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So I found this article this morning and it doesn't make any sense to me - aren't soy products ultimately detrimental to one's health?

I can understand wanting to eat vegan for an animal welfare standpoint, but I can't justify killing oneself (however slowly) just so that an animal which will be slaughtered anyway will still be ultimately slaughtered for someone else to eat.

http://www.livestrong.com/article/401432-vegan-paleo-diet/

What do you guys think?

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Very interesting question here with vegetarian/paleo discussion paleohacks.com/questions/17059/… – sherpamelissa Mar 28 2011 at 14:31
It's hard enough being vegan to get nutritional requirements met. B12 and protein come to mind (along with certain minerals). The mainstay for vegans is beans/soy to get enough protein, which the article mentions. First thing we say to eat on paleo: MEAT - eggs, beef, fish, etc. Kinda hard to follow when you rule all that out (and dairy). – Dave S. Mar 28 2011 at 16:58

14 Answers

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There can't be a 100% vegan paleo diet, but the article says "vegans can adapt some of the principles behind the Paleo Diet," which is correct.

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What about Storm Talifero? He eats paleo just without eating meat or dairy and without cooking anything. And he seems to be doing pretty well. How exactly can't there be a 100% vegan paleo diet? Are you using the phrase "paleo diet" such that in its very definition, it includes eating meat and dairy? – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:36
***meat OR dairy – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:36
Storm probably doesn't call his diet paleo though, he says he eats raw vegan. Paleo might not include meat and dairy, but I challenge you to eat raw vegan during the winter. It wouldn't be a lot of fun. Unless you eat imported vegetables and fruits all the time. But that ain't paleo. Maybe nuts? I don't think anyone who eats only nuts is very healthy. – Korion Sep 4 2011 at 13:00
it depends where you live korion, you could easily eat raw vegan all year in a tropical zone. – cliff Sep 4 2011 at 13:57
Regarding the raw veganism issue, there are studies and experiments that indicate one of the big leaps in human evolution is the nutrients released from food when it is cooked. They've done experiments with animals (such as where they feed snakes cooked vs. uncooked meat) and the animals who ate cooked food, expended less energy when resting because they didn't need to get more food all the time. Great link here on a BBC Documentary: topdocumentaryfilms.com/cooking-human – GabyYYZ Sep 4 2011 at 13:59
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Most vegans don't eat meat because of the "cruelty to animals". That's an ideology that isn't "paleolithic" at all. A caveman with such an ideology wouldn't last long. If you are paleo, you should at least believe that eating animals is totally normal.

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If there is an vegan period in paleo time! You can label it Paelo. If there were people eating a vegan diet in praehistoric times, why not call it vegan paleo*

Probably it was limited to some season. Later people start eating animals again.

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Any evidence this happened? – Satchmo Mar 21 2012 at 1:18
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Veganism in general is pretty unhealthy, because if you're not getting a complete source of protein from SOMETHING at least like eggs (the next best thing to meat) then you're not eating a nutritionally complete diet.

Not to mention, the Omega-3 content in a vegetarian or vegan diet is extremely low. As we all know, ALA conversion is inefficient in humans and you can't simply rely on that for your Omega-3s.

Finally, veganism is an oxymoron to Paleo/Primal. Paleo men and women were not vegans and thus vegans are not paleo.

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Source for the claim that no Paleolithic era peoples subsisted off a plant based diet that lacked access to meat? – Satchmo Mar 21 2012 at 1:15
Source for the inference that there were vegan Paleolithic people who didn't die off within a year? – Roth Apr 27 2012 at 12:46
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Im a born Vegan, and have to be a vegan because of religious reasons, i read the Paleo Solution by Robb Wolf but i figured that it's based mostly on meat. I don't know what to do. I have to get my proteins from Soy products, I just can't keep up with Vegan Paleo. I tried to eat paleo for a week but I stopped after the 3rd day because I was falling apart. I ate fruits, stir fried vegetables, salads. Things i can't eat > Meat, Fish, Eggs. and when you add paleo to that it greatly reduces eg. No Bread, Potato, Grains, Soy, Dairy. < Those things are basically all I used to eat. I need serious help here. too.

