The Nugent Report

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The science behind health and nutrition. Welcome to this episode of the Nugent report. I definitive source for objective information on health and nutrition, featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author public speaker expert on science, health, wellness, and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at drnugent.com and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram @thenugentreport.

Welcome to the Nugent report. I’m Dr. Steve Nugent. This is the third in a series of episodes of vitamin D and magnesium two nutrients that need to work together for your health. In this episode, I’ll be throwing a lot of numbers and values your way, but don’t panic. It’s my goal on the Nugent report to make sure that you have transcripts written, supportive data tables or hotlinks to tables. When I give you a whole bunch of numbers, I don’t want you to stress out, attempting to remember the numbers, just enjoy the episode and then go to drnugent.com to look for the numbers that you have in mind.

I want you to remember that the nutrient report is a labor of love, and it’s not my day job. And in fact, I have two very talented, very dedicated individuals helping me on this website, and it’s not their day job either. So we’re posting these things as soon as we can. And if things don’t come out as fast as you want them to just try and be patient, please. Now back to vitamin D. As I mentioned in previous episodes, once a lab test for physicians was developed so that they could easily test vitamin D levels of their patients, the general perspective on vitamin D supplementation changed almost diametrically before the test existed. And I can remember frequently arguing with medical physicians about vitamin D supplementation. No, a very significant percentage of patients. According to study, as much as 42% are deficient in vitamin D and physicians who have been taught that vitamin D supplementation wasn’t necessary, or perhaps even toxic.

Now they find themselves recommending thousands of units for patients each week. Remember garbage in, garbage out. If the data you’re using to, with to make your decision is flawed and not accurate, it’s highly probable that your conclusion. So be flawed and inaccurate. Okay. The first step, when you have a health question, any health question, not just about vitamin D is to get the appropriate tests from the appropriate practitioner, go to a doctor who knows what they’re doing in the case of vitamin D testing. Any physician can do this for you. When you see your physician, ask them for a vitamin D blood test, a serum analysis these days it’s pretty routine. And it’s unlikely that you’ll get any arguments. When any lab test comes back from any lab, it’ll be pretty simple, right? On the printout. It will say low, normal or high. This is not rocket science.

You’ll hear me talking again. This podcast probably many times about inadequate levels versus deficiencies. There is a distinction and that distinction is important when making decisions for your health. So let’s apply that to vitamin D. If your blood test comes back with less than 30 millimoles per liter, and by the way, that is written as lowercase MMOL forward slash upper case L so 30 millimoles per liter, less than that amount, that means it’s low. And this is typically associated with deficiencies that can lead to serious health issues. If your test comes back between 30 and 50 millimoles per liter, it’s classified as being less than adequate for bone health in already healthy individuals and amounts greater than or equal to 50 will be considered adequate for bone health, as well as general health for already healthy individuals. Now don’t panic. If I said those numbers too fast, remember the tables or hotline sports tables will be provided for you on drnugent.com.

It’s probably a good idea for me to go through some terms for you right now, because it occurs to me that you’ll be looking at labels. You’ll be looking at literature, you’ll be seeing things on the internet and you might see some abbreviations that will just leave you confused. So let’s do some terms and definitions right now, for many, everybody was used to looking at a dietary supplement label and they were looking for the RDA and that’s the required dietary allowance. But then there was the RDI, which means required daily intake. And then there’s the DRI, which is the dietary reference intake that by the way, is created by the food nutrition board FMB, which is part of the Institute of medicine of the national academies. And by the way, the national academies used to be called the national Academy of sciences.

Are you confused yet? Well, hang on, there’s more, there’s also the AI and the EAR and finally the UL. Well, that is a lot to sort out, but I’m going to try and simplify each of these definitions for UDR I that’s the dietary reference intake. That’s a set of values designed for assessing nutrition intake for all ready and healthy people. Then there’s the RDA or required dietary allowance. And that’s the average daily level of intake deemed to be adequate. There’s a word again, to meet the nutrient requirements for about 97 to 98% of healthy people. The RDA is typically used to plan diets that are nutritionally sufficient. Then there’s the AI or adequate intake. The adequate intake is the level of assumed to ensure nutritional adequacy. This value is used where there isn’t enough human clinical evidence to develop the RDA.

This brings up the difference between inadequate dietary levels and deficiencies. Very often people are rated as having inadequate levels of nutrition to maintain normal health. However, a deficiency would be a level that would contribute to a significant health issue. So be aware when you’re reading the differences between inadequate and deficient, by the way, some authors are going to list it in the positive, and they’re going to use the words adequate or sufficient lots of stuff here. Well, moving on, we have two more, that’s the EAR or estimated average required. Now that’s the daily average level of intake estimated to meet the requirements of 50% of already healthy individuals, EAR is typically used to assess and plan the nutrient intakes of groups of people rather than individuals, so that roots can achieve adequate diets, but the EAR can also be used to evaluate nutrient intakes off individuals.

Finally, we have the UL, which actually is an abbreviation for tolerable upper intake level. Now that’s the safe, maximum daily intake level, which is unlikely to cause adverse effects throughout my career. Countless times people have told me that they thought, if they went over the RDA, that they were automatically toxic, they were in danger. They were afraid capers. There’s quite a span between the RDA and the UL of most nutrients. Again, tables or links to tables will be provided for you on Dr. mnuchin.com. So don’t panic, and won’t be there. Now, if you take a look at one of those tables for the dealer requirements, what you’re going to find is that in this case, the case of vitamin D the nutrient requirements for males and females is the same RDA. That’s not typical by the way, generally, you’ll find that with nutrients, it differs by age and gender, but in this case, it varies only by age and pretty significantly, by the way, sometimes you’re going to see vitamin D rated in, I use or international units.

And other times you’ll see it listed as micrograms, which is abbreviated as lowercase, M C, G. I know what you’re thinking. Why doesn’t everyone just get on the same page and just do it for simplicity sake? Just one thing, don’t hold your breath on that folks. There’s actually reasons for all this. So what you’re going to notice on the table is that between the ages of 0 and 12 months, the requirement is 400 IQ. Then it jumps up to 600 IQ all the way up to eight 70, and then starting at age 70 forward for the rest of your life. It increases for another 200 international units per day at business. Because as you age, you become less efficient at synthesizing vitamin D from sunlight. It’s again, one of those verses of age, but, you know, aging is really preferable to the alternative. You know, the next step is sewed. We’ll be talking about the sources of vitamin D conversion of sunlight to vitamin D and the benefits of vitamin D until then, this is Dr. Steve Nugent saying, please stay safe, be sensible and stay objective.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Nugent report, visit our website at drnugent.com for more objective facts about health and nutrition, and email your questions and feedback to drnugent.com. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram Nugent report. Stay informed, get the facts with the Nugent report.

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以科学方式分析健康与营养。欢迎收听本期Dr. Nugent报告。本节目由Dr. Steve Nugent主讲，为您提供健康和营养方面的优质客观信息。Dr. Steve Nugent是著名的心理学家、作家、公共演说家，也是科学、健康、保健和营养方面的专家。请访问我们的网站DrNugent.com，并在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上关注@TheNugentreport。

欢迎收听Dr. Nugent报告。我是Dr. Steve Nugent。这是“维生素D和镁”主题系列的第三讲，这两种营养素需要相互结合才能确保人体健康。在本期节目中，我会抛出大量数字和数值，但大家没必要惊慌。作为Dr. Nugent报告的主讲人，我会为大家提供文字素材、支持性数据表格以及链接。当我列举大量数字时，希望大家不要费力去记这些数字，你们只需享受本期节目，随后登录drnugent.com便可获取相关的数字。

希望大家记住，这个营养报告是我的兴趣所在，而非我的正职。实际上，有两个才华出众、高度敬业的人在帮助我打理这个网站，同样，这也不是他们的正职。我们总是尽可能快地发布相关内容。如果大家依然觉得发布不够及时，那么还请大家再耐心等待。本期我们继续讲维生素D。我在上几讲中提到，如果医生可以进行实验室检测，他们便可轻易测出患者的维生素D水平，在实验室检测出现之前，大众对维生素D补充剂的观点是截然不同的。我记得自己总是跟内科医生争论维生素D补充剂的问题。也不全是内科医生，其实极大比例是病人。根据研究，多达42%的人群缺乏维生素D，而医生们却被如此高质：维生素D补充剂全无必要，甚至可能有毒。

