Diet

A surprising new study has revealed that diverse sounds produced by human speech not only evolved after Neolithic times but also stem from biological alterations in the human bite as a result of eating softer diets. The findings contradict the theory that the range of human sounds has not changed since Homo sapiens emerged about 300,000 years ago. Linguistic diversity was also commonly thought to evolve independently of biological changes. In 1985, linguist Charles Hockett suggested that labiodentals – the class of speech sounds including ‘f’ and ‘v’ in English – might have evolved as diets became softer with the move away from hunting and gathering towards agriculture and industrialized food processing. These changes, he said, altered the human bite so that new sounds were easier...

The latest study warning us to eat less meat has brought angry skeptics out in droves. But who should we believe? Food, how to cook it, what it does to you and what growing or rearing it does to the planet are issues that crowd the media. And yet, as the clamor grows, clarity recedes. An estimated 820 million people went hungry last year, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. A third of all people were vitamin-deficient. Two billion were classified as overweight and 600 million as obese. It’s also estimated that 1bn tonnes of food is wasted every year – a third of the total produced. A plethora of academic reports concerning food consumption and production have been published in recent years. The latest and arguably the most far-reaching is Food in the Anthropocene: ...

Richard Vernon says population reduction would do more for the planet than a change of diet, Stuart Roberts and John Davies extol the benefits of British farming, Dr. Michael Antoniou calls for balanced scientific information and Paul Faupel on meeting his dietary needs with chocolate-enrobed brazil nuts. Damian Carrington gives us a fine review of the “planetary health diet” in his article (New plant-focused diet would ‘transform’ planet’s future, say, scientists, theguardian.com, 16 January). It’s clear that this diet offers both better health than the current norm of a high-meat diet and a more environmental food production system with its emphasis on plant rather than animal production. However, I doubt the validity of some claims in the report. Moreover, population reduction sho...