Acknowledgments: A special note of thanks to the following individuals who at one time or another have reviewed articles and offered helpful critiques; served as sounding boards; or who have apprised us of new information/research during article development for the site: Peter Brandt, Loren Cordain, Dean Esmay, Sean McBride, Christopher Morrill, Craig Woods Schiemann, Dorleen Tong.

Funding:
Provided from the hip pocket of site editor Tom Billings. C'mon, some of you folks we've seen postings from elsewhere on the net speculating who might be behind Beyond Veg. If you think this site is funded by the proverbial USDA or Meat & Dairy Board, you're not being imaginative enough: Think black helicopters, Trilateral Commission, and all that other good New World Order conspiracy stuff. The goal here is to be masters of the universe, and therefore you gotta believe our roots trace all the way back to the Knights Templar in the 13th century. After all, isn't it pure deception that anyone could afford, by themselves, the $34/month in web hosting fees it currently takes to run this website? It boggles the mind.

• Assessing Claims and Credibility in the Realm of Raw and Alternative Diets: Who Should You Believe?

• Beyond Denial: Coming to Grips with Reality in the Veg/Raw Movements. (off-site interview that will eventually be reproduced on Beyond Veg itself)

• The Calorie Paradox of Raw Veganism.

• Clarifying Orthorexia: Obsession with Dietary Purity as an Eating Disorder (comments on Steven Bratman's "Health Food Junkie" article).

• Comparative Anatomy and Physiology Brought Up to Date: Are humans natural frugivores/vegetarians or omnivores/faunivores? (note: the numerous sub-articles in this paper are noted separately elsewhere on the website)

• Fruit Is Not Like Mother's Milk: The Nutritional Fallacies of a Popular Fruitarian Myth Exposed.

• Functional and Dysfunctional Lunch-Attitudes.

• Idealism vs. Realism in Raw Foods.

• The Raw Vegan Pledge of Extremism, Ignorance, and Denial. (satire)

• The Seduction of Simplistic Raw Vegan Dogma.

• Selected Myths of Raw Foods.

• To Those Considering a Fruitarian Diet.

• Troubleshooting: Avoiding and Overcoming Problems in Raw and Living-Foods Diets.

• 30 Years of Transitions: from Fruitarian to Living Foods to Lacto-Vegetarian. (dietary bio)

• Turn Your Parrot Into A Famous Diet Guru Now! (parody)

• Vegan Attitudes Toward Instinctive Eating.

• Wild/Natural Fruit vs. Modern/Cultivated Fruit: A summary comparison.

• Raw Vegan/Raw Food Diet Research: Links to Abstracts and Full Text.

Steven Bratman, M.D. is a physician practicing alternative medicine who often recommends dietary improvements for patients, but from lengthy experience no longer sees nutrition as the be-all/end-all health treatment. During his youth 20 years ago, Steven was a cook and organic farmer in a large commune, where he prepared meals for many different types of dietary adherents. He has seen numerous cases of dietary eating disorders firsthand--including in himself previously--stemming from obsession with pure foods.

• Health Food Junkie. (originally published in Yoga Journal) Concern with eating pure and proper food is certainly necessary for optimum health. But how far is going too far, and when does it become an obsession that turns pathological?

Loren Cordain, Ph.D. is Professor of Exercise and Sport Science at Colorado State University, and is one of the pre-eminent figures pursuing research in the emerging scientific field of "Paleolithic diet"--the investigation of human diet and health in the evolutionary past and its genetic relevance today. He has authored or co-authored a large number of peer-reviewed papers on the subject (currently over 20) that may be of interest to readers.

Go to Loren's website for his complete peer-reviewed works including printable PDFs of each paper, and for information about his 2002 book, The Paleo Diet.

Articles for the Beyond Veg website converted from Loren's postings to the Paleodiet list:

• Are Higher Protein Intakes Responsible for Excessive Calcium Excretion?

• Dietary Macronutrient Ratios and their Effect on Biochemical Indicators of Risk for Heart Disease: Comparing high-protein/low-carbohydrate diets vs. high-carbohydrate/low-fat diets.