现在，他们建议病人每周摄入数千个单位的维生素D。请记住，胡乱摄入的结果是胡乱排出。如果你的决策依据是有问题的、不正确的，那么，你的结论就很可能存在问题且不正确。好，如果出现健康问题，任何健康问题，不仅仅是维生素D方面的问题，第一步要做的是，从正确的医生那里进行正确的检测，去找一位了解维生素D检测的医生。所有医生都能做到这点。看医生时，要求进行维生素D血液检测，当下，血清分析是一种常规检测。你们无需争执。只需实验室给出一个检测结果，这是轻而易举的事情，对不对？检测结果可以打印出来。结果无非是偏低、正常、偏高。这不是一件复杂的事。

我之后还会再次讲到。这个播客可能会多次谈到水平不足及缺乏的问题。这其中有所差别，并且这一差别会影响到大家的健康抉择。我们通过维生素D来展开这一观点。如果血液检测结果显示，维生素D的含量低于每升30毫摩尔（顺便说一下，这个单位是小写的mmol，加正斜杠，加大写的L），则意味着水平偏低。而这通常与导致严重健康问题的维生素D缺乏症相关；如果在每升30至50毫摩尔之间，则意味着不够健康人群维持骨骼健康；大于或等于50毫摩尔意味着足够健康人维持骨骼健康及整体健康。大家不要惊慌。如果大家没有记下这些数字，请访问drnugent.com查阅相关表格或链接。

或许我应该帮大家梳理一些术语，因为我突然想到，大家会查看标签。大家看文献或者上网时，可能会看到一些不太理解的缩略语。所以，我们现在来看一些术语和定义。所有人都习惯查看膳食补充剂标签，寻找RDA，也就是建议膳食摄取量。后来又有了RDI，也就是建议每日摄取量。然后又有了DRI，也就是膳食参考摄入量，顺便说一下，这一概念是由食品营养委员会FMB创造，FMB属于国家学会医学研究所，而国家学会的前身是国家科学院。

大家是不是已经有点迷惑了？再坚持一下，下面还有，包括AI、EAR以及UL。我们需要理清很多概念，我会尝试简化每个定义，其中，UDR是指膳食参考摄入量，旨在评估健康人群的营养摄入量；然后是RDA，即建议膳食摄取量。它是指足量的平均每日摄入量，代表着约97%到98%的健康人群的营养需求。我们可以参照RDA制备营养充足的饮食；然后是AI，即足量摄入。它是指认定的可达到营养充足的水平。足量摄入适用于无法借助充分的人类临床证据制定RDA的情况。

这就引出了膳食水平不足和缺乏之间的区别。人们经常被判定为营养水平不足，无法维持健康。然而，营养缺乏将会导致重大的健康问题。因此，当大家在读到有关不足和缺乏之间的区别时，一定要注意，有些作者会进行正面描述，他们会使用“充足”、“足够”、“大量”等字眼。好，我们继续讲解剩余的两个概念，一个是EAR，即估计平均所需。它是指可满足50%健康人群需求的估计每日平均摄入量，通常用于评估和规划群体而非个人的营养摄入量，保证群体饮食摄入充足，但EAR也可用于评估个人的营养摄入量。

最后一个概念是UL，它实际上是指可耐受最高摄入量。这是安全的最大日摄入量水平，不太可能引起不良影响。我曾无数次听人说，如果超过RDA，人体会中毒，会陷入危险。他们很担忧。RDA与UL中的大多数营养元素需求存在很大差异。Dr. mnuchin.com上同样也会提供相关表格或链接。大家不要担心记不住。现在，如果大家看一下其中一个表格，便会发现，在这种情况下，在RDA中，男性和女性的维生素D营养需求相同。这并不常见，一般来说，营养素需求会因年龄和性别而异，但在这种情况下，它只因年龄而异，而且相当明显。顺便说一下，有时大家会发现，维生素D的数值使用的是国际单位计量。

有时又会用微克，缩写形式是小写的mcg。我知道大家的内心想法。为什么不能统一一下，免得这么复杂？大家不要过分苛责。这其中包含几个原因。大家会在表格上注意到：0到12个月之间的需求量是400 IQ，后来升到600 IQ，再升到870，然后从70岁到生命结束，一直处于上升状态。它每天额外增加200个国际单位。因为随着年龄增长，人体中阳光合成维生素D的效率会降低。这是衰老的另一个副作用，但是，衰老总好过于早逝。大家知道，下一阶段就是离开人世。我们之后将探讨维生素D的来源、将阳光转化为维生素D，以及维生素D的益处。下次见。我是Dr. Steve Nugent，请大家多保重，保持理智，保持客观。

感谢收听本期Dr. Nugent报告。访问DrNugent.com，获取更多有关健康与营养的事实性信息。如有问题或反馈意见，可发送邮件至[email protected]。请在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上关注Dr. Nugent报告。获取事实性信息，资讯先人一步。

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Intro: The Nugent, the science behind health and nutrition. Welcome to this episode of The Nugent Report, a definitive source for objective information on health and nutrition featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author, public speaker, an expert on science, health, wellness, and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at DrNugent.com. And follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at The Nugent Report.

So, we’re going to talk about men’s health, and that includes mental health. So, we’ll talk about some psychology. Keep in mind that in less than one-hour presentation, we couldn’t possibly cover all of these things in detail. That just can’t be done. So, this is kind of an overview of what I feel are very important topics as it relates to men’s health. And so we’re also going to talk about brain health, prostate, and hormonal health, we’ll talk a little bit about the nutrition of aging as well. There are a few things that a lot of people just don’t know when it comes to men’s health. And I would say including, and especially men don’t know a lot of this stuff. Let’s start with the way people think.

Now, a lot of how we think is determined by the way our brains are structured. And so I’m going to throw in a little bit of neurobiology for all of you, which I hope that you’ll find both informative, and hopefully even maybe a little bit entertaining to learn some of this information, that there are indeed, structural differences between male brains and female brains. And before I go too much further, you know, I get way too many emails to get into circular conversations with folks about differences between men and women. I’m just not going to go there, folks. I’m going to present to you as a scientist, and I’m going to give you facts, and I hope that these facts will help you make good decisions about your health, that’s where it will be. Okay? Because, gosh, I’m getting so many emails now, I can’t possibly answer all the emails. I want to but I can’t.

So, structural differences, it is indisputable that there are structural differences between the brains of men and women. That’s not an argument. And there are also certain behaviors, which are innate behaviors. And these behaviors are to a very large extent, based on the structural differences in our brains. Now, some people get a little uptight about that, because then they think, “Oh, my gosh, are you saying that we have certain behaviors that simply can’t be changed?” Well, I would say that there are certain survival behaviors that can’t be changed. For instance, you do need to eat. If you don’t eat, you will not survive. So, there are innate messages coming from the brain through your genetic code that tells you that you must eat.

So, there are certain innate behaviors that you can modify, like, how much do I eat, when do I eat, but push comes to shove, at the end of the day, you’re going to have to eat. Okay. So, what I’m trying to say to you all, is that there are innate behaviors. And that means, and if we say this in modern terms, genetic behaviors. So, there are things that are printed into your genes that tell you how to behave. These are not things that you learn. So, the old nature versus nurture argument is what we’re talking now. And these are not things that you learn, these are things that are actually printed in your genes before you are born. And these are passed on to you from your parents, these survival behaviors. Okay.

Scientists now say that at least 50%, of all of your behavior, of all of your behavior that is seen as psychological behavior, at least 50% of it is genetic, it is actually programmed into your genes, telling you how to work. Again, folks, don’t freak out and think that thinking sets of absolutes and say, “Oh, that means this behavior, that behavior could never be changed.” You can learn to modify your behaviors. But there are certain aspects of genetic behavior which you cannot be at the very end at the final point, you can’t change certain behaviors. That’s the way that is.

So, if you were to look at the general behaviors of — and I’m going to speak in broad generalities. Because there are specific differences from one human being to another. So, I’m not implying here that everybody has precisely the same behavior if you’re a man or precisely the same if you’re a woman, that is not what we’re saying. So, there are specifics, which can be different, not only within a gender but in any individual. Okay. So, in a general sense. Broadly, and generally, males tend to be resistant to preventive health measures. We’ll talk a little bit more about that.

Generally speaking, females, as a general population tend to be very proactive about their health. Women are thinking about proactive measures, men, typically, and there are exceptions, of course, but men typically are not thinking about proactive measures for their health. The average male is like, “Well, if I hurt, I’ll go get a painkiller. Or if I need to get a drug or surgery, I’ll do that. Otherwise, everything that my female partner says is nonsense.” Okay. So, that tends to be the general. And again, there are exceptions. But in general, the overwhelming majority of patients who go to see a natural practitioner, so an integrative health practitioner, or a naturopath, or I’m not sure if you have chiropractors in Australia. Anyone who’s doing natural health measures or offering dietary supplements, the majority of the patients they will see will be female.

