Chuck Pezeshki is a published professor of engineering in the field of design theory and high performance work teams. I can claim no specialty here, as I lack even a college degree. Still, Pezeshki and I have much in common — like me: He prefers a systems view, as he summarizes his blog on his About page, “As we relate, so we think.” He states that, “My work exists at, and reaches far above the micro-neuroscience level, into larger systemic social organization.”
An area of focus we share is diet and health and we’ve come to similar conclusions. Like me, he sees a relationship between sugar, obesity, addiction, trauma, individuality, empathy issues, authoritarianism, etc (and inequality comes up as well; by the way, my favorite perspective on inequality in this context is Keith Payne’s The Broken Ladder). And like me, he is informed by a low-carb and ketogenic approach that was initially motivated by weight loss. Maybe these commonalities are unsurprising, as we do have some common intellectual interests.
Much of his blog is about what he calls “structural memetics” involving value memes (v-memes). Even though I haven’t focused as much on value memes recently, Ken Wilber’s version of spiral dynamics shaped my thought to some extent (that kind of thing being what brought me to Pezeshki’s blog in the first place). As important, we are both familiar with Bruce K. Alexander’s research on addiction, although my familiarity comes from Johann Hari’s writings (I learned of the rat park research in Chasing the Scream). A more basic link in our views comes from each of us having read the science journalism of Gary Taubes and Nina Teicholz, along with some influence from Dr. Jason Fung. He has also read Dr. Robert H. Lustig, a leading figure in this area who I know of through the work of others.
Related to diet, Pezeshki does bring up the issue of inflammation. As I originally came around to my present diet from a paleo viewpoint, I became familiar with the approach of functional medicine that puts inflammation as a central factor (Essentialism On the Decline). Inflammation is a bridge between the physiological and the psychological, the individual and the social. Where and how inflammation erupts within the individual determines how a disease condition or rather a confluence of symptoms gets labeled and treated, even if the fundamental cause originated elsewhere, maybe in the ‘external’ world (socioeconomic stress, transgenerational trauma, environmental toxins, parasites because of lack of public sanitation, etc. Inflammation is linked to leaky gut, leaky brain, arthritis, autoimmune disorders, mood disorders, ADHD, autism, schizophrenia, impulsivity, short-term thinking, addiction, aggression, etc — and such problems increase under high inequality.
There are specific examples to point to. Diabetes and mood disorders co-occur. There is the connection of depression and anhedonia, involving the reward circuit and pleasure, which in turn can be affected by inflammation. Also, inflammation can lead to changes in glutamate in depression, similar to the glutamate alterations in autism from diet and microbes, and that is significant considering that glutamate is not only a major neurotransmitter but also a common food additive. Dr. Roger McIntyre writes that, “MRI scans have shown that if you make someone immune activated, the hypervigilance center is activated, activity in the motoric region is reduced, and the person becomes withdrawn and hypervigilant. And that’s what depression is. What’s the classic presentation of depression? People are anxious, agitated, and experience a lack of spontaneous activity and increased emotional withdrawal” (Inflammation, Mood Disorders, and Disease Model Convergence). Inflammation is a serious condition and, in the modern world, quite pervasive. The implications of this are not to be dismissed.
I’ve been thinking about this kind of thing for years now. But this is the first time I’ve come across someone else making these same connections, at least to this extent and with such a large context. The only thing I would add or further emphasize is that, from a functional medicine perspective (common among paleo, low-carb, and keto advocates), the body itself is a system as part of the larger systems of society and the environment — it is a web of connections not only in which we are enmeshed but of which forms everything we are, that is to say we aren’t separate from it. Personal health is public health is environmental health, and think of that in relation to the world of hyperobjects overlapping with hypersubjectivity (as opposed to the isolating psychosis of hyper-individualism):
“We shouldn’t personally identify with our health problems and struggles. We aren’t alone nor isolated. The world is continuously affecting us, as we affect others. The world is built on relationships, not just between humans and other species but involving everything around us — what some describe as embodied, embedded, enacted, and extended (we are hypersubjects among hyperobjects). The world that we inhabit, that world inhabits us, our bodies and minds. There is no world “out there” for there is no possible way for us to be outside the world. Everything going on around us shapes who we are, how we think and feel, and what we do — most importantly, shapes us as members of a society and as parts of a living biosphere, a system of systems all the way down. The personal is always the public, the individual always the collective, the human always the more than human” (The World Around Us).
