I like a good steak every now and then but I would rather have fish and rice, or a soup with lots of vegetables, rice or pasta thrown in. And of course, lots of carbohydrate-laden beer!
My compromise with my hunter-gatherer genes? (not that you asked, but here goes anyway)
No carbos during the week--including beer, pizza, bagels, pasta, potatoes, etc--but whatever I want on the weekends. It works. (I do have whiskey during the week, though).
Cheers,
"I agree with your way of thinking. The life expectancy of humans has increased enormously since switching to a carbohydrate-based diet. Granted, some of that increase can be attributed to better medical care and hygiene. But as you point out, the Asians, who eat mostly rice have very long lifespans. As do Italians who eat lots of breads, wines and pastas."
I would tend to disagree that carbohydrates - or the carbs that our country consumes - are the key to long life.
Asians eat a wholly dissimilar diet than we do, while it's based on rice, it also lacked the sugar and white, bleached wheat of ours. They eat more vegetables, eat more protein, especially from shellfish and fish, and most westerners find the diet very bland or too spicy for their palate.
Italians are the same - lots of good fats, like olive oil, lots of vegetables, meats, fish, and wine. Their diet is not pasta based, that's an American idea.
The American diet is loaded up with cane sugar, fructose syrup, white bleached flour (essentially nutrient-free - they have to advertise on white bread that they ADD nutrients) and bad trans-fats. We DO NOT eat the same carbs as the Asians or Italians, and to compare us to them is hilarious. Our palate in the US is so overloaded by carbs and sugars it's scary.
I tend to think the longer life expectancy is due more to better healthcare, medicine, easier lifestyles, more access to minerals and vitamins and nutrients (which we now avoid as a culture and favor manufactured foods), and our sedentary lifestyles (as compared to the always active hunter/gatherer). We also don't fight wild animals with sticks, and if we break a bone, get an infection, or develop pnuemonia, we just go see the doctor. We can cure some forms of cancer, and operate to repair or fix our problems. The cavemen had none of this.
They also had no pollution, toxic waste or any of the other nasties we do, yet they lived shorter lives - one could also use your logic and say pollution makes us live longer.
To say carbs make us live longer is quite amusing, and I'd love to see the science to back that up - especially since our carb and sugar based diet is causing diabetes and obesity and the diseases that it causes to skyrocket into staggering numbers.
It also depends on what you define as a carb, and what carbs we're talking about - not all carbs are bad. You also need to put the diet you're talking about into a context, in other words lifestyle and culture, and genetic background. Asians I know who tried Atkins did horribly, and it made them ill to consume the large amounts of protein in that diet, but everyone I know who's of Western European stock does remarkably well. '
Anyway, before I stray too far from the point, I think saying carbs are the answer to long life is entirely too simplistic and wildly naive in the face of the data we have. It strikes me as a rationalization to consume carbs - hey, if you want them, eat them, but don't try to sell them like the snake oil salesmen of old.