In fact, an overwhelming majority of the people who buy dietary supplements are female. Generally speaking, when I was in practice, what I observed is that men tended to be less cooperative as patients and women pretty much had to drag them in, to get their health taken care of. And it forced them to be seen, because well, there are men, and you know, they are tough, and they’re just, you know, “This is all nonsense. If I’m in pain I’ll go get a surgery, or a medication.” That is, unfortunately, innate, thinking, that is part and parcel with the structure of the male brain, as it is compared to the female brain. I’ll give you more on that as we proceed. Some of you may find this interesting. In fact, I could easily do a full hour on the differences in the structures in the brain, between men and women, and I think a lot of you would find those pretty interesting. But just stick on the topic I was asked to speak about.

So, give you some examples, the portion of the brain or the portions I should say, of the brain, which make a person open to proactive health behaviors tend to be significantly larger in females in their brains, then in the male brains. There are certain behaviors, which, again, are innate behaviors. So, these are pressed into your genetics, if you will, certain behaviors that can’t be changed. But there are behaviors that men can learn to change. So, if there’s nothing to and you know, people tend to — the psychological studies are very clear on this, by the way. Human beings in almost every case, tend to follow the path of least resistance. And that’s a survival mechanism, by the way, that’s an innate survival mechanism. So, it’s not good or bad, it simply is. And part of the makeup of the male brain is to not be open to these behaviors, but they can learn. And that’s important. So, ladies, there is hope for you to help your men become better stewards of their own health. You can help them with that. And ladies, your men do need help, you’ll learn more as we proceed. And that, again, is probably why someone in Australia recognized that there needs to be a Male Health Week because people need to be aware of these things.

Now, you hear all the time about well, humans are smarter because our brains are bigger. That’s actually not true. People like absolutes and they like simplification so that sounds simple. The human brain is larger than a chimpanzee brain. Therefore, humans are smarter than chimpanzees. Sorry, wrong. That’s just wrong. Male brains are larger than female brains in human beings. Does that mean that men are smarter than women? I think most of the ladies will say no, that’s probably not true. Okay. So, I did mean to have a little humor here, but the idea is, gorillas have much larger brains than humans. But I don’t know of any gorillas in the space program, so it’s not just about the size of the brain, it’s about the brain structure. And it’s about the complexity within each of those structures that has their own separate functions.

Well, here we come to the idea of I’m sure this term has been used in Australia. I know it’s been used like crazy in the United States, getting in touch with your feminine side. So, the idea throughout most of human history until really, about the mid to late 1960s, we would say, well, men behave this way and women behave that way. Okay. And then, of course, we had to start saying to the men, it’s okay to get in touch with your feminine side. Because folks, there are certain behaviors and I know that somebody will misunderstand this and somebody is going to get upset, folks, really, my only purpose is to help people not to argue with them. So, please don’t email on this. Okay? The fact is, there are certain behaviors, which are more female, and certain behaviors, which are more male, and that has to do with the structures of the brain, which then has to do with their genetic behaviors.

Now, generalization is usually not a good thing to do, but here we have to generalize for the purpose of this presentation. And what I want you to all understand is that even though a male fetus is a male fetus, the brain of a male fetus begins as a female brain. All human brains begin as a female brain. Now, what happens as the fetus is developing within the womb, is that testosterone, because it’s a male, testosterone levels begin to sort of flood through the brain tissue. And, believe it or not, if you can just imagine this, if you can visualize it, the testosterone actually shrinks some of the areas of the female brain, which the result of this then is a male brain. So, there are certain aspects, and guys, I don’t want you to get depressed. Okay. Because there’s more of this presentation, but I want you to understand, we men all started with female brains, all of us. Okay. There’s no exceptions here. So, testosterone actually shrinks certain areas of the male brain in the fetus, areas like communication centers, empathy centers, and so on. And we’ll talk more about that in a few minutes.

Now, there can be variations in brain matter within the same gender. So, what do I mean? So, you will have some females as an example, who will exhibit more male behavior. And you will have some males who exhibit more female behaviors. And I don’t want you, folks, to go on to extremes and all that, but just understand what I’m saying that in a single gender, there can be variations in the proportion of genetic male and genetic female behaviors. Okay. All right. Here’s a couple of examples. I mentioned the empathy centers. So, generally speaking, and there are exceptions, of course, and remember, that men can learn so men can change, men can improve. All right? And I do mean improve. Because if you add new pathways through a process, that’s called neuroplasticity. So, neuroplasticity is a reality. It’s not a question. It’s a reality. If you work an area of your brain consistently, day after day, after day, you will actually grow new pathways in that portion of your brain. You will actually cause that portion of your brain to actually get bigger, to expand.

So, men can learn behaviors that are not innate to them, that are not genetically programmed to them. Some men will learn more than others and this will be to a great extent based on something called selection pressure. So, we go back to a path of least resistance. If you have a bunch of men who have no female influences around them. And they all have stereotypical male structure and stereotypical male behavior, they have no reason to create new neural plastic pathways, they have no reason to, because you follow the path of least resistance. But when men associate with females, now they have a reason to begin to adapt certain behaviors and we may say getting in touch with your feminine side. All right. Hopefully, this is coming through clearly for everyone and no one’s getting upset with me, I hope. But I’m just telling you the science behind this neurobiology.

So, the areas devoted to communication in females is almost double the size of what it is in males for empathy, for saying, I feel so badly for you, I feel your pain, I feel that you’re hurting. So, empathy is almost double the size in females than it is in males. And that’s why you will often have the responses that you have from males. It’s not that males are bad people. It’s the way their brain is structured. And once again, they can learn and can create new pathways. And they can eventually become just as empathetic as any woman once they’ve created those new pathways. And the same thing goes with communication. And the reason scientists believe that the reason that the communication centers are bigger than females, is because the anthropological evidence, going back to our earliest ancestors indicates that females were the caregivers, females were their nurturers.

Now, they didn’t just give birth and breastfeed. And by the way, breastfeeding was always the first few years of life until very recent times. And so there was a real bond there between the mom and the child, for sure. And that was because they were getting the nutrients that they needed from breast milk, it was the best source for any baby. It still is, by the way. Please don’t email me about breastfeeding time. Okay. I’m just stating the scientific and anthropological factor. I don’t want to fight with anybody about it. So, the anthropological evidence indicates that the majority of males functioned as hunters and hunters need to communicate less. If you’ve ever been hunting, you have to keep your mouth shut. You got to keep quiet, you got to be as quiet as you can be. And if you’re hunting with a group of men, you used hand signals, gestures, and nods. You don’t talk. So, if scientists are correct about this, then that would explain why the communication center in women is far larger than it is in men.

Now, can men expand their communication center? Of course, they can’t. Of course, they can. We go back to neuroplasticity again. But men, here’s the saving grace for us. Our section of the brain for visual-spatial is much larger than it is for women. And you know what that means? That means we can throw a spear better than the average woman can any day.  It’s actually been tested and it’s been shown that men can throw spears better and more accurately than women when it has to do with the structure in our brains. And again, this supports the scientists who believe that throughout most of human history before farming began that males were hunters and women were nurturers and caregivers. And this is why we scientists believe that women today, even as our society has changed, and women now have very different positions in society than ever before in history as far as we know, this, again, is about neuroplasticity. So, females can change behaviors, males can change behaviors. But generally, this is why women are more aware and they are more proactive about the health and the well-being of their family. You know, males are like, “Well, didn’t I tell you I loved you last year? Do I have to say it again? Don’t you just know it? Do I have to say it? Do I have to say it?” Okay. I’m exaggerating a little bit, obviously. But there are certainly differences between men and women.

So, convincing men to take care of themselves can be a really tough job. In fact, the only time that men tend to want to initiate this themselves, once again, with the exception of very rare men who really are tuned in to preventive health. But for most men, it’s only about power. So, bodybuilding is a great example. Men will voluntarily do bodybuilding, but that’s because the result is a psychological perception of an increase in power. So, as the body is built up, stronger, now you have more power versus other males who are less built up. This is an innate behavior. And males perceive that and it’s not always the case because we don’t want to stereotype and say that all women are only attracted to muscular men, scientific study actually proves this is not true. But some women are exclusively attracted to men who are more muscular. And so men perceive this as if I build myself up, I have a better shot at getting the mate I want. Okay. And as I mentioned before, women usually have to drag their men into seeing a health care practitioner.

