3 Comments
User's avatar
Robert Jay Rowen, MD's avatar

good point. I think beef tallow is fine. That is why I mentioned lard.

Expand full comment
Dennis Rodgers's avatar

Top problem with industrial oils (usually a way to dump industrial waste for a profit, as with MTBE) is the linoleic acid (LA) content. Humans need a tiny bit of LA, but just as too much zinc can impeded copper metabolism and too much of Mg or Ca, can inhibit the other, LA is essential to a specific type of cardiolipin, while being detrimental to others. The makeup of cardiolipin is different in different functional areas, with LA being detrimental in most, while essential in few, but the massive increase in LA in the western diet means LA is in a lot of places where it doesn't belong and where it down regulates proper energy conversion.

The principle ingredient in health is energy. Simply stated, energy is the enemy of entropy, and it is our gradual inability to generate energy that underlies aging as well as chronic health challenges. With insufficient energy, we can't even fight off a cold, let alone cancer. LA damages most mitochondria.

LA, as you've stated, also oxidizes at lower temps than the "better" fats, but even as an ingredient when not overheated, it is rare in any natural diet. We need ~2-4g and the average American diet contains 40-60, and the average teenager is probably twice that, meaning that what we needed more of is being pushed aside by something of which we need very little.

Expand full comment
Clark's avatar

Do you know how to keep fish from smelling? Cut off their noses. Okay, that's a playground joke, from about 50 years ago, but...

Actually, I just discovered that's not the only way to keep this from smelling. Rising CO2 in the sea increases acidity which reduces fish's ability to smell, and to detect predators, according to this report. Of course, if the predators also rely on their sense of smell to detect prey, wouldn't that even out? I wouldn't be surprised if this was a bogus study.

https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-44925495

Here's a more detailed article on that same study.

https://daily.jstor.org/will-fish-lose-their-sense-of-smell-in-acidic-oceans/

Expand full comment