The World is Obsessed with Death

It's everywhere. You can't seem to go very far or do very much in this world without seeing or hearing about death. Death seems to be a popular subject throughout the world.

For example if you walk into a grocery store the first thing you see is a refrigerator or freezer filled with death. There are dead fish piled up high, dead shrimp, dead clams, dead crabs. In another section of the same store there are parts of muscles of dead animals. Pieces of animals' legs, chests, rumps, thighs, and even some entire bodies or heads of animals that are dead.

If you go to the cleaning products aisle there are products that that say that they kill 99.9% of germs. There are products that say they kill viruses, they kill pests like rats, mice, insects and the like.

There are stores totally devoted to killing that sell 'sporting' goods to kill anything and everything in any size. There are handguns, shotguns, bows and arrows, electical guns, poisons, traps, and other assorted killing equipment.

Most people will sit down to 'enjoy' a plate full of death. There are dead animals in most of their dishes as well as other assorted dead foods that have had their life forces destroyed by heat from cooking.

Everything that has been cooked or heated is dead and has very little value to the human body in that state. Few if any life forms will consume these dead products. Most carnivores will only eat a dead prey animal after it has recently been killed. They rarely will eat an animal that was already dead except in a situation where they are nearly starving to death themselves.

Of course there are a few exceptions such as vultures which survive off of the scraps of already dead animals but few species behave this way.

Why then are humans so obsessed with death? We have death sports like hunting and fishing where the primary objective is to kill another being for the purpose of sport and entertainment.

Most humans however do not and will not participate in the killing of their food. They prefer to have someone else do the dirty work and kill by proxy. They allow the butchers and slaughterhouse employees to do the killing for them. This is still killing but most people will never admit to being a killer.

Besides all of this there are dog fights that usually end in one or more of the dogs dying. Hundreds of people will pour into a basement or an outdoor ring to watch these dog fights and see violence and death.

Besides the dog fights are the chicken fights. People actually train chickens to peck each other to death when they meet another fight chicken. Eventhough these are illegal in most of the USA still there are many illegal chicken fights still in operation in most of the country.

In cultures such as the hispanic culture there are bullfights. These 'fights' are not really fights but an unecessary slaughter of a helpless bull. The bull fighter is equipped with swords and other lethal weapons but the bull is only equipped with it's natural defenses which are it's strength and it's horns. There is practically no chance of one of these bulls ever 'winning' one of these competitions. Still thousands or even millions of people attend these bloody events in the name of entertainment.

On the streets of Asia you can see the sales of sometimes live and often dead animals to be used for food or other possibly religious ceremonies.

Nearly every Hollywood movie is chock full of violence and death. There are vehicles blowing up, people being shot, stabbed, burned, hung, run over and killed in every new creative way possible.

When a convict is killed everyone wants to see the procedures in countries and states where the death penalty is still legal. The obituary pages of the newspapers of the world are some of the most popular pages of the newspaper. In fact my parents look at that section before they look at even the first page of the newspaper.

What is so exciting about death? Why don't we have a world that is obsessed with life? Why can't we all agree that life is the way to go and eliminate all of the death? Of course death is totally natural and is the end of life but we don't need to be so obsessed with it. In order to actually have a healthy and happy life, no death is ever needed, we can eat healthy and tasty food that totally comes from plants in their natural state. We can enjoy many sports that do not require another being to suffer or die. There is no need to present death as a glamorous way to entertain ourselves.

Death is not something to sensationalize, it is something we need to recognize but then move on and concentrate on life and the living. Does anyone disagree with this?

How Much Water Should One Drink?

I already addressed this topic on my original blog, but unfortunately the URL has been taken down and is no longer accessible. I decided to post a new posting on water because most people do not understand how much water we need or do not need.

If you follow the mainstream they will always recommend that we drink at least 8 glasses (8 US ounces) of water a day. This amounts to about 2 liters of water a day. This recommendation of course is based on the typical American diet, which is a very highly concentrated diet of processed foods with tons of added salt, spices, additives and condiments.

In fact this recommended amount of water is probably way too low for the average American dieter. In order to clean out all of the toxins that they consume a lot more water than that is necessary. Almost all cooked food (except for boiled or steamed vegetables and possibly rice) is extremely dehydrated. For each ounce of cooked food at least 2 to 3 ounces of water are needed just to rehydrate the food.

More water than that is needed to help the body eliminate the toxins and the resultant toxins from our metabolism of these foods. In fact the recommendation is off by about 100%, at least 16 glasses (8 US ounces) should be consumed a day when eating a cooked diet.