Well, in most categories, and this is why you need a Men’s Health Week. Men don’t know this. In fact, I think most women probably don’t know this either. But in most categories, men require more nutrition than women. Now, men tend to think of it the other way around. “I don’t need that supplement stuff, just need a steak and a beer.” Right? Well, no, that’s not the case. That’s not what science says. All vitamins, and most minerals, not all minerals but most minerals can be dosed by body weight, and/or body size. Generally speaking, men tend to be larger than females. I’ll cover that in a little more detail in a moment. Now, exceptions to this are going to be if women are menstruating, they’re going to need more nutrients that contribute to hemoglobin because they’re losing so much iron when they menstruate and of course, men don’t go through that. If women are pregnant, they are feeding to people, not just themselves. So, they have an increase in nutrients required and of course, if they’re breastfeeding.

And a great example here is among women who are pregnant, 65 milligrams of vitamin C, minimum, that’s a minimum not a maximum, minimum per day, for females who are not pregnant or breastfeeding. For men, it’s 90 milligrams. So, we see that the male has a significantly larger requirement for vitamin C than the adult female does. The exception, of course, is if the adult female is either pregnant or nursing. Pregnant women need 120 milligrams, minimum, not maximum, minimum of vitamin C. So, what I’m showing you here is men in almost, not every category, but almost every category require more nutrition than women. Yet, the majority of people who buy dietary supplements are women, not men. And scientific surveys show that men tend to make less healthy dietary choices than women.

Now, some of you ladies are probably chuckling as you’re listening to this, but it’s true. Men, as a group, tend to choose less healthy food than women do. So, what does this mean? Men require more nutrition and are probably getting less from food than the women are. This makes it even more important to have a Men’s Health Week down there in Australia. Let’s start with brains. There are two things that if you don’t have them working, right, there’s not much point hanging around. If your heart’s not working, you can’t hang around and if your brain’s not working, why bother hanging around? Because if there’s no brain, I mean, there’s no you, right? So, the nutrients for the brain are the same for men and women. There’s no difference. DHA omega-three. So, when you take an omega-three supplement, you are taking both DHA and EPA, but it’s the DHA portion that you need for the brain.

Magnesium, oh, folks, I could do 300 pages on magnesium. Honestly. The average person has no idea how important that mineral is. And the problem that we see everywhere, first of all, is not just that, nobody seems to know how important it is, but only approximately 1% of the magnesium in your body can be found in your blood and your medical doctor has been taught to test for magnesium by checking your blood. Well, he or she cannot check for more than 1% of your total. In other words, checking your blood for magnesium doesn’t actually tell you how much magnesium you have. It doesn’t tell you how much functional magnesium you have for your body. That presents a very, very big problem.

And when I was in practice, I always recommended to every physician I taught and I’ve been teaching doctors for more than 30 years that they don’t bother with a serum, serum means blood. So, they don’t bother with a serum magnesium test, but instead that they use a red blood cell magnesium. Now, that will not be a test covered by most insurance companies in the countries where insurance companies pay for that sort of thing. And all countries are different to how you do this sort of thing. But red blood cell magnesium is the way to find out how much magnesium you have, not serum magnesium, some calcium is fine, but serum magnesium is not fine. Okay.

In addition to that, the brain requires some B vitamins that are super important for brain function, B1, B6, folate, B12. In fact, those four vitamins, those four B vitamins are crucial to making you feel happy. I mean, vitamin B1, I actually call it all the time I call it the happiness vitamin. If you have enough B1, it’s pretty hard not to be happy, it’s pretty hard not to smile. It’s that important for the chemicals in your brain that determine whether you’re happy or sad. Okay. Now, also you’ve got to have vitamin A, C, and E, for your brain. It happens that depression is a very big problem for men. Men and women both suffer from two kinds of depression. One type is situational. So, that depends on events going on in your life, events going on around you.

The other type is chemical, you could also make the case for a structural. And that would be brain structure causing the improper production of chemistry to keep you from becoming depressed. Okay. So, you could make the case for that as well. So, when we talk about depression, if you’re talking about chemical depression, that’s a different thing than situational depression. Now, nothing is going to change a bad situation except time and healing, and sometimes counseling, and sometimes the help of a friend, or just somebody taking you in their arms and just giving you a good, sincere caress and hug. And so they can feel that you care and that you love them. And sometimes, that’s all that you can do with situational depression. And we all have situations in our lives, that can make us feel very sad.

The thing with males is they have a different aspect of situational depression, which goes beyond those things that all women experience and all men experience. And that is depression based on achievement. Again, the structure of the male brain, and I’m not saying that there are not females that have this portion of structure in their brain, because there are. So, again, there are differences within genders. All right. So, don’t try and absolute me on these statements I’m making. But generally speaking, in general terms, the structure of the male brain lends itself to be focused on achievement. And if a male does not make that achievement, he will become unhappy, depressed, and sometimes so severely depressed, that the result is suicide. In fact, males are three to four times more likely to successfully commit suicide than females. And almost all of this is achievement-based.

Males have, in their structure of their brain, they have an innate program that says they must achieve, they must win, they must be number one, they must succeed, they must have recognition of their importance, they must have recognition of their self-worth, in whatever that achievement is. When a male can’t have that he has a chemical cascade that makes them depressed. Literally, the thought and the chemistry together. This for many men will cause them to actually take their own lives because they feel worthless. Because it’s so hard to help a male who is in this mindset, it is so difficult to help a male feel any degree of self-worth, if they have failed in whatever their achievement goals were. And I’m not talking about little things like scoring the points at the football game. That’s not what I mean. I’m talking about big things, big important things.

We see this particularly in males who feel that they have failed in relationships, males who feel that they have failed as providers, and I could go on for two hours on this, but I won’t. We see this particularly high in men who are 65 years of age or higher. Because men are also going through a different portion of their chemistry. Everyone’s heard of the midlife crisis, everyone’s heard of that. The midlife crisis for men generally starts somewhere in the mid-50s, and goes up through the upper 60s. And men will come to this realization that, “You know what, I am not that strong, energetic, young male I used to be. There’s no way that I have any time left in my life to make the achievement that I always thought I would make. I’m just going to take my life.” And this is why we see so many males over the age of 65, that is the highest suicide rate, highest group of suicide of any groups. And that’s as bad as depression gets, folks, you can’t get worse than that. Supplements can’t change a situation, there’s no way that a supplement can help that man get the recognition he desperately needs, or to help that man achieve the goal that he has not achieved.

But when the chemistry that’s generated from missing that achievement, from not making that goal, from not having that sense of self-worth, that’s how a male sees his sense of self-worth. And there are exceptions, of course, there are those rare exceptions, but I’m talking in general terms now. What will happen is the chemistry produced, the negative chemistry that’s produced is going to cause that male to require more magnesium and more B vitamins than he required before the depression. So, it’s not that the supplement changes the situation, won’t do it. The situation is the situation. Other things can be done, as I mentioned before, in terms of counseling and caring and recognition, and various things that can be done. But that change in chemistry will make that man require more magnesium and more B vitamins. So, keep that in mind as we proceed.

But women innately, as I mentioned before, it’s a program in women. And yes, of course, there are exceptions, there are some women, you see the news story, which is rare, folks, it’s so rare, where you see a woman who murders her children or something like that, but that is so unbelievably incredibly rare. The only reason that anyone even knows about it is because it makes a news story. It’s so rare. Generally speaking, women are innately programmed to care. They are innately programmed, to be proactive, for the health, and the welfare, and the well-being of their families. And men, well, men, I’m sorry to say this, but men are not innately programmed that way. Now, can men learn that? Of course, they can. And generally, you learn through experience. And some would say you learn through failure, and I would go with that as well. Even when you fail, you still learn.

And you want to make sure that you take what you learned and improve. They say things like, “Well, you don’t really appreciate what you have until you don’t have it.” And that’s true. It is true for most human beings. And very often if a man fails in something or he loses something or someone, then he begins to change, he begins to make new neural pathways. Now, are there some men who are more programmed from birth with that? Yes, of course, of course, there are. And that, again, is individual differences within the gender as I mentioned before. But generally speaking, men need to learn these things. It’s not part of the genetic program, whereas, for women, it very clearly is.

So, step one, men need a high potency, emphasized high potency vitamin-mineral formula. Typically, the majority of men do not need iron supplementation. In fact, about 75% of people in modern countries do not need iron supplementation, which is why I have always recommended that we make vitamin-mineral products without iron on purpose. The 25% who need iron supplementation also very often need medical supervision. And what I don’t want is for people to be taking the supplement alone, if they also need medical supervision, I want them to have that. And that’s why it has always been my philosophy to make vitamin-mineral products without additional iron supplementation. Okay. So, that question comes up all the time, now, you have the answer.

