User:JaredWeiss/sandbox

Jared,

You have clearly done a lot of research on a topic that you are passionate about. Our concerns are that your sources are either commercial ones (Thomas Delaurer) or not peer-reviewed journals (Atlantic, Scientific American). Because you are looking at a topic within the medical or scientific field, your sources need to be more rigorous. Please see Ryan's comment on October 25. Don't forget that this is a food history class and not one of your nutrition classes. Keep a historical perspective.

Article Evaluation on article about Chinese Herbiology

Based about Almond Milk changes to make. First off, the author mentions in the says added salt and there is a big difference between no more salt vs. adding salt. Also, I felt like it did too much comparing with the modern western dis cited well. One last change I would make is that I felt that the section titled “Foods” became a bit repetitive as it mentions the same principles pf the diet multiple times as well as in the start of the article.

Adding Citation

Added citation to the article titled "Baked Beans"

Canned baked beans are used as a convenience food. They may be eaten hot or cold, straight from the can, as they are fully cooked.

Possible Article Topics

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-carbohydrate_diet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermittent_fasting

Sprouted Bread

What I can improve- Can add history and a lot more information to all three as well as more recent uses

Article Choice-Intermittent Fasting

The article that I am choosing to add to is the one about intermittent fasting. I believe that it is lacking a lot of the history of why it is done as well as all of the new research describing the health benefits of it. It doesn't mention a lot about how our primitive ancestors and hunter gatherers would eat this way. It also leaves out why it is beneficial due to our evolution as a species and how our bodies still haven't adapted to allow for continuous food consumption.

Article Sources: http://www.thomasdelauer.com/how-to-use-fasting-for-inflammation-and-longevity-benefits-of-intermittent-fasting/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmyMVtJWL2U

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-intermittent-fasting-might-help-you-live-longer-healthier-life/

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/01/the-new-way-to-love-food/283276/

Drafting Article: Intermittent Fasting

I am a little concerned that the Thomas DeLauer sources may not be the best option to use, as it seems very much a commercial website. And a commercial website like that has a real monetary incentive to present things in a way to sell something. The page lists its references which seem more impartial, see if you can look through those to use instead Rgh234 (talk) 00:59, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

How people use intermittent fasting to lead healthier lives

Intermittent fasting has been used for a long time although originally it was just a way of life. It was not seen as new knowledge that could be for benefits in the fitness industry. Intermittent fasting helps with fat loss and boosts human growth hormone. There are other types of fasting as mentioned previously, however intermittent fasting is a strategic fast for health and fitness cleansing purposes as opposed to religious purposes for holidays such as Yom Kippur or Ramadan. Fasting can stave off inflammation of the body as well. while inflammation is the body's natural response to sickness and infection, if it stays in our body for too long, it can cause adverse health consequences. "Leukotriene B4 (LTB4) plays an important role in several cellular processes involved in inflammation, including oxidative metabolism, enzyme release and stimulation of neutrophil migration and aggregation." A healthy diet can stave off this inflammation, however intermittent fasting in particular can decrease levels of LTB4. Intermittent fasting might be difficult for most people to do and as such should not be done every day and especially not on days when physical activity is incredibly high in the early hours. On a day when one is not very active, by intermittent fasting, one can jumpstart cell regeneration, fat burning, and give their digestive systems a break so that they can focus on other processes in maintaining homeostasis. There was a study done on rats that found that the fasting improved brain function and reduced the risk of neurodegenerative disorders. Fasting decreases the inflammatory response as the body doesn't have to concentrate on digestion and can move on to other processes which end up cleaning out the digestive system.

Living longer by going back to primitive ways of eating

"Studies have shown that reducing typical calorie consumption, usually by 30 to 40 percent, extends life span by a third or more in many animals, including nematodes, fruit flies and rodents." This is contrary to what some health experts claim in that you should eat 5-7 small meals per day. In the case of intermittent fasting, you are waiting till the afternoon (16-20 hours of fasting and 4-8 hours of a feeding window) to start caloric consumption for the day. Therefore, you would not be eating 5 more times throughout the day, but would rather be having 2-3 larger meals in the rest of the day. This concept of intermittent fasting is also helpful in reducing disease risk. What makes intermittent fasting pleasurable to some is that you can afford to have larger meals or feast in order to break the fast as opposed to limiting calories in countless small meals throughout the day. This way of eating has also been found to lower risk of brain diseases such as strokes or Altzheimers due to the lack of inflammation occurring in the body. It has also been said that having the three main meals a day is a "modern invention" along with several snacks throughout the day. This is not how humans were programmed to eat from an evolutionary standpoint. In early civilization, our ancestors would have to wait for the animal to be killed and they would also be constantly moving around to avoid danger, so there was not always time to eat nor was there always food available. Our genes have not had the chance to be modified to support modern society and therefore the primitive way to eat is seen as more "natural." One common concern for trying this out could be the possibility of binge eating, or eating so few calories during one time might cause them to overeat during their next time eating. However, in a study done on mice this was found to not be the case. "She was surprised to find that, like mice, when people are given only 25 percent of their caloric needs on a fasting day, they do not eat 175 percent the following day. They actually only eat slightly more—115 percent or so. That means by the end of the week, they’ve eaten a lot less than they typically would, and they only felt deprived for 3.5 days." This would lead to weight loss or at least weight maintenance depending on where your current health standing is when you do intermittent fast. Also, the studies showed that people were able to stick to this plan. Even when people decided to "cheat" a few times a week, these people would still end up losing more weight than those that tried other diets. This is because the overall calorie intake still ended up being less as well as the other health benefits that would occur. Intermittent fasting also leads to increased productivity for all aspects of work and life. This is due to the fact that when your body is in "starvation mode" it is not able to become distracted by petty issues. It focuses on one thing, which is maintaining homeostasis and in order to do so must concentrate intensely at the task at hand. Hormone regulation is also involved such as insulin not being released which controls blood sugar, and once you do break the fast the insulin response is not as large.