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3 
 Maybe you should evaluate how important it is to you to have a healthy body. A diet where all your protein comes from soy is likely to be detrimental to your health eventually. Veganism really doesn't seem to be a healthy, appropriate diet for humans. If nothing else, the B12 issue is pretty good evidence of that. Also, what religious beliefs require veganism (instead of the more common vegetarianism)? – Olivia Sep 4 2011 at 7:06
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 By the way, it's ok to eat dairy if you tolerate it well. It's miles better than soy for a protein source. – Olivia Sep 4 2011 at 7:07
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 I think it is a basic human right to decide what food actually nourishes your body. Any organization/religion that puts limits on your ability to nourish yourself is violating your human rights. I hate to "go there" but a common tactic with cults is to limit protein and fat in adherents diets because it reduces the ability for rational thought and the floaty/spacey feeling from vitamin and mineral deficiencies are interpreted as religious experience. – Happy Now Sep 4 2011 at 7:40
Are you vegan or vegetarian? Dairy and potatoes are paleo approved by most and can make the bases for a pretty solid diet imo. If your full on vegan supplements+paleo plant foods could make a decent diet. – cliff Sep 4 2011 at 14:03
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"Paleo" in today's sense of the word, no obviously not because it's come to mean meet. I personally have no problem with raw/'paleo' (no neolithic foods) vegans. I have friends who swear by raw or mostly raw diets. It works for them. It probably wouldn't work for me/ my body type but I'm going to try it for a week when I get settled down again. I think we should just let the raw/paleo vegans live and stop waving our steaks in front of them. I'm sometimes embarrassed to be put in the paleo box for that reason. I think the veggie chip munching vegetarians are more worth mentioning as not being healthy than a raw/paleo vegan.

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Sensible answer. Thanks. – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:42
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Sure. Do all the same stuff, just don't eat meat or dairy. I frequently go a few days without having eaten any meat or dairy. Sometimes I even go a day or two eating RAW vegan.

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 I agree. We have this image of paleo hunters bringing home a nice big game animal every day. There may have been times and places that happened, especially when people migrated to places like the western hemisphere. But mostly, no. There were eras when people survived by the ocean or streams and mostly lived on what they could catch or collect. In very cold climates and periods, yes, lots of meat. In East Africa, not so much. Don't lump every homo creature for the last 2.5 million years together. – Harry May 13 2011 at 15:57
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Paleo Vegan would be live like apes. Lot of greens, and fruits. Occasianally insects and bugs and if you desire hunt some small mammals or be canibalistic.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15640434/ns/technology_and_science-science/t/early-pre-humans-enjoyed-extensive-diet/

http://www.pnas.org/content/97/25/13506.full

http://www.beyondveg.com/nicholson-w/hb/hb-interview1c.shtml

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Yeah paleo vegan would occasionally include insects, bugs, small mammals, and other humans. Really good insight there, pal. – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:41
Except vegans don't eat any animals or anything derived from animals so no, insects aren't vegan. "Real" vegans even avoid chitosan (which is often made from crushed beetles or something like that) or red food coloring. – Roth Sep 4 2011 at 7:13
this is a good answer. Why give it a downvote?! Its answers the qeustion. The question is not are there healthy vegans? Some people here answer on a question which snt asked? If there is a vegan period in paelo time. You can label it veganpaleo why not. – oak0y Sep 4 2011 at 9:05
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I would worry about the person's nutritional needs, it doesn't seem to be a very wise decision. The basis of the paleo diet is meat and if you take that away you are basicly ridding yourself of most everything save fruits, vegetables and nuts/seeds. It sounds like a death wish to me JMO!!

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OMG everything but fruits, vegetable, and nuts/seeds?? HOLY SHIT that's only like 5,000 million different kinds of foods!!!!11 How could anybody bare it? Google "Storm Talifero". He seems to be doing fine. – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:40
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It would never be ideal, but maybe you could approximate the diet of one of our ancestors who couldn't hunt but still managed to produce viable offspring. I'm assuming he accomplished the later by trickery, and that the resulting resentment explains why no one shared their meat with him.

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I love this answer. :D – a hut full of spears May 12 2011 at 19:20
Stupid answer, but fleetingly amusing. Downvoted anyway. – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:39
I'm with AC. There are plenty of cultures that aren't big game hunters. I hate dip-shit stuff like this. – Satchmo Mar 21 2012 at 1:11
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my husband attempted paleo as a pescatarian and was miserable and hungry. it might be possible for a very short period of time, but certainly not healthy and not sustainable in the long run.

ETA: a very vegan friend of mine did a month GF, and felt great, but couldnt go longer than a month.