Men typically don’t need it and it’s because of male dietary choices. Males tend in general, to eat a lot more meat than women. In fact, because of the pH of women versus the pH of men, the chemistry of women versus the chemistry of men, women tend to not only be more alkaline in general, but women tend to have appetites for more alkaline foods. Men tend to have appetites for more acidic foods. Men eat more meat because they have a genetic program, that says they must. They have to eat more protein because they have more muscle mass. And you can’t maintain your muscle mass unless you eat enough protein. This is again, generally speaking, why males eat a lot more meat than women do.

Before the whole cholesterol nonsense, I say nonsense, because, for 50 years or more, the entire world population was fed this nonsense that if you eat fish, you won’t get heart disease. And if you eat meat, you will. That’s complete total utter nonsense. It’s been disproven in study after study after study. But the media apparently still doesn’t know it, the general population doesn’t know it. And even most healthcare practitioners still don’t know it, even though it’s been disproven. So, before all that started, before any man was told, “Oh, if you eat meat, you’ll get our disease.” If you look at the past, you look at the records, you’ll see that men would choose meat, usually red meat, and women would choose seafood. If they had that choice in a restaurant, that would be the choice that will be made. Seafood is very easy to digest and red meat is the hardest to digest. So, that goes back to your differences in the systems. Red meat is very high in iron. In fact, the redder a meat is, the more iron it has in it. So, it’s pretty rare to find a male who is short on iron unless, of course, that male is a vegetarian or a vegan, then it can be a different story.

They need to supplement high B vitamins and magnesium in particular. B vitamins are stress vitamins. B vitamins are necessary for conversion of carbohydrates. B vitamins are necessary to produce a wide range of enzymes. B vitamins are essential to your nervous system, to your brain function, so many things. And magnesium, folks, magnesium has more than 600 functions in the human body. That’s why I couldn’t possibly cover the detail of magnesium in one block, it simply can’t be done. There’s too many functions and too many potential problems if you’re not getting enough magnesium. And males need to have a minimum, minimum of 10 grams more protein per day than females, minimum. So, males have to as a minimum average have 56 grams, females 46 grams. But the larger the male is, and the more muscle mass he has, to begin with, the more protein he has to eat. This is why sometimes you’ll see bodybuilders who eats unbelievable amounts of meat and eggs every day because they need that extra protein just to maintain their muscle mass, let alone build more muscle mass.

What about prostate health? Just as the female reproductive system which gets a lot of discussion, there’s just a zillion female products out there and so much information about female reproductive systems, not as much on male reproductive systems. And most of this, unfortunately, is driven by money. Because again, the majority of people who buy supplements are female. Most men don’t buy supplements unless they think it’s going to give them some edge, some performance edge, typically. But if a male has seen a practitioner who says, “You know what, you got some prostate stuff going on.” All right. Now, now, not before but now the male will say, “Oh boy, maybe I should buy a prostate supplement.” And men will usually go right out and do it like right away. The prostate gland required selenium, magnesium, zinc, vitamin D, and something called beta-sitosterol. Well, that’s a plant sterol. The plant sterols’ not a vitamin or mineral. And you have to get that separately from what you would get the selenium, magnesium, zinc, and vitamin D.

If you’re missing, if you as a man are missing those nutrients, if you’re not getting enough of them, and if you’ve reached around oh, say the age of 40-ish, your prostate is going to start to grow. It’s going to grow big. And it’s going to be pretty unpleasant as it grows. And trust me on this, you will not be happy with those results. The symptoms you have are not going to be good. Your prostate health will decline if you do not have those nutrients in sufficient supply. And keep in mind once again, the average male makes less healthy dietary choices than the average female and therefore, gets less nutrition than the average female. Yet, they require more than the average female.

Well, then there’s alcohol consumption. Generally, males consume more alcohol than females. And there are exceptions, of course. But the male liver is about twice the size, on average, of the female that are on average. And this is why when you read through material, it says, you know a woman should have only one glass of wine, but a man can have two. Men can tolerate more, generally speaking, so they tend to drink more. And as a result, they are causing their body to require greater amounts of — guess what — B vitamins and magnesium in much greater quantities. And then with the liver something called choline as well, which is associated with the B vitamin group. Some argue it’s a B vitamin, some argue it isn’t. So, we’ll say it’s associated with the B vitamin group.

Step two, ensure that a high potency vitamin-mineral supplement is used, of course, that has at least 100% of the daily requirements of selenium, magnesium, vitamin D, and zinc. And make sure that as a male, you are taking a supplement that contains beta-sitosterol. Because your prostate gland will not — understand what I’m saying, I don’t like to speak in absolutes, but I’m going to say this again. Your prostate will not be healthy if you are not getting beta-sitosterol every day. You make sure you’re doing it. And then we go back to B vitamins and mood, B vitamins and feeling sad, B vitamins and being depressed. You need B vitamins to fight that. And as you consume alcohol, you are burning those up fast.

Interesting exercise was done in Australia, actually, when they saw this to be a real problem among Australian men because of alcohol use. And what they did was they mandated that synthetic vitamin B1 be added to all grain products. So, all products that make bread and muffins and buns and whatever sort of correct term is used in Australia to describe those bread products, those grain products. That’s why you have that mandated by your government because it’s that important.

And finally, what about aging? Well, as you age, you are digesting your food less efficiently whether you’re a man or a woman. You’re making less digestive enzymes every year of your life starting around the age of 40. And most people are not taking a digestive enzyme product, so they’re not supplementing what they need to digest their food as well. We can argue, and I think it’s a strong argument to say that because of less effective digestion. As we age, we are receiving less important nutrition, which in turn increases and accelerates the aging process. And studies on aging populations pretty much show us this across the board.

One study that I found was interesting had more than 4,000 people in it above the age of 51. And some of them took supplements, and some took them occasionally and some didn’t take them at all. Now, what they found was that almost nobody in this aging population was getting enough nutrition every day. But they found that the group that use dietary supplements was getting about 80% of what they needed, but even that was not enough. So, they’re eating and taking supplements and still coming up short. And the thing that the population tested was coming up short of universally across the board, there were other nutrients but the big one was magnesium. Again, brain health, nervous system health, heart health, the list goes on. And of course, vitamins A, C, and E, which are required to help you fight the aging process.

Outro: Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent Report. Visit our website at DrNugent.com for more objective facts about health and nutrition and email your questions and feedback to [email protected]. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram at The Nugent Report. Stay informed. Get the facts with The Nugent Report.

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简介：Dr. Nugent报告，以科学方式分析健康与营养。欢迎收听本期“Dr. Nugent报告”，本节目由Dr. Steve Nugent主讲，为您提供健康和营养方面的优质客观信息。Dr. Steve Nugent是著名的心理学家、作家、公共演说家，也是科学、健康、保健和营养方面的专家。请访问我们的网站DrNugent.com。并在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上关注@TheNugentreport。

本期我们来探讨一下男性健康，包括男性心理健康。我们会涉及一些心理学知识。但请大家理解，由于节目时长不足一小时，我们无法细致尽述所有方面。因此，我主要概述我认为重要的男性健康方面的问题。我们还将探讨大脑健康、前列腺和荷尔蒙健康，也将略微探讨一下衰老营养方面的知识。很多人并不了解男性健康方面的一些事，尤其是男性自己都不太了解这些事。让我们从人们的思维方式说起。

很多时候，我们的思维方式都取决于大脑结构。因此，我会在这里讲一些神经生物学方面的内容，希望大家能够从这些信息中获得一些信息和乐趣：男性大脑和女性大脑确实存在着结构差异。在进一步探讨之前，我想说，我收到的很多电子邮件都在反复谈及男女差异。我不会谈论这些问题，朋友们。我将以科学家的身份向大家介绍，将给大家呈现事实，我希望这些事实能帮助大家在健康方面做出正确的决定，这就是我的目标。我现在正收到大量电子邮件，我无法一一回复。我希望可以一一回复，但我办不到。

说到结构差异，男性和女性大脑之间存在结构差异，这点无可辩驳。这没有什么好争论的。还有一些行为属于先天性的，它们在很大程度上是源于大脑的结构差异。现在，有人可能会表示担忧，心想，“天哪，你的意思是，我们根本无法改变自身的某些行为？”我想说的是，只是一些生存行为不可改变。例如，我们需要进食。如果不进食，就无法生存。因此，来自大脑的先天信息通过遗传密码命令我们进食。

因此，一些先天行为可以改变，比如，进食量、进食时间，但归根结底，人必须进食。好。我想说的是，一些先天行为是存在的。这意味着，如果用现代术语来说，那就是遗传行为。一些东西被印在我们基因里，告诉我们如何行事。这些东西无法习得。因此，我们现在讨论的是古老天性与后天培养。这些东西不是学习而来，而是在出生前就已经印在基因里。它们是父母遗传过来的，是生存行为。