If you are not on a cooked food diet or a dehydrated food diet (as the gourmet raw diet) and you consume only fresh, ripe, raw whole foods like fruits and vegetables then your need for water drops. Most fruits are full of water as are most vegetables.

If you live in a cooler or moderate climate and you do not do a lot of extremely difficult work or exercise then your recommended consumption of water would not be very high. This also depends on what kinds of fruits you are eating that day.

If your diet consists of a lot of low water fruits like dates and bananas then you will need to drink water to make sure you are hydrated well. If on the other hand you consume only very high water content fruits like citrus, mangoes, papaya, etc. then your need for water goes way down.

In fact if we still consumed the 8 or 16 glasses of water a day with a diet of high water content fruits you would actually be hurting yourself and not helping by over taxing your kidneys.

If your urine is clear and you go urinate at least 8 to 14 times a day then there would be no need to drink more water. That would only cause your elimination organs to unecessarily work harder than they should. Every organ of the body except the heart and lungs needs to have a rest, forcing the kidneys to work all day long is preventing them from getting sufficient rest.

Judge for yourself. If you are seeing clear urine and you urinate between 8 and 14 times a day then you do not need to drink more water. Waking up once or twice a night to urinate is also normal and not a sign of something wrong.

Do not just go out and drink more water just because somebody is telling you to, make sure that you are hydrated well by checking the color of your urine and how often you urinate. Depending on your level of activity and the climate where you live the amount can range from less than half of a liter to as much as 3 or 4 liters a day.

Why Are So Many People Sick, Overweight and Obese?

When I speak of the typical diet in this post I am speaking of the typical diet of most Americans or even most North Americans, which includes Canada and Mexico. Although Mexicans consume a very different diet from Americans and Canadians, they do not consume a diet that is compatible with a human digestive system.

I live in the southwestern part of the United States now. This area is close to the state of Texas. Most people know Texas as the state which includes lots of cowboys. There are ranches and cattle farms everywhere in Texas.

One of the typical restaurants in Texas is known as Rudy's. Their web site is www.rudys.com There are branches of this restaurant in other states such as Colorado, Oklahoma, and New Mexico.

They have their menu available on the web site. Most of the items available are heavy on the animal flesh. In fact most of the dishes are predominantly meat from a cow. They have a couple of chicken, turkey and pork dishes listed on the menu but most of their specialty is the good old cowboy favorite, beef.

Most of the items on the menu are listed as 1/2 pound of meat.

I decided to check their nutritional information to see what the average customer of this restaurant is getting when they eat one of the meals there. I am really only interested in the percentage of fat. Fat is probably the most important nutrient for human health. Once a human's diet includes more than 10% of it's calories from fat the person will start seeing predictable declines in health.

Here is a breakdown of the items on the menu:

Brisket, moist (1/2 pound) 641.4 calories 454.95 from fat: 70.93% calories from fat

Brisket, lean (1/2 pound) 614.16 calories 431.01 from fat: 70.18% calories from fat (really lean!)

Turkey breast (1/2 pound) 212.83 calories 22.59 from fat: 10.61% calories from fat (almost 80/10/10)

Pork loin (1/2 pound) 465.9 calories 289.17 from fat: 62.07% calories from fat

Chopped beef (1/2 pound) 617.13 calories 416.43 from fat: 67.48% calories from fat

Pork spare ribs (1/2 pound) 458.03 calories 329.49 from fat: 71.94% calories from fat

Baby back ribs (1/2 pound) 383.37 calories 329.49 from fat: 85.95% calories from fat

Half chicken (1/2 chicken) 730.31 calories 454.95 from fat: 62.29% calories from fat

Regular sausage (whole link) 640.00 calories 468.09 from fat: 73.14% calories from fat

Only the turkey breast is anywhere near the 10% or less of calories from fat which is necessary to stay healthy. Of course the overall diet should have less than 10% of it's calories from fat and not just one meal so if one eats a meal like this only once in a long while and all of the rest of their meals are extremely low in fat then they would still be living a healthy lifestyle. Unfortunately this is rarely the case and most people eat a diet that averages way higher than 10% of it's calories from fat.

Even the lean brisket is only .75% less fat than the regular brisket. Not much of a savings in fat there at all.

Besides all of the other negative health consequences of eating foods like these such as hormones in the meat, antibiotics, diseases, possibility of food borne contaminations like e-coli and salmonella, low vitamin and mineral and other micronutrient values, the percentages of fat by calories are as much as 9 times the recommended values.

If you or someone you know still desires to eat foods like these, please educate yourself and understand the consequences. Being healthy and consuming foods like these are mutually exclusive.

What is too Extreme?

I thought it was about time to say something about this as it has been on my mind for more than 3 years now. Just to give a history of where this is all coming from, I read the book "The 80/10/10 Diet" by Douglas Graham in 2006.

