the lives of millions per year. It is in the letting down of our guard, through woeful ignorance of our past sufferings, history, and enemies, that the destruction is brought back.
I have no arguments against organic farmers, just as I have no bones with any one who is able to meet their own electrical requirements with solar power. However, neither of these technologies are ready, and may never be. The reasons for reversing, removing, and replacing our present systems is not settled science, either. Therefore, I am not conflating anything, but arguing against national implementation of local-only, organic, water restriction, and other Sustainable Agricultural policies supported by the UN.
Organic farming has its place and niche market, like renewables or dietary cures for cancer. Once again, I am not arguing against your research or successes. Why would I do that? I am certain that individual farmers can be responsible and not become breeders of blight. But the government has proven to be totally irresponsible on many occasions, such as its unwillingness to spray bark or Aisian Longhorn beetles, allowing them to wipe out whole forests here in the US under its management. Then, – it blames the fires on global warming!
It just isn’t ready, and it is most importantly, not necessary to remake our energy or our agricultural sectors.

Actually, I did respond to your remark regarding rust & other wheat pathogens.

What I was thinking of when I passed the original remark was the conversation that occurred between conventional and organic wheat/sheep farmers at the IFOAM conference in Adelaide in 1980. The conventional growers asked the organic growers “what do you do about smut, rust, yellow-spot?” etc. The organic growers all reported no problems. Note well that this does not mean these diseases were necessarily entirely absent; just that controlling them was economically unviable because they were occurring at such a low level.

Now I can claim no special expertise in wheat growing; I am reporting what was said by wheat growers at a major agricultural conference. I can also report that not very long after this, the breakfast cereal manufacturer Uncle Tobys began manufacturing its big seller Vita Brits made with 100% organically grown wheat. Hitherto, most of these wheat growers had sold their produce to the AWB where it became indistinguishable from the conventional wheat it inevitably became mixed with. You claim that you never eat organic produce and despite my asking how you determine the provenance of the food you presumably eat, have not indicated how you can tell.
You say you are not arguing against my research or successes, but you claim that organic production reduces yields by 50% and increases prices by 100% without providing a single shred of evidence to that effect. You are merely parroting what the manufacturers of agvet chemicals assert. I also gave the anecdote when I discovered that the PRO for AVCA admitted to me that the anti-organic diatribes he engaged in when we both were writing for the local rural newspaper were entirely bogus and made up. He merely wrote what he was being paid to write.
Your remarks about late blight in potatoes seem to indicate that you believe an organic potato farmer would just sit and watch his crop die from it. Just how stupid do you think we are? Like their conventional counterparts organic producers control blight with copper-based sprays, the more modern ones being preferable to Bordeaux since far less copper is applied to the crop and copper is toxic to earthworms. In thirty years I have had late blight on only one occasion, the year I commenced market gardening when it rained for 28 days in the first month of spring. Since I’m not the idiot you think I am, I grabbed some copper oxychloride that all apple growers, organic and conventional, apply to their trees each spring and put it on the spuds. That crop of spuds yielded close to 10 pounds per square foot, a far from trivial yield and one I have only rarely bettered.
You also state that it’s OK for small scale growers to be organic which would seem to imply that you disapprove of farmers like my late friend Bert Farquhar. Wyambi/Rushy Lagoon carried 8,000 cattle and 50,000 sheep, more than double the numbers when run by the previous owners British Tobacco and the Cascade Brewery. How do you reconcile this with your claim that organic reduces yields by 50%? Incidentally, not all of Wyambi/Rushy Lagoon was managed organically. The very sandy coastal strip was extremely phosphorus deficient so Bert applied super-phosphate there. He was the largest single purchaser of super-phosphate in Tasmania when he did that.
Finally, you are bitching about the UN and the US government. Really, I couldn’t give a rat’s left testicle unless they get in my face and try to tell me what to do and how to do it. I have far too few years left in me to waste my time on lunatic fantasists. You refer to the government being irresponsible and I can only agree.

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