科学家们说，所有行为，尤其是所有心理行为，至少有50%是遗传而来，它们被编入基因，告诉我们如何行事。大家不要担心，不要想得那么绝对，不要心想，“这意味着这种或那种行为永远无法改变。”我们可以学会改变自己的行为。但遗传行为的某些方面确实无法改变，事情就是这样。

我们可以看一下一般行为——我将谈一下普遍状况，因为人与人之间存在具体的差异。我并不是暗示，因为你是男性或女性就一定会具有某种行为，我不是这个意思。一些具体行为会有所不同，不仅性别之间会存在差异，个体之间也会存在差异。从一般意义上讲，从广义上讲，男性往往会抗拒预防性保健措施。我们之后会更多地探讨这个问题。

一般来说，女性往往会积极主动地关注其健康。女性会采取积极主动的措施，男性虽然也有例外，但通常不会采取积极主动的健康措施。男性一般会说，”如果疼痛，吃片止痛药就好了。如果需要药物或手术，我照做就是了。伴侣说的都是些无稽之谈。”好。一般情况往往就是这样。当然，也有例外情况。但总的来说，去看自然医生的，也就是综合保健医生或者是理疗师，我不确定澳大利亚这里有没有脊椎按摩师，大多数都是女性。在提供自然保健手段或膳食补充剂的医生那里，大多数患者也都是女性。

事实上，购买膳食补充剂的绝大多数是女性。一般来说，根据我行医时的观察，男性患者往往不太配合，女性需要把他们强拉过来解决他们的健康问题。她们要强迫男性接受治疗，因为男性总要做出坚强的样子，他们只会说，”这些都是无稽之谈。如果感觉痛苦，我会去做手术，或服用药物。”遗憾的是，这是一种先天性思维，与男性大脑结构相关，区别于女性大脑结构。我下面会给大家提供更多这方面的信息。有的人可能会觉得很有意思。事实上，关于男女大脑结构的差异我可以讲上一小时，我想很多人应该会很感兴趣。但我需要专注于本期主题。

我可以给大家举一些例子，与男性大脑相比，女性大脑中有更多区域主导积极的健康行为。我再说一遍，一些行为是先天性的。它们被编入了基因，某些行为无法改变。但男性可以学习改变某些行为。人具有一定的倾向——顺便说一下，心理学研究得出了明确结论。在几乎所有情况下，人都倾向于遵循阻力最小的路径。这是一种生存机制，一种先天的生存机制。这没有好坏之分，只是简单的事实。男性大脑的部分构成不接受这类行为，但他们可以去学习。这点至关重要。女士们，你们还有希望，可以帮助男性转变为更好的健康管理者。大家可以帮助他们做到这点。女士们，你们的男性确实需要帮助，你们在后面会学到更多这方面的知识。可能正是因为如此，澳大利亚有人觉得有必要设立一个“男性健康周”，因为人们需要了解这些事情。

大家经常听到：人类更聪明是因为我们的大脑更大。这种说法实际上不正确。人们喜欢把事情绝对化和简单化。人类的大脑比大猩猩的大脑大，因此，人类比大猩猩聪明。抱歉，这种说法是错误的。男性大脑大于女性大脑，这是否意味着男性比女性更聪明？我想大多数女性会给出否定回答，这可能不是事实。好。我想在这里穿插一点幽默：大猩猩的大脑其实远远大于人类大脑，但据我所知，大猩猩从未参与过太空计划，所以，相对于大脑的大小，大脑的结构更重要。这涉及到每个结构的复杂性，每个结构都有独立的功能。

下面我们来看一个澳大利亚一定也在使用的术语。美国在疯狂使用这一术语来展现女性化的一面。在人类历史的大部分时间里，我们会说男人要这样做，而女人要那样做，直到上世纪60年代中后期才有所改变。后来我们对男性说，你们可以展现自己女性化的一面。朋友们，我知道有人会误解我的意思，会感到不高兴，但我唯一想做的，是停止大家的争执。所以，不要发有关这个问题的邮件给我。好吗？事实是，一些行为的主体大多是女性，而另一些行为的主体大多是男性，这些与大脑结构有关，与他们的遗传行为有关。

以偏概全通常不太好，但为了完成本期节目，我们需要进行概括。我想告诉大家，男性胎儿的大脑一开始也是女性大脑。所有人类的大脑最初都是女性大脑。当胎儿在子宫内发育时，睾丸激素会充满男性胎儿的脑组织。不管你信不信，大家可以想象一下，可以发挥自己的想象力，睾丸激素实际上会使女性化的区域收缩，最终形成男性大脑。具体表现在一些方面，但是，朋友们，我不想让你们感到沮丧。好。讨论还要涉及很多别的内容，但我想让大家明白，男性大脑都是从女性大脑发展而来，所有人都一样，没有例外。在胎儿时期，男性大脑的某些区域会在睾丸激素的作用下而缩小，如沟通中心、同理心等区域。几分钟后我们会进一步讨论这个问题。

同性别的大脑物质也会有差异。什么意思呢？比如说，有些女性会展现更多男性化的行为，而有些男性会展现更多女性化的行为。朋友们，我不希望大家走极端，你们只需知道，在同一性别中，遗传性男性行为和遗传性女性行为的比例可能会存在差异。好。我举几个例子。我之前提到了同理心。一般来说，当然也有例外，男性可以学习、可以改变、可以提升。对不对？我说的确实是提升。通过一个过程增加新的通路，这叫做神经可塑性。神经可塑性是一个事实。不是一个问题，它是一个事实。如果日复一日坚持不懈地锻炼一个大脑区域，这个大脑区域会发育出新通路。实际上，这个大脑区域会变大，会扩展。

男性可以学习那些并非与生俱来、编入基因的行为。一些男性学到的更多，这在很大程度上是基于选择压力。我们回到阻力最小路径。如果男性周围没有女性的影响，并且又有着典型的男性结构和男性行为，那么，他们便没有理由创造新的神经可塑性通路，因为他们会跟随阻力最小路径。当男性与女性交往时，他们就有理由开始适应某些行为，去接触自己女性化的一面。好吧，希望大家都能理解我的话，并且都不要生我的气。我只是在讲述这种神经生物学背后的科学。

在共情方面，女性的沟通区域几乎是男性的两倍，她们更善于表达：我为你感到难过，我能感觉到你的痛苦，我能感觉你正经历痛苦。女性的同理心是男性的两倍。因此，难怪男性会给出那种反应。这并不是说男性很坏，这跟他们的大脑结构有关。还是那句话，他们可以学习，可以创造新的通路。如果创建好这些新通路，他们最终可以变得和女性一样具有同理心。沟通也是如此。科学家认为，女性沟通中心更强大的原因，可以追溯到我们的祖先，根据人类学证据，女性的身份是照顾者和养育者。

现在，女性不再只负责生育和哺乳。顺便说一下，生命的最初几年总是需要母乳喂养，这种现象直到近代才得到改变。妈妈和孩子之间存在一种真正的纽带，这是因为婴儿必须从母乳中获得所需的营养，母乳对于婴儿来说就是最佳食物。当下依然如此。请不要给我发电子邮件，询问有关母乳喂养时间的问题。好吧，我只是在陈述科学和人类学方面的因素。我不想与任何人争论这个问题。所以，人类学证据表明，大多数男性担任猎手的角色，而猎手所需的沟通较少。打猎的时候需要保持安静。必须保持安静，尽可能地安静。如果是和一群男性一同打猎，只需用到信号、手势和点头。根本不需要说话。如果科学家们在这一点上是正确的，那么就可以解释为什么女性的沟通中心远远大于男性。

男性能否扩大自己的沟通中心呢？当然不能，又当然能。我们再次回到神经可塑性这个话题。各位男性朋友们，我们还有一个仅剩的优点——男性大脑中的视觉空间区域远远大于女性。大家知道这意味着什么吗？这意味着，男性投掷长矛的能力超出一般的女性。实际上，已经有测试表明，与女性相比，男性投掷长矛的能力更优秀且投掷得更准确，这与大脑结构有关。而且这再次支持了科学家们的观点，即在农耕社会开始前的大部分时间里，男性是猎手，女性是养育者和照顾者。因此，科学家们认为，今天的女性也是如此，即使我们的社会已经发生了变化，当下的女性在社会中的地位超越了任何历史时期——这也是神经可塑性的功劳。因此，女性和男性都可以进行行为改变。但总的来说，这就是女性对家人的健康和福祉会更有意识，更积极主动的原因。男性总是说，“我去年不是说过我爱你吗？我有必要再说一遍吗？难道你不知道吗？我有必要说出来吗？真的有必要吗？”好吧，我显然是有点夸张了。但男性和女性之间肯定存在差异。