I found the information so astounding and realistic that I almost immediately stopped what I was doing at the time and converted to a whole foods raw and low fat diet.

Actually my diet at the time was quite different from the mainstream. I was eating a nearly 100% raw diet with big salads covered in olive oil and lots of almond and other nut butters smothered on raw seed crisps for lunch.

The diet I was on was giving me about 35% of my calories from fat. This was far from the ridiculous 65% plus derived from most raw gourmet diets but still way above the target of under 10%.

The information was not extreme at all. It was not radical. It made total sense. If anything was extreme or radical it was everyone else's diet. It's no wonder the world is so sick, everyone is overweight, obese, complaining of so many illnesses.

Even people who I thought were doing fine, I later found out were really quite sick. For example one of my coworkers who I recently met as I started the new job seemed like he was quite healthy. I don't see too many people eating the standard North American diet who are slim, fit and healthy.

I thought I found one example of this. This person is about 50 years old and works in the information technology area. They seem to adhere to the usual diet of most Americans. Burgers, fries, soda, some home made cooking, a few salads covered in oils and vinegars, etc. are what I usually see this person eat.

After a few weeks there was a discussion in our office and the truth came out. This person is suffering from gout. They limit their intake of red meat and other foods that cause a relapse. Even the one person I felt was an example of how someone can eat poorly and still be healthy turned out not to be so healthy afterall.

It really seems to me that if the usual diet of most Americans was the right diet for people then they can eat all of the things they like in any quantity and still not have any problems or consequences. Obviously this is not the case as even one of the only healthy looking people I know is suffering from gout and must limit certain foods in their diet.

Now back to the book I read in 2006. The book was so meaningful to me that I wanted to reach out to others and make sure they read it. I lent the book to my mom. I then lent it to a friend.

I believe that my mom read most of the book and my friend read a little of the book. He said that he skimmed through it. Both had the same comment, they felt that the diet described in the book was too extreme.

If it is too extreme then nobody can do it, or at least only certain chosen people would be able to do it. It's kind of like someone who is an amateur runner but never ran a marathon saying that running is great but running a marathon is too extreme.

Certainly a marathon is not too extreme for the thousands of marathoners who participate in them regularly. In effect it is not really too extreme but it is too extreme for them personally.

The same goes for the diet, it is far far from an extreme diet. In fact it is the only diet that is not extreme. Anyone who says that it is extreme is just saying that they themselves find it too extreme and that they rather stick with their poor addictive diet and use the "too extreme" excuse to not even bother to try it.

Is anyone in agreement?

What is the Risk Anyways?

Am I crazy or does this make any sense? I work for a large federal government agency. They manage all of the national parks and national forests in the country. In fact they employ over 40,000 people to do all this work. A large task to say the least.

As a government agency we could be targeted in a terrorist attack. Besides that, many other accidents or unexpected disasters might occur. Due to this we recently had a safety meeting to inform all of the employees of what would be the best way to face an emergency.

It seems like safety is an important concern to the government. They do not take it lightly. We listened to an ex-policeman speak about fire extinguishers and how to use them. He explained what to look for to make sure they are in good condition to even use.

He talked about what to do if someone would enter our building with a gun. He described several scenarios about how to react to a fire, a bomb, some other emergency.

Obviously this information is very important. Many of the topics he spoke about were very interesting and I would have never thought about them if he did not mention them.

The only thing I have to say about this is that the probability of something like one of the scenarios he spoke about happening is probably in the range of 1 out of 10,000 or maybe even less than that. Even the chance of being in an airplane crash is only 1 in 400,000, so this kind of event is about 40 times more likely than that.

I think my reasoning is quite sound. Sure the events of 9/11 did happen but that was once and only in relatively few areas of the country. The explosion in Oklahoma City also did happen but that too was a one of a kind event and confined to one building in one city. Fires and crazy people returning to the work place with a gun happen often enough, but still out of over 150 million people who work in this country only about 15,000 have been in a situation like one I described above.

That's 0.01% of the working population. Of course it's a lot better to be prepared for an event like this but in reality it's unlikely to happen to any one person in their lifetime.

The probability of someone actually dying from avoidable causes like heart attacks, stokes, cancer, and many many other preventable diseases is about 1 in 3. This is a fact, about 33% of the population dies from a preventable illness. These people seem to be so concerned about a possible event that might happen to 1 out of about 10,000 people when they totally ignore the reality of one third of the population dying of a completely avoidable and reversible disease.

The obvious ones who are most likely to be striken are the obese and the ones who have a tobacco habit. Still many people who look fit and trim and do not smoke are just as likely to be candidates of one of these preventable illnesses.

