Growing a Big Brain with Meat | Amber O'Hearn

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A brief interview with Amber O'Hearn on the significance of Animal Foods for Brain Evolution

Find Amber on Twitter at @KetoCarnivore
The introduction to Amber's in progress book is available online at: https://facultativecarnivore.com/my-b...

If you type "Amber O'Hearn" into youtube, you can find several talks of hers.

|||SOURCES: For sources on some of the information Amber mentioned (plus timestamps to questions)|||
◆1:19 - What is plants role in our evolution?
[1:20] She's referring to Richard Wrangham, author of "Catching Fire: How cooking made us human"
◆2:20 - Can you comment on the significance of babies' fuel metabolism?
[2:36] Early man's gut shrank as the brain grew in size. | Miki-Ben Dor's paper "Man the fat hunter" https://bit.ly/2DhE91W and Aiello & Wheeler's paper "The expensive tissue hypothesis" https://bit.ly/2DgbWJ1 talk more about this.
[2:40] Regarding how the ability to ferment fiber for fat energy was something lost for humans, see "The Western Lowland Gorilla Diet Has Implications for the Health of Humans and Other Hominoids" https://bit.ly/2CtpQWm "...the human colon may contribute as little as 2-9% to total energy compared with possibly 30-60% for the gorilla."
◆4:06 - What is the state of a baby's metabolism?
[4:20] Babies are in ketosis:
・George Cahill's "Fuel Metabolism in Starvation" https://bit.ly/2DhDn4Q (behind a paywall, but the relevant snippet is shown here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yooNuOKsa1Q&t=465s

・See "Ketone Body Transport in the Human Neonate and Infant" - https://bit.ly/2CxPNnE
[4:45] The fetus is living on ketones from the start of pregnancy. | This is from a Dr. Muneta Tetsuo's book (in Japanese: ケトン体は人類を救う) That portion of the book is featured here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yooNuOKsa1Q&t=519s

[5:20] More on ketone bodies crossing the blood brain barrier (via Mark Brandt PhD) - https://bit.ly/2FHw5sN
◆5:55 - Do babies being in Ketosis have anything to do with gestational diabetes?
◆7:00 - What are some nutrients/foods necessary for building the brain?
[7:22] For more on the importance of Arachadonic acid, see "The Essentiality of Arachidonic Acid in Infant Development" https://bit.ly/2CqXrjO
[8:45] For a primer on the inhibitory factors that make it hard to absorb nutrients in plants, see this presentation by Maelán Fontes PhD
https://bit.ly/2SWeGR3
◆10:00 Do you think there's a perfect balance between plant and animal foods that could be struck to enhance longevity?
[11:38] For more on the antioxidant properties of a ketogenic diet, see "Anti-Oxidant and Anti-Inflammatory Activity of Ketogenic Diet: New Perspectives for Neuroprotection in Alzheimer’s Disease" https://bit.ly/2W0m7bN "The ketogenic diet (KD) stimulates the cellular endogenous antioxidant system with the activation of nuclear factor erythroid-derived 2 (NF-E2)-related factor 2 (Nrf2), the major inducer of detoxification genes."
[11:50] A bit about why Amber may be referring to phytonutrients as "phytotoxins" is shown here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isIw2AN_-XU&t=659s

◆12:15 - What do you think of plants as medicine?
◆13:16 - Could fermented meat have any significance to our evolution? [Link to paper mentioned: https://bit.ly/2FeGzQJ]