In its earliest meaning, diet meant a way of life, not merely an eating regimen. And for most of history, diet was rooted in cultural identity and communal experience. It reinforced a worldview and social order. This allows diet to be a perfect lens through which to study societal patterns and changes over time.
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Relevant posts by Chuck Pezeshki:
Weight Loss — it’s in the V-Memes
Weight Loss — It’s in the v-Memes (II)
Weight Loss by the V-Memes — (III) What’s the v-Meme stack look like?
Weight Loss by the V-Memes (IV) or Channeling your Inner Australopithecine
Weight Loss by the v-Memes (V) – Cutting out Sugar — The Big Psycho-Social-Environmental Picture
The Case Against Sugar — a True Psychodynamic Meta-Review
Quickie Post — the Trans-Cultural Diabolical Power of Sugar
How Health Care Deprivation and the Consequences of Poor Diet is Feeding Contemporary Authoritarianism – The Trump ACA Debacle
Quickie Post — Understanding the Dynamics of Cancer Requires a Social Structure that can Create Cellular Dynamics
Finding a Cure for Cancer — or Why Physicists May Have the Upper Hand
Quickie Post –A Sober Utopia
Rat Park — Implications for High-Productivity Environments — Part I
Rat Park — Implications for High-Productivity Environments — Part II
Leadership for Creativity Isn’t all Child’s Play
Relational Disruption in Organizations
The Neurobiology of Education and Critical Thinking — How Do We Get There?
What Caused the Enlightenment? And What Threatens to Unravel It?
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Relevant posts from my own blog:
It’s All Your Fault, You Fat Loser!
The World Around Us
The Literal Metaphor of Sickness
Health From Generation To Generation
The Agricultural Mind
Spartan Diet
Ketogenic Diet and Neurocognitive Health
Fasting, Calorie Restriction, and Ketosis
Like water fasts, meat fasts are good for health.
The Creed of Ancel Keys
Dietary Dictocrats of EAT-Lancet
Eliminating Dietary Dissent
Cold War Silencing of Science
Essentialism On the Decline
There is also some discussion of diet in this post and the comments section:
Western Individuality Before the Enlightenment Age
And related to that:
“It has become an overtly ideological fight, but maybe it always was. The politicization of diet goes back to the early formalized food laws that became widespread in the Axial Age and regained centrality in the Middle Ages, which for Europeans meant a revival of ancient Greek thought, specifically that of Galen. And it is utterly fascinating that pre-scientific Galenic dietary philosophy has since taken on scientific garb and gets peddled to this day, as a main current in conventional dietary thought (see Food and Faith in Christian Culture ed. by Ken Albala and Trudy Eden […]; I made this connection in realizing that Stephen Le, a biological anthropologist, was without awareness parroting Galenic thought in his book 100 Million Years of Food).”
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Mental health, Psychopathy, Addiction, Inflammation, Diet, Nutrition, etc:
Dark triad traits and health outcomes: An exploratory study
by Jasna Hudek-Knezevic et al
Brain chemical is reward for psychopathic traits
by Ewen Callaway
Psychopaths’ brains wired to seek rewards, no matter the consequences
from Science Daily
Psychopathic traits modulate brain responses to drug cues in incarcerated offenders
by Lora M. Cope et al
Links Between Substance Abuse and Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD)
from Promises Behavioral Health
Antisocial Personality Disorder and depression in relation to alcoholism: A community-based sample
by Laura C. Holdcraft et al
More inflammation but less brain-derived neurotrophic factor in antisocial personality disorder
by Tzu-Yun Wang et al
High Neuroticism and Low Conscientiousness Are Associated with Interleukin-6
by Sutin, Angelina
Aggressive and impulsive personality traits and inflammatory markers in cerebrospinal fluid and serum: Are they interconnected?