I think that having safety meetings is important but there should also be some education for the people who are on a path to causing themselves worse harm just by their choice in lifestyle.

Anybody agree?

Who is a Success?

The idea went through my mind about who is really a success. In the world where everything is a competition I suppose that living until your genetic potential is a competition.

We can get a rough estimate of what our genetic potential is by how long our parents and grandparents lived. If we live the same way that they lived then we should be able to live the same length of time. On the other hand, if we live a much healthier lifestyle we should be able to outlive our ancestors by several years, if not decades.

People who use addictive chemicals and continue to consume them fully knowing that they are killing themselves are either so addicted to these chemicals or they are suicidal and are seeking a way to get out of their horrible life.

Which chemicals are included in this list? The obvious ones are tobacco, alcohol, recreational drugs, and of course prescription and over the counter drugs or medicine. The less obvious ones are foods like meats, dairy products, nuts and seeds in excess, condiments like garlic, onions, salt, pepper, spices, vinegar, etc.

Even cooked and processed foods that are low in fat are dangerous and life threatening.

When someone who is clealy continuing to consume dangerous chemicals and knows that they are slowly killing themselves dies at an early age are they a success or a failure?

An analysis of their behavior would point to a success. They behaved in such a manner that is consistent with someone suicidal. They succeeded in killing themselves and therefore died a success.

On the other hand if they lived to an age that was way beyond their life expectancy they were a failure. They failed at their goal of suicide.

Would you like to be a success or a failure? Why does it seem like the vast majority of people are successful at a slow suicide?

Is it that they just enjoy the thrill of getting as close to death as possible without actually dying? Was their goal to just get some attention and pity or was it to actually die?

Who on this planet doesn't know that smoking tobacco products, or just using any kind of tobacco porduct is dangerous, probably more dangerous than crossing a busy freeway. I think most know that but still they continue to do it.

I suppose the short addictive pleasure the tobacco gives is just so much better than the pain of reality, knowing that a nearly certain premature death is waiting down the road.

Are you one of those people? Are you just enjoying your dangerous lifestyle so much that you are ignoring the consequences? If so, it might be time to make some changes and instead of being a success at suicide, be a success at avoiding it.

Remove the cause: Works for more than just diseases!

What most of the world seems to misunderstand about natural hygiene is that almost all illnesses are self-inflicted. Rarely does someone actually get ill when they do everything right. In fact before we humans destroyed the beautiful planet we live on, it was difficult to become ill because we had only the best quality food, we had nearly no pollutants, we had clean air, sunshine available to us every day, we had to get exercise in order to have food and stay away from danger, everything was just right to stay healthy.

Now illness is so common that nearly every human on the planet is infected with something every few weeks or months. It's assumed that this is normal or natural. It is not normal nor natural but totally unnatural to be ill. It's just our body removing toxins that should have never been there in the first place.

Modern man believes that the way to health is by adding more toxins to an already toxic body. The people go to a doctor or to the pharmacy and take medicine (which is always toxic) in order to get relief from their illness. They sometimes actually do feel better but not because they removed the cause of the illness but because their body has stopped creating the symptoms and instead it is trying to deal with a new emergency, the toxin that was just ingested, the medicine.

Sometimes it's actually a placebo affect that helps as the consumer takes a pill that was marketed to do something, quite often it does what the consumer expects. This is a mental change and not a physical one.

Natural hygiene on the other hand proposes to eliminate the cause of the illness and eventually it will go away. That seems to make perfect sense to most people but in practice they almost all go directly to the pharmacy to buy more toxins to cure their illness. Logically it doesn't make a lot of sense to take a pill to heal something when you continue to cause the problem. It will just come right back.

This philosophy works not only in health but in many other fields as well. For example if you have children and they act poorly, or misbehave, punishing them is not what will remove the cause of their poor behavior. This might make them behave for the short term to avoid another punishment but it certainly will not permanently change their poor behavior.

If parents of a misbehaving child find out the cause of the bad behavior then they could easily remove the cause and the poor behavior will stop. This could be a simple change in diet, exercise, sleep, sunshine, or one of the other essentials. It could also be something else. Whatever it is, children can be made to behave once the cause is removed.

The same goes for animals, or pets. If they behave poorly they also need to be analyzed and the cause found so that it too can be removed. Once the cause of the bad behavior is found and removed the bad behavior will change.

The same goes for most everything in life. If your relationship is not going as you truly wanted, find the cause of the problem and remove it. If your automobile is not performing as expected then find the root cause and remove the problem. If we approach most of our problems in this way, we'll receive much better results and less difficulties with these problems coming back.