On 2011-09-22 14:23, FOB wrote:
But I think his most important point is that the wheat we get now is not the
wheat of our ancestors, in fact, not even the wheat of 50 years ago.


FOB,

You are right, I failed to point out that basic fact of the discussion
of Genetics that Dr. Davis gave on the 14, 28 and 42 chromasome stages
of wheat development, and the intensive mutations in the 20th century
to try to solve the grain shortage problems 0f developing countries such
as Mexico by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center. That
work began in 1943 by a collaboration between the Rockefeller Foundation
and the Mexican government at a research site near Mexico City. By 1980,
these efforts had produced thousands of new strains of wheat, the most
high-yielding of which have since been adopted worldwide in third world
countries and industrial countries.

There are no longer any "Amber Waves of Grain" as this refers to the
older four foot (4' )high thin stalk strains. Growing more seeds on
these tall slender stalks simply lead to the buckling of the stalk and
the wheat plants would bend way over, and adding more grains to the
stalk tip would result in a plant very difficult to harvest, if it
wouldn't suffer from the horrible geometry.

So the solution was to breed for short two foot (2')stiffer and thicker
stalks and bigger seed bundled on those stronger plant tops.

So it is absolutely correct that the modern dwaft wheat plants are not
the plants that an old person like myself grew up with and ate as a
child. And, I am reasonably sure that my grandmother never at any of
this dwarf wheat in her entire life.

Dr. Davis comments on the protein modifications produced by a wheat
hybrid when compared to the proteins of the parents. While approximately
95% of the proteins expressed in the offspring are identical to the
parents, about 5% are unique, found in NEITHER parent. Wheat gluten
proteins undergo considerable structural change with hybridization- to
forms never seen before.

These high-yield dwarf strains of wheat increased yields up to ten-fold.
Guess why they caught on and are planted around the world..

There were never any tests for detrimental effects of these modern major
modifications for human safety. It was axiomatically accepted that
"wheat was wheat", and therefore safe.


---------------------------------------------------------------
Doug never needs facts to write his stuff. I am sure that some of these
issues were covered in the article linked to in the original post.

And NO DOUG---IT"S NOT JUST ABOUT GLUTEN INTOLERANCE.

So, you begin "off the mark".





Doug Freyburger wrote:
|
| Being wheat intolerant myself I am biased against eating wheat. That
| said I think the current wheat scare is mostly a veiled push for low
| carbing in general. Blaming wheat gets people to eat less carbs and
| most people do better with less carbs.
|
| The number of people who are wheat intolerant or gluten intolerant is
| only a few percent of the population. Enough that it's vastly more
| than the ones who know they have the issue. A percentage that is far
| too small to tell people blindly to avoid wheat.
|
| My view is the current push against wheat gets a lot of people to
| lower their carb intake. That helps a very large minority of the
| population. Among them is a small percentage who benefit from
| actually removing wheat rather than just from reducing carbs.
|
| It's not a bad approach but it misses the point that what is happening
| in most cases is lower total carb intake and lower glycemic load.

You are missing the point of everything about this subject, because you
are denying anything outside of what you currently think is trivial. You
have practiced that for a long time.


| Pick any high glycemic load food that's a sizable percentage of the
| typical diet. Convince people to not have that. The result is good
| because the typical diet is so high in carbs it's a problem.
| Convincing people to drop sodas would generally have the same result.
|
| Simple minded, effective, beneificial, but based on an idea that
| points in the wrong direction.

You are a good illustration of a "Wrong Direction" kind of guy.

|
| One really good lesson - Glycemic load matters. Talk of "simple
| versus complex carbs" has little to do with actually measuring
| glycemic load. Very carby foods aren't beneficial in a culture that
| has already pushed many of us to the point our bodies treat very
| carby foods as problems.