Living below the line 2014

Brunneria · Apr 19, 2014

Indy51 said:
I guess I wonder why people still talk about longevity as if its a great thing. What's the point if you're decrepit and being overmedicated for the sole purpose of keeping you alive, with no attention being paid to quality of life?

Yes

My wonderful, bright, twinkly, fit, active 82 year old father has just been diagnosed with the first stage of Alzheimer's.

My not so fit, or active, or lively mother is terrified.

Increased longevity is a very mixed blessing.

borofergie · Apr 19, 2014

I already showed you @Yorksman, the median lifespan declined after the paleolithic and didn't recover for another 7000 or so years.

borofergie said:
This is what I have for median lifespan:
30,000 to 9,000 B.C. (Late Paleolithic): Male 35.4 Female 30
9,000 to 7,000 B.C. (Mesolithic): Male 33.5 Female 31.3
7,000 to 5,000 B.C. (Early Neolithic): Male 33.6 Female 29.8
5,000 to 3,000 B.C. (Late Neolithic): Male 33.1 Female 29.2
3,000 to 2,000 B.C. (Early Bronze): Male 33.6 Female 29.4

That shows a marked decline in median life expectancy from the Paleolithic to the Late Neolithic.

Yorksman · Apr 19, 2014

borofergie said:
I already showed you @Yorksman, the median lifespan declined after the paleolithic and didn't recover for another 7000 or so years.

30,000 to 9,000 B.C. (Late Paleolithic): Male 35.4 Female 30
9,000 to 7,000 B.C. (Mesolithic): Male 33.5 Female 31.3
7,000 to 5,000 B.C. (Early Neolithic): Male 33.6 Female 29.8
5,000 to 3,000 B.C. (Late Neolithic): Male 33.1 Female 29.2
3,000 to 2,000 B.C. (Early Bronze): Male 33.6 Female 29.4

But those figures are from a 1982 study from the eastern mediterranean where the archaeological record was incomplete for the area, and this "spottiness" to use the description in your linked article, was filled in by samples from outside the area ncluding places as diverse as North Africa and the Ukraine so we have to consider how valid it is to compare palaeolithic samples from say, the Ukraine, with Neolithic samples from the Fertile Cresent.

Moreover, whilst the table above shows no increase in longevity from the mesolithic onwards, the graph from the 2007 study does show an increase in longevity.

The Galor and Moav study has the benefit of improvements in C14 dating, of improvements in the techniques of osteoarchaeology and modern statistical analyses rather than simple median averages.

So why favour the former over the latter which has the benefit of 25 years additional research?

Indy51 · Apr 19, 2014

Seriously dudes, duelling studies now? Does anybody really care apart from you two? Why don't you take this discussion off the forum into PM if you find it so fascinating? Maybe I'm wrong, but I very much doubt if anybody else does...

Yorksman · Apr 19, 2014

Indy51 said:
Seriously dudes, duelling studies now? Does anybody really care apart from you two? Why don't you take this discussion off the forum into PM if you find it so fascinating? Maybe I'm wrong, but I very much doubt if anybody else does...

Indy51 said:
living as I do in a retirement village surrounded by increasingly more decrepit people taking forever to die,

You're not Victor Meldrew posing as an antipodean are you?

Indy51 · Apr 20, 2014

Yorksman said:
You're not Victor Meldrew posing as an antipodean are you?

Nope, just a natural born cynic

Yorksman · Apr 20, 2014

Indy51 said:
Nope, just a natural born cynic

A cynic is what an optimist calls a realist.

Spiker · Apr 20, 2014

Yorksman said:
A cynic is what an optimist calls a realist.

"The optimist declares we live in the best of all possible worlds.
The pessimist fears that this is true."

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AlexMBrennan · Apr 20, 2014

Indy51 said:
Seriously dudes, duelling studies now? Does anybody really care apart from you two?.

Yes, why bother to see if you're right before telling everyone on here that they need to follow the fad diet you favor and that their doctor is conspiring with big pharma and big grain to kill us.

tomvonc · Apr 20, 2014

Yorksman said:
A cynic is what an optimist calls a realist.

I for one could not get through a day of this wretched life without a healthy amount of cynacism ;-)

Tom

Yorksman · Apr 20, 2014

AlexMBrennan said:
Yes, why bother to see if you're right before telling everyone on here that they need to follow the fad diet you favor and that their doctor is conspiring with big pharma and big grain to kill us.

It's quite common for websites to include information which supports their argument and in the case of the table cited, it is a 1999 page which cites a paper from 1982 which uses data drawn up by a guy called Angel in the early 1970s. Whilst some of the original conclusions still hold, there have been a lot of developments since then both in terms of accuracy of existing techniques, eg C14 dating and in terms of method, in particular the genetics. In all these fields, it is important to understand the history of the study and not just dip into it at convenient points.

Many studies into Hunter Gatherer societies concentrate on the Hunting element to the detriment of the Gathering element and, in particular, to what degree wild grains were consumed. Arable farming developed because people already consumed wild grains that they gathered. What we don't know is, how important it was to their diet.

noblehead · Apr 20, 2014

''A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.''

Winston Churchill

Spiker · Apr 20, 2014

"I didn't come here for an argument."

- Monty Python

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donnellysdogs · Apr 20, 2014

What has all this got to do with being able to live for a £1 a day?

Sorry, can we go back to OP and the great chats about the food we could live on?

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tomvonc · Apr 20, 2014

donnellysdogs said:
What has all this got to do with being able to live for a £1 a day?

Sorry, can we go back to OP and the great chats about the food we could live on?

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Jack Monroe http://agirlcalledjack.com does this every year. Not sure she exactly goes for lo-carb lol.

Tom

donnellysdogs · Apr 20, 2014

Lo carb, higher carb - who cares? This post had some good thoughts on choices of foods for less than £1. I loved hearing how others would do it, but now its just got into a boring posting of i'm right, i'm right and i'm right....

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Yorksman · Apr 20, 2014

donnellysdogs said:
What has all this got to do with being able to live for a £1 a day?

Sorry, can we go back to OP and the great chats about the food we could live on?

Hunter gatherers get food for free, in this case an 89% success at snaring:

Unfortunately, I'm not keen on rabbit and they're one of the few plentiful supplies of free meat around and farmers, once they get to know you, are generally happy for you to get rid of the blighters.

Mackerel are easy to catch though if you live near the sea:

It gets dangerous tough foraging for cockles:

and you need a licence now to collect sea bird eggs:

donnellysdogs · Apr 20, 2014

Crikey, thats some food for free.....after the cost of the snares of course....unless you can get a farmer to pay you for the catch of his land...then it would be paid to eat-lol!!

Only thing I know of is rabbit stew and that reminds of a bunny boiler in a film..

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Yorksman · Apr 20, 2014

I don't like rabbit but I do like mackerel. Freshly caught, it is wonderful on a BBQ, very sweet and succulent and not at all fishy. I fancy building a home smoker as they are simple to make. This one is basically a cupboard. I've seen them with zinc buckets in the bottom with wood shavings smouldering away:

paul-1976 · Apr 20, 2014

I like Mackerel too and as you say-nice smoked or on a BBQ-I haven't line caught one in years but the last time I did was at Goodrington in Torbay,Devon and they were very easy to catch with a spinner on the end of the line.

Living below the line 2014

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