因此，说服男性照顾好自己会非常艰巨。极少数的男性真的会进行预防保健，事实上，男性如果主动照顾自己，只有一个原因。对大多数男性来说，是因为力量。健身是一个很好的例子。男性主动健身，是因为他们最终会获得力量增加的心理感受。与不如自己健壮的男性相比，身体强壮的男性具备更多力量。这是一种先天性行为。男性所认为的这一点，但事实并非总是如此，因为我们不想刻板地说，所有女性都喜欢肌肉发达的男性，科学研究证明这其实并非事实。但有些女性只喜欢肌肉发达的男性。因此，男性会想，如果我把肌肉练好，找到理想伴侣的概率就更大。就像我之前提到的，女性通常需要硬拉着男性去看保健医生。

大多数情况下都是如此，这也是有必要设立“男性健康周”的原因。男性不知道这一点。事实上，我认为，大多数女性可能也不知道这一点。但是在大多数情况下，男性比女性需要更多的营养。男性却不这么认为。“我不需要那些补充剂，只需要牛排和啤酒。”对不对？不对，事情不是这样的。科学不是这么说的。所有维生素，以及大多数矿物质（即使不是所有的矿物质）是可以按体重和/或体型来配量。一般来说，男性体型往往大于女性。我之后会更详细地介绍这一点。经期的女性例外，她们需要更多有助于生成血红蛋白的营养物质，因为在月经期间她们会丧失大量的铁，当然，男性不会经历这些。如果是怀孕女性，她们不仅要自己摄入，还要喂食婴儿。因此，如果是母乳喂养，她们所需的营养物质便会增加。

怀孕的女性是一个很好的例子。对于没有怀孕或哺乳的女性来说，每天最少需要65毫克的维生素C，这是一个最低量，而不是最高量。男性则需要90毫克。因此，我们看到，与成年女性相比，男性对维生素C的需求量明显更大。当然，怀孕或哺乳期的成年女性是个例外，她们至少需要120毫克维生素C，注意是至少，而不是最多。因此，我要说的是，男性几乎在所有情况下，都比女性需要更多营养。但购买膳食补充剂的大多数是女性，而不是男性。科学调查显示，与女性相比，男性的饮食选择更不健康。

一些女性听到这里可能会笑出声，但这是真的。与女性相比，男性群体倾向于选择更不健康的食物。那么，这意味着什么呢？男性需要更多的营养，他们从食物中获取的营养可能比女性更少。因此，在澳大利亚推出“男性健康周”就显得尤为重要。让我们从大脑谈起。如果缺少了两样东西，人就无法生存。如果心脏不跳动，大脑不运转，人就无法生存。因为没有大脑，就没有生命。男性与女性所需的大脑营养物质一样，没有任何区别，即DHA和欧米伽3。服用欧米伽3补充剂时，可以补充DHA和EPA，但大脑需要的是DHA。

关于镁，朋友们，我可以写一本300页的书籍，这毫不夸张。普通人都不知道这种矿物质的重要性。我们首先发现的不是镁的问题，似乎没有人知道镁的重要性；人体血液中大约只含有1%的镁，但医生却总是通过血液检测来进行镁含量测定。他们测的是仅占总量1%的镁。换句话说，血液镁检测，并不能如实得出人体的镁含量。它无法说明人体内含有多少功能性镁元素。这带来了一个巨大的问题。

在我30多年的医生培训生涯中，我总是向培训过的每一位医生建议不要为血清（即血液）检测。让他们不用费心进行血清镁检测，而是进行红细胞镁检测。在很多国家，大多数会支付此类检测花费的保险公司不涵盖这一检测，但各国的实践有所不同。但红细胞镁检测是测量镁含量的方法，血清镁检测不够准确，但血清钙检测是准确的。

除此之外，大脑还需要B族维生素，包括B1、B6、叶酸、B12，它们对于大脑功能具有格外重要的作用。事实上，这四种维生素对快乐感的产生至关重要。我实际上一直将维生素B1称为“快乐维生素”。如果B1足够，人很难不快乐，会忍不住微笑。它是一种对于大脑至关重要的化学物质，人的快乐和悲伤情绪取决于它。好。大脑还离不开维生素A、C和E。抑郁症是困扰男性的一个严重问题。男性和女性都可能患上两种类型的抑郁症，其中一种是“情景性抑郁症”。这取决于生活中的事件，周围发生的事情。

另一种是“化学性抑郁症”，也可以说是“结构性抑郁症”。这是大脑结构导致的化学成分分泌异常，从而导致抑郁。所以，这也是其中的原因。当我们谈论抑郁症时，化学性抑郁症与情景性抑郁症是不同的。只有依靠时间和治疗才能改变糟糕情况，有时咨询、朋友的帮助、拥抱、真心的爱抚和相拥也会起到帮助。让对方感觉到你关心他们，爱他们。有时，对于情景性抑郁症，我们只能做这些。在生活中，我们都会遭遇一些让我们陷入悲伤的状况。

男性的情景性抑郁症有所不同，不同于所有女性和男性的正常经历。他们的抑郁症与成就感有关。这关乎男性大脑结构；我并不是说女性没有这类大脑结构，她们也有。正如之前所说，性别内部存在着差异。所以，不要以绝对化的方式理解我的这些表述。但一般来说，男性大脑的结构专注于成就。如果一个男性没有取得某种成就，他会变得不快乐和抑郁，有时会严重抑郁，更有甚者会自杀。事实上，男性成功自杀的可能性是女性的三到四倍。而几乎所有这些都与成就感相关。

男性的大脑结构具有一个先天程序，告诉他们一定有所成就，一定要胜利，一定成为第一，一定要成功，一定要让别人认可自己的重要性，一定要让别人认可自己的价值，不论是什么形式的成就。如果无法拥有这些，男性就会经历化学物质紊乱，从而感到沮丧。事实上，这是思想和化学物质共同作用的结果。许多男性会因为没有价值感而结束自己的生命。如果男性没有实现成就目标，要帮助他们扭转这种心态非常困难，要让他们找到价值感也很难。我指的不是在足球赛中进球得分这样的小事，而是重要的大事。

比较典型的是那些经历了情场失败或无力供养家庭的男性，我可以讲解两个小时，但我不想继续。65岁以上的男性占有很高的比例。因为男性也在经历体内的化学物质变化。大家都听说过中年危机。男性的中年危机一般在55岁左右开始，一直持续到60多岁。他们会意识到，“我已经不是以前那个强壮、有活力的年轻人了，已经没有时间去取得我一直以为可以取得的成就，干脆自杀算了。”也正是这个原因，许多65岁以上的男性选择了自杀，这是自杀率最高的年龄群体。这就是抑郁症的糟糕程度，朋友们，糟到不能再糟。补充剂不能改变状况，无法帮助男性获取迫切需要的认可，也无法帮助男性实现尚未实现的目标。

但是，这种化学反应是由于无法取得成就、无法实现目标、无法获得自我价值感产生的，这是男性看待自我价值感的方式。当然，也有极个别例外，但我现在说的是一般情况。由于这种负面化学反应，男性将需要比患上抑郁症前更多的镁和B族维生素。因此，并不是说补充剂可以改变状况，它们无法改变，情况是现实存在的。正如我之前提到的，在咨询、关怀和认可以及其他方面，可以做些努力。但是化学成分的变化会导致更大的镁和B族维生素需求。希望大家记住这一点。

正如我之前所说，女性大脑天生具有这种程序。是的，当然也有例外情况，新闻中偶尔会有女性谋杀孩子或类似的报道，但这些极为罕见。大家之所以知道这些，只是因为新闻有报道。这十分罕见。一般来说，女性具有关爱的天性。她们天生会主动关心家人的健康、福利和福祉。而男性，我很抱歉这么说，但男性天生不是这样。男性可以学会这一点吗？当然能。一般来说，可以通过经验进行学习。一些人说，从失败中学习，我对此表示赞同。即使失败了，也可以学到东西。

要确保领会所学到的东西并加以改进。常言道，“失去后才懂得珍惜。”这是真的。大多数人都是如此。很多时候，在经历失败，或者失去某些东西或某个人时，人才会开始改变，开始建立新的神经通路。是否有男性先天就更具有这方面的特质呢？是的，当然有。但正如我之前提到的，这是性别内部的个体差异。一般来说，男性需要学习这些东西。这不是遗传而来，而对女性而言，它显然是一种遗传程序。