• The Late Role of Grains and Legumes in the Human Diet, and Biochemical Evidence of their Evolutionary Discordance.

• Metabolic Evidence of Human Adaptation to Increased Carnivory.

Dean Esmay is former host and moderator of the PALEODIET listgroup, and was coordinator of several other internet lists including LOWCARB. Dean tried the conventional wisdom of a high-carb, low-fat diet for a few tough years before deciding to give near-veganism a brief (and disastrous) attempt, and now eats Paleodiet-style after discovering the low-carb dietary literature.

• From Failure on Conventional High-Carb, Low-Fat Diet
  to Low-Carb, High-Protein, No-Problem. (dietary bio)

Kate Finn lives in Santa Monica, California and works as a massage therapist and yoga instructor.

• Finding Balance Between the Extremes of Denial and Indulgence. (dietary bio)

Roy Holman was previously a human rights activist doing work in Central America and is presently a distributor for an intestinal cleansing program.

• Back from the Brink of an Eating Disorder after Raw Foods. (dietary bio)

• Eating Our Way to God: A Poem.

Inanna has her own web page I Have Survived (offsite link), that provides information and healing resources for survivors of abuse. Her Eating Disorders link page (offsite link) includes a bulimic parody of the "Obsession" perfume ads.

• An Anorexic Creed.

Gerald Y. Kinro writes articles on fruit and agriculture "for fun." The article below appears on Beyond Veg with permission of the publisher, the California Rare Fruit Growers, Inc.

• Brave New Fruits: An Introduction to Transgenics.

Ward Nicholson is a graphic designer and business copywriter, a long-time distance runner, and was a haphazard vegetarian for 15 years before getting serious for a few more years as coordinator of the Natural Hygiene Many-to-Many letter group from 1992-1996. After experiencing deterioration on a more pure vegan diet during this period, and observing similar problems in other natural hygienists--plus having begun to explore the research on human dietary evolution--Ward later added animal foods and changed to a more Paleolithic-style diet.

• Attrition after Fasting, Raw Foods, and Conventional Veganism. (dietary bio)
  
  
• Evolution vs. Creationist Pseudoscience: No contest when you know the facts. Some extremists will go to any length to rationalize and defend their conception of an originally pristine frugivorous human species, even attacking evolution itself and its findings as invalid in principle. This piece gives a thorough debunking of such notions.
  
  
• Going Ape Over Chimp Diets: Dispensing with fruitarian monkey business. A reprint of a listgroup debate exposing tall tales about chimp diet by fruitarians.
  
  
• Longevity & Health in Ancient Paleolithic vs. Neolithic Peoples: Not what you may have been told.
  
  
• The Morality of Human Omnivorousness. (satire/editorial opinion)
  
  
• Paleolithic Diet vs. Vegetarianism: What was humanity's original, natural diet? A three-part, referenced interview first published in Health & Beyond (now with significant updates) consisting of the following articles:
  
  
  • Setting the Scientific Record Straight on Humanity's Evolutionary Prehistoric Diet and Ape Diets.
    
  • Fire and Cooking in Human Evolution.
    
  • The Psychology of Idealistic Diets.
    
    
• Simplicity vs. Complexity in Diet: Where Do We Find Truth?
  
  
• Six Vegetarian Problem Scenarios, followed by Why "Failure to Thrive" on Vegetarian Diets is Rarely Talked About, and What Happens if Vegetarian Diets Are Not Best for Everyone?
  
  
• Special Report: Applesteak Fruit, Lab Beef, Plantimals Next from Biotech Firms. (satire)
  
  
• 29 Common Reasons Why Your Vegetarian Diet Isn't Working. (satire) (a.k.a. "The Beyond Veg Litmus Test.")
  

Kirt Nieft is a schoolteacher, and has taught special and regular education classes in the U.S. and abroad in Peru, Thailand, and New Zealand. Kirt ate strictly instincto for a few years before including salads and occasional fresh juices in his diet. After 8 years all-raw he has recently been experimenting with some minimal cooking of meat and vegetables.

