Compare And Contrast Paleo Diet And Veganism

It seems as if everyone is looking for the perfect diet. That special eating plan where you not only lose weight, but also feel great. Two very popular diets are the vegan and paleo diets. Throughout the past couple of years the debate between veganism and paleo has come to new heights. A vegan diet consists of not eating meat or any animal products and a paleo diet consists of eating meat, fish, eggs, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and healthy fats. With more scientific evidence to support both sides, the evidence for veganism greatly outweighs paleo evidence. Overall, the vegan diet has greater mental and physical health benefits than the paleo diet. The anatomy of a human is most like the anatomy of a herbivore. Like the name sounds,
The paleo diet’s strongest argument is that animal protein is the best way to get protein and that people should be eating more protein than carbohydrates. According to paleodietevolved.com, “The paleo diet relies heavily on animal flesh and with it comes healthy protein. This protein is very anabolic and is used for building new cells like muscle mass” (“Real”). This reasoning is both right and wrong. Protein does build muscles but animal protein is not the most optimal protein to consume. In fact, animal protein takes more energy to digest than what it is actually worth. When meat is consumed, our body releases digestive enzymes to help digest our food, but with meat those enzymes become exhausted with the hours they must work to digest the meat. It can take up to 5 hours to digest meat (Norton). When the human body is using all of this energy to digest meat there is less energy to perform regular day to day tasks. Therefore, consuming plant protein is more effective because the energy normally used to digest meat could be utilized elsewhere. Due to this evidence, it is clear that animal protein is not the most optimal protein and plant protein is just as effective, even more