by S. Bromander et al
Inflammation Predicts Decision-Making Characterized by Impulsivity, Present Focus, and an Inability to Delay Gratification
by Jeffrey Gassen et al
Could Your Immune System Be Making You Impulsive?
by Emma Young
Impulsivity-related traits are associated with higher white blood cell counts
by Angelina R. Sutin et al
Dietary long-chain omega-3 fatty acids are related to impulse control and anterior cingulate function in adolescents
by Valerie L. Darcey
Diabetes Risk and Impulsivity
by David Perlmutter
Experimentally-Induced Inflammation Predicts Present Focus
by Jeffrey Gassen et al
Penn Vet researchers link inflammation and mania
by Katherine Unger Baillie
Anger Disorders May Be Linked to Inflammation
by Bahar Gholipour
Markers of Inflammation in the Blood Linked to Aggressive Behaviors
from University of Chicago Medical Center
Anhedonia as a clinical correlate of inflammation in adolescents across psychiatric conditions
by R. D. Freed et al
From Stress to Anhedonia: Molecular Processes through Functional Circuits
by Colin H. Stanton et al
Mapping inflammation onto mood: Inflammatory mediators of anhedonia
by Walter Swardfager et al
Understanding anhedonia: What happens in the brain?
by Tim Newman
Depression, Anhedonia, Glutamate, and Inflammation
by Peter Forster et al
Depression and anhedonia caused by inflammation affecting the brain
from Bel Marra Health
Inflammation linked to weakened reward circuits in depression
from Emory Health Sciences
Depression in people with type 2 diabetes: current perspectives
by L. Darwish et al
The Link Between Chronic Inflammation and Mental Health
by Kayt Sukel
Emory team links inflammation to a third of all cases of depression
by Oliver Worsley
Brain Inflammation Linked to Depression
by Emily Downwar
The Brain on Fire: Depression and Inflammation
by Marwa Azab
Inflammation, Mood Disorders, and Disease Model Convergence
by Lauren LeBano
High-inflammation depression linked to reduced functional connectivity
by Alice Weatherston
Does Inflammation Cause More Depression or Aggression?
by Charles Raison
A probe in the connection between inflammation, cognition and suicide
by Ricardo Cáceda et al
What If We’re Wrong About Depression?
by Anna North
People with ‘rage’ disorder twice as likely to have parasitic infection
by Kevin Jiang
Rage Disorder Linked with Parasite Found in Cat Feces
by Christopher Wanjek
Maternal Inflammation Can Affect Fetal Brain Development
by Janice Wood
The effects of increased inflammatory markers during pregnancy
from Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin
Inflammation in Pregnancy Tied to Greater Risk for Mental Illness in Child
by Traci Pedersen
Inflammation may wield sex-specific effects on developing brain
by Nicholette Zeliadt
Childhood obesity is linked to poverty and parenting style
from Concordia University
The Obesity–Impulsivity Axis: Potential Metabolic Interventions in Chronic Psychiatric Patients
by Adonis Sfera et al
The pernicious satisfaction of eating carbohydrates
by Philip Marais
Your Brain On Paleo
from Paleo Leap
The Role of Nutrition and the Gut-Brain Axis in Psychiatry: A Review of the Literature
by S. Mörkl et al
Emerging evidence linking the gut microbiome to neurologic disorders
by Jessica A. Griffiths and Sarkis K. Mazmanian
New Study Shows How Gut Bacteria Affect How You See the World
by David Perlmutter
The Surprising Link Between Gut Health and Mental Health
from LoveBug Probiotics
Nutritional Psychiatry: Is Food The Next Big Frontier In Mental Health Treatment?
by Stephanie Eckelkamp
Ketogenic Diets for Psychiatric Disorders: A New 2017 Review
by Georgia Ede
Low-Carbohydrate Diet Superior to Antipsychotic Medications
by Georgia Ede
Gut microbiome, SCFAs, mood disorders, ketogenic diet and seizures
by Jonathan Miller
Can the Ketogenic Diet Treat Depression and Anxiety, Even Schizophrenia?
by Rebekah Edwards
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