A study came out from the Harvard Chan School of Public Health, saying that intermittent fasting can help a healthy aging process. It was found that fasting keeps mitochondrial networks in a youthful state. Also, it's been shown that dead cell turnover happens faster and more often when people are fasting. "In addition, they found that these youthful networks increased lifespan by communicating with organelles called peroxisomes to modulate fat metabolism." William Mair said in this article, "“Our work shows how crucial the plasticity of mitochondria networks is for the benefits of fasting. If we lock mitochondria in one state, we completely block the effects of fasting or dietary restriction on longevity.” It seems a bit paradoxical that taking in less energy would lead to more energy and health benefits for the person. One major key though is in meal timing as well as frequency of intermittent fasting. For instance, it's not beneficial to fast every day because our bodies adjust and develop other mechanisms of storing nutrients and not burning fat. Also, on days when one wakes up early and does heavy strength training, this requires carbohydrates for maximum output, so this would not be smart to wait another 6-10 hours after the workout to eat. Rather, on a day with lighter activity or an off day or one with not as much going on in the early hours, a fast can provide all the benefits mentioned before.

Possible Concerns

One main concern is if you're over-exerting yourself and not replenishing your muscles with carbohydrates, this can lead to burnout, fatigue and overtraining syndrome. Your body's energy relies on glycogen stores, and if these are depleted, it will resort to protein and fat stores to burn energy. Burning fat is a good thing, but burning protein is very bad and ultimately adversely affects muscle growth, thereby causing the person the opposite of what he or she wanted. Bryant also says that the research hasn't shown the comparison of intermittent fasting with traditional healthy eating and weight loss programs, so although this is effective in numerous studies, it might be more difficult than just eating normal and healthy for some people. Weight loss "experts" worry that not eating for one meal or two could lead to overeating in the following meals. "Another concern is that promoters of intermittent fasting will, perhaps unintentionally, encourage extreme behaviour, such as bingeing. This is reflected in the photos accompanying many recent new articles on “the fast diet” or the “5:2 diet.” Often, they depict people eating heaps of high-calorie, high-fat foods, such as hamburgers, french fries and cake."  As there is other research suggesting that it is better to eat small meals throughout the day, this way of fasting is seen as a backlash and as such is met with concerns of binging on unhealthy foods when not fasting. "There is indeed a large body of research to support the health benefits of fasting, though most of it has been conducted on animals, not humans. Still, the results have been promising. Fasting has been shown to improve biomarkers of disease, reduce oxidative stress and preserve learning and memory functioning, according to Mark Mattson, senior investigator for the National Institute on Aging, part of the US National Institutes of Health."

"Refeeding" to Prevent Issues

One way to prevent issues of low fasting blood glucose and low carbohydrates being available for proper brain and muscle function is to have what's known as an occasional "reefed day." This day of fueling the body with a large amount of carbohydrates which is against the norm of fasting days and the diet as a whole is done as a way to provide fuel for the brain and muscles to overcome the possible struggles associated with intermittent fasting or restrictive diets such as ketogenic and paleo.

Peer Reviewing

I will review the article by Alicia about Chinese herbiology and the one about Almond Milk.

Peer Review: Nicole Vladimirschi

Hi Jared, I think you have a great start to your article editing. This is a lot of information and it seems to be backed up with credible citations.

One general comment I have is that you could focus your article slightly. I read the current Intermittent Fasting wikipedia page and it seems to have general information. I think what you have written is more detailed and will compliment the page well. That being said, perhaps you want to disperse your essay. For example, add some of your broader information to the beginning of the page and maybe create an "intermittent fasting in history" section. You could mention the uses in different religions, and a perhaps the feasting and fasting we spoke about during the Roman Empire just to bring it back to the course a little more. Also, you could expand into historical meal separation a little more. I like when you mention 3 meals a day is a modern invention, so maybe you can touch on historical eating patterns

Another interesting way you could explore this topic would be an exploration of how it recently became popular. A few years ago I don't think intermittent fasting was as mainstream as it is today, so it could lead to something interesting. {What I Peer Reviewed (also did it on their pages)}

Peer Review from Jared Weiss

Jared Weiss's edit: Overall, I found what you added to be very informative in terms of factual information and what people generally feel about these Chinese herbs. You did a good job of utilizing quality sources and choosing specific instances when the herbs proved ineffective such as in the case of ephedra. Things that can be improved I think are you should include specific herbs that are considered Chinese herbs and describe what they do and if they are commonly used and have found to be useful or not. Lastly, a brief history of where these herbs came from would be helpful to the reader to knowing why they are here in the first place.

Peer Review by Jared Weiss[edit) (also did the edit on their page)

This is definitely a good starting point and I like how you cover numerous facets of almond milk and why people drink it. There is definitely a lot you can do in terms of organization with the topic. Where I think you can improve this is in narrowing down the topics and possibly combining some to allow for more information per section. Too many small sections can be overwhelming for the reader as it might seem as if the topic has too many parts and should be split up. If you condense the amount of topics and broaden the information on each topic, this will allow for a smoother flow.

Peer Review by Charlotte

Hi Jared. I think this is a very good start to a very informative passage. However, I think you could make some changes in your organization to make what you're articulating a bit more clear. For example, the paragraphs could be shorter and more focused. You could have one about the history, one about the benefits, and one about possible concerns. Now these ideas are dispersed throughout the article so its a bit difficult to follow. Also, this might not matter on wikipedia, but you could very your phrasing/sentence structure a bit. For example you say "stave off" twice. A few small changes in organization and and structure and you will have a very strong article!