• An Ex-Instincto's Guide to Instinctive Eating...and crash course for the instinctively perplexed.

• From Fit for Life, to Instincto, to Paleo. (dietary bio)

• A Tale of Raw Heaven. (humor) If you were at St. Peter's gate and found you hadn't made the cut for the afterlife's Raw A-team, which choice would you take: Raw Vegan Hell, or Instincto Hell?

• Book reviews of:
  • Instinctive Eating: The Lost Knowledge of Optimum Nutrition
    (by Zephyr)
    
  • Instinctive Nutrition
    (by Severen Schaeffer)
    
  • Instinctive Nutrition: Food, Your Body and You
    (by Helen Young)
    
  • Maximize Immunity: And Unleash Your Best Defense Against Illness
    (by Bruno Comby)
    
  • NeanderThin: A Caveman's Guide to Nutrition
    (by Ray Audette with Troy Gilchrist)
    
  • We Want to Live: Volume One--Out of the Grips of Disease and Death (the story) & Volume Two--Healthfully (the facts)
    (by Aajonus Vonderplanitz)

Jeff Novick is the Director of Nutrition at the Pritikin Longevity Center in Aventura, Florida, where he helps people make the transition to healthful eating. He holds both undergraduate and graduate degrees from Indiana State University in nutrition with minors in exercise science.

Jeff has taught nutrition at Indiana State University, Indiana University Medical School, and at the University Of Miami Medical School. While in Indiana he developed and taught the Nutrition Education Initiative, a nutrition and preventative medical curriculum for medical doctors, residents, and medical students. In recognition of this project, he was awarded the Indiana State Public Health Excellence in Health Science Award.

Jeff serves as Vice President on the Board of Directors for the National Health Association (NHA: formerly known as the American Natural Hygiene Society), and writes for Health Science magazine, the membership journal of the NHA. He is frquently quoted on nutrition topics in a wide range of popular health magazines.

• Effects of a Nutrition Education Program on the Related Knowledge and Behaviors of Family Practice Residents.

Jean-Louis Tu recently completed his Ph.D. in mathematics in the U.S. and has returned to his native France where he now holds an assistant professorship. He eats mostly instincto-style.

• Is Cooked Food Poison? Looking at the Science on Raw vs. Cooked Foods. (note: the numerous sub-articles in this paper are noted separately elsewhere on the website)

• One Man's Meat Is Another Woah-Man's Poison: The official un-consensus on which toxic foods to avoid, from Anopsology to Zen Macrobiotics. (satire)

Stephen Walsh has a Ph.D. in Process Systems Engineering from Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine, specialising in data analysis, mathematical modelling, and optimisation. Stephen is Vice Chair of the U.K. Vegan Society Council (Board of Trustees).

Stephen's comments regarding the use of his material on Beyond Veg are as follows:

"I consider vegan diets to be advantageous to health. There is, however, a need for care on B-12, omega-3 fatty acids, iodine, selenium and vitamin-D (the latter three only in some locations) if these advantages are not to be eroded. All these issues can be dealt with satisfactorily and easily within a vegan diet (see the offsite article: A recipe for abundant vegan health).

I regard the Beyond Veg site as providing a useful sceptical voice in relation to raw vegan, mainstream vegan and vegetarian diets. I do not agree with the overall conclusions of the site - that "evolutionary" diets including animal products are preferable for human health to appropriately chosen vegan diets. There is no known nutritional requirement for humans that cannot be met by an appropriate vegan diet."

• What Every Vegan Should Know About Vitamin B12.

Sandy Warf is a schoolteacher and former chair of EarthSave Orange County [Los Angeles]. She now includes eggs in her natural hygiene-style diet after developing troubles following a more traditional interpretation of the program for some years.

• To Balance Compassion for Animals with Nutritional Needs. (dietary bio)

Sharrhan is a musician who records and performs her own original meditation music of improvisations for electronically altered flutes and voice. She is also a silk painter/watercolorist and a long-time meditation practitioner.

• My Search for Friendly Dietary Fuel: from low-carb to all-raw and back again after 20 years.. (dietary bio)