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I feel like I know a lot of vegans who are also gluten-free. I kind of just assumed that was one of the reasons why people who go vegan often report feeling so great for the first time in their lives. (And also because they cut out processed foods.) – Paul Mar 28 2011 at 17:54
oh totally. my friend who went GF owns a vegan grocery store and has been vegan for about 30 years. she and her husband opened the store and literally sold nothing but vegan junk food (vegan marshmallows, vegan gummie candy, vegan skittles, etc). after going GF, she started eating so radically differently that her store slowly started to transition to vegan healthy food- fermented veggies, bobs red mill, less soy, raw nuts, sea veggies... DEFINITELY a good transition, especially since she had end stage renal disease and a kidney transplant a few years earlier! – being Mar 28 2011 at 20:35
That's a good story. I was going to say that I also know a vegan who says she never gets colds (and I believe her). And I was going to say: must be the no-gluten and the no-industrial oils and the no sugar. But then I remembered that she occasionally eats fish .... I feel like vegan + fish wouldn't be all that bad of a diet. Hope your friend continues to do better .... – Paul Mar 29 2011 at 7:53
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 Mark Sisson's wife is piscatarian. And by all accounts she is very healthy. Different strokes for different folks I guess. – Harry May 13 2011 at 15:50
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Turning immediately to soybeans for protein is kind of a lazy answer. Off the top of my head, you would probably do better eating a combination of sweet potato, coconut, and mushrooms. It would be fairly easy to get up to a minimal protein intake that way, and would be truly paleo. Obviously you could eat other things as well, but those would be your staples. Good luck finding a vegan source of B12 that is actually paleo, though, since most B12 nowadays is made using genetically engineered bacteria.

Or just don't be vegan. Problem solved.

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 algae. mmm. ocean sludge is so tasty. – Stephen-Aegis Mar 28 2011 at 15:16
Gotta love sushi nori. I need to find a new way to eat it as my favorite nori wrapped crackers are now out of the question. – Oranges13 Mar 28 2011 at 18:00
@oranges- I live in hawaii and grew up eating nori plain. It's really common here, you can probably find it at your local asian store if not in the asian food isle of most grocery stores. – Danielle Mar 28 2011 at 23:07
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For short periods of time, I think yes, by relying on roots and fruit. I know people who have done this. But long-term the deficiencies will catch up to you unless you supplement.

Nutrition and Physical Regeneration has a post about Orthodox Christian fasting, which is mostly vegan with some shellfish allowed. I have met a few Orthodox paleos who manage this. Michael isn't paleo and uses lentils. Paleos have to rely on SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much coconut it's ridiculous- like 2-3 cans a day. That plus starch allows one to be OK and maybe even thrive, but it's very difficult to get all that food down the hatch. I've been palel-pescatarian before and you really do have to force yourself to eat a lot of very satiating starch and fat, which can be hard because it's so filling, but if you feel full and haven't gotten enough calories you will feel kind of sick later.

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 In that case I am a vegan...in between meals! ;) – Asclepius Mar 28 2011 at 13:49
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No. It's an oxymoron.

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That's what I thought, reading the article (especially on such a really well reputed site) I was really confused. This is really bad, then. – Oranges13 Mar 28 2011 at 13:51
There is already confusion about what constitutes a 'paleo diet' - with disagreement over carbohydrate content and dairy etc... Stretching paleo to include a vegan element introduces unneccesary confusion. If you eat meat, vegans will not consider you vegan. Period. If you don't eat foods recogniseable to HG, then it isn't paleo. Period. Livestong's adivce that vegans can "...opt mostly for foods that can be gathered, but supplement with legumes and soy products to ensure a sufficient intake of protein." is basically what vegans do anyway. It is tautological and in no way 'paleo'. – Asclepius Mar 29 2011 at 10:02
Uh, why? Care to substantiate? – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 0:37
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 'Paleo' comes from 'paleolithic'. The paleolithic heralded the migration of humans out of the savannah of East Africa. The evidence we have is that they were hunter gatherers. They survived an ice-age which would only be possible with recourse to hunting. Cave art from the neolithic depicts hunting. The tools from this time were engineered for hunting and animal-butchery. So being 'paleo' without the fat/meat from hunting is like claiming to be promiscuous but without having sex. – Asclepius May 13 2011 at 11:48
@Asclepius: More like claiming to be promiscuous but without doing any foreplay ever. Odd, but still fits the definition. – Anonymous Coward May 13 2011 at 23:05
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