因此，第一步，男性需要高效力维生素-矿物质配方。通常情况下，大多数男性不需要补铁。事实上，在现代国家，约75%的人不需要补铁，因此我一直建议制作维生素-矿物质产品时有意不加铁。25%需要补铁的人群通常也需要医疗监督。我建议大家不要单独服用铁补充剂；如果需要医疗监督，最好获得医疗监督。因此，我的理念始终是制作没有额外铁质补充的维生素-矿物质产品。好。这个问题经常出现，现在，你有答案了。

男性通常不需要补充铁的原因在于他们的饮食选择。一般来说，男性摄入的肉类多于女性。事实上，对比女性的pH值与男性的pH值及化学成分，会发现，女性体质呈现更强的碱性，而且女性倾向于摄入更多碱性食物。男性则倾向于摄入更多酸性食物。男性摄入的肉类更多，因为他们的基因程序告诉他们要这样做。他们必须摄入更多蛋白质，因为他们的肌肉质量更大。只有摄入足够蛋白质，才能保持肌肉质量。所以，一般来说，男性比女性摄入的肉类多。

关于胆固醇，我们听过很多谬论，我说它们是谬论，是因为在过去50年或更长的时间里，全世界的人都被灌输这一无稽之谈：吃鱼不会得心脏病，而吃肉会得心脏病。这简直是一派胡言。一项又一项的研究推翻了这种谬论。但媒体显然还不知道，普通民众也还不知道，甚至大多数医务人员至今也不知道，尽管它已经被推翻。在此之前，在”吃肉会得病”这一说法之前，如果回顾过去，查看记载，我们可以发现，男性会选择肉类，通常是红肉，而女性会选择海鲜。如果他们在餐馆就餐，这通常是他们的选择。海鲜极易消化，而红肉最难消化。这又回到了系统差异上。红肉的铁含量非常高。事实上，肉越红，铁含量就越高。因此，很少有男性缺铁，当然，素食男性则另当别论。

他们尤其需要补充大量B族维生素和镁。B族维生素是应激维生素，是转换碳水化合物的必需成分，也是产生各种酶的必需成分。B族维生素对神经系统与大脑功能来说必不可少，功能很多。但朋友们，镁在人体中可以发挥600多种功能。所以，我无法只通过一期节目来涵盖关于镁的多所有细节知识，这根本不可能。如果缺镁，会导致许多功能问题和潜在问题。男性每天至少需要比女性多摄入10克蛋白质。因此，男性必须至少平均摄入56克，女性需摄入46克。首先，男性的体型更大，肌肉质量更大，所以必须摄入更多蛋白质。因此，大家有时会看到，健身人士每天要摄入大量的肉和蛋，因为他们需要额外的蛋白质来维持肌肉质量；而要增加肌肉质量，则需要摄入更多。

接下来探讨一下前列腺健康。关于女性生殖系统的讨论有很多，女性产品也有很多；关于女性生殖系统的信息很多，但关于男性生殖系统的信息却并不多。遗憾的是，这其中大部分都是由金钱所驱动。因为购买保健品的大多数是女性。大多数男性不买保健品，除非他们认为保健品可以为他们带来一些优势，尤其是表现方面的优势。但是，如果医生对一名男性说，“你知道吗，你有一些前列腺问题。”男性会说，“哦，天啊，也许我需要买前列腺补充剂。”他们通常会马上行动。前列腺需要硒、镁、锌、维生素D，以及一种叫做β-谷甾醇的东西。这是一种植物甾醇，不是维生素或矿物质，必须单独获取，就像获取硒、镁、锌和维生素D一样。

如果作为一个男性缺少这些营养物质，在40岁左右，你的前列腺会开始生长。它会变大。随着它的生长，会变得非常不舒服。相信我，你会对这些症状感到不舒服。如果没有摄入足够的营养物质，前列腺健康水平会下降。再次强调，在健康饮食方面，男性一般不如女性，因此获得的营养少于女性。然而，男性的营养需求却高于一般女性。

然后是酒精摄入。一般来说，男性比女性摄入的酒精多。当然，也有例外。但平均来看，男性的肝脏大小大约是女性的两倍。因此，阅读资料上会写：女性可以喝一杯酒，但男性可以喝两杯。一般来说，男性的耐受性更强，因此酒量更大。因此，他们的身体需要更多的——猜猜是什么——B族维生素和镁。然后，肝脏里还有一种叫做“胆碱”的东西，它与B族维生素有关。有人认为，它是一种B族维生素，有人认为不是。因此，我们只好说，它与B族维生素有关。

第二步，确保使用高效力的维生素-矿物质补充剂，当然，它至少可以100%满足每日的硒、镁、维生素D和锌需求。男性需确保自己服用含有β-谷甾醇的补充剂。请大家理解我的意思，我不喜欢说得太绝对，但我要再说一遍。如果不每天摄入β-谷甾醇，前列腺不会健康。要确保每天摄入。然后我们回到B族维生素和情绪，B族维生素与悲伤和抑郁的关系。B族维生素可以对抗这些情绪。如果饮酒，这些维生素会被快速消耗。

在澳大利亚，实际开展过一项有趣的实验。实验显示，由于饮酒（这对于澳大利亚男性来说是一个切实的问题），政府强制要求在所有谷物产品中添加合成维生素B1。因此，所有面包、松饼和小面包及谷物产品（我不确定这些是不是描述澳大利亚面包产品、谷物产品的正确术语）中都含有合成维生素B1。这就是你们的政府要求这样做，因为这很重要。

最后，我们谈一下衰老。随着年龄的增长，不论男性还是女性，消化食物的能力都会下降。从40岁左右开始，人体每年产生的消化酶都在减少。大多数人不服用消化酶产品，也就是说，他们没有补充消化食物所需的物质。对此我们可以进行争辩，我认为，一个强有力的论据是消化能力变差。随着年龄增长，我们摄入的重要营养更少，这反过来又加速了衰老。老龄人口研究向我们全面展示了这一点。

我发现了一项由超过4000名51岁以上的人参与的有趣研究。他们中有些人服用补充剂，有些人偶尔服用，有些人从来不服用。研究发现，在这些老龄人口中，几乎没有人每天能获得足够的营养；使用膳食补充剂的群体获得了80%的所需营养，但即使这样也不够。他们既摄入饮食，也摄入补充剂，但却仍然缺乏营养素。被检测人群普遍缺乏各类营养素，但主要缺镁（影响大脑健康、神经系统健康、心脏健康等），当然还有维生素A、C和E，它们是帮助你对抗衰老过程所必需的。

结语：感谢收听本期Dr. Nugent报告。访问DrNugent.com，获取更多有关健康与营养的事实性信息。如有问题或反馈意见，可发送邮件至[email protected]。请在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上关注Dr. Nugent报告 。获取事实性信息，资讯先人一步。

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Intro: The Nugent, the science behind health and nutrition. Welcome to this episode of The Nugent Report, a definitive source for objective information on health and nutrition featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author, public speaker, an expert on science, health, wellness, and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at DrNugent.com. And follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at The Nugent Report.

Welcome to The Nugent Report, Episode Two of the series on vitamin D, and magnesium. At the conclusion of the last episode, I left you with two questions. Do you really need to supplement vitamin D? Do you really need to supplement magnesium? Well, that’s what we’re going to talk about in this episode. Remember, Parva and his research team states that “Vitamin D deficiency is becoming an epidemic in the US. The people most likely to be deficient are African Americans, and Hispanic Americans.” I’ll give you more information on why a little bit later. Regardless of race, people who are obese or who suffer from diabetes, are also at high risk of vitamin D deficiency.

Depending on the study that you consult, you’ll find anywhere between 39% and up to 42% of the US population are believed to be deficient in vitamin D. This is huge, and does present a very serious health concern. I’m using US statistics, but keep in mind that people are people. We are all biochemically the same. We’re all human beings. And you can take this data to the country that you live in, for the most part, maybe not the specific percentages, but the concepts, the ideas, the understandings you can use in any country.

In Episode One of this series, I briefly talked about changes in conditions between the 21st century and previous centuries. Almost all jobs now are indoors. Our young people have become addicted to their digital devices, and social media. Versus their grandparents, who as children did most of their activities of their youth, primarily outdoors and in the sunlight. Sun exposure is without question a factor in the increasing number of people in the 21st century, who are vitamin D deficient.

Vitamin D is after all called the sunshine vitamin, because it can be converted from sunlight through an amazing process that requires magnesium. A person who is deficient in magnesium is almost certainly still going to be deficient in vitamin D, even if they are supplementing vitamin D. Perhaps this is why so many physicians have patients on thousands of units per week chronically, and their vitamin D deficiency doesn’t seem to get solved. Are those prescribing doctors aware of the magnesium connection? The answer is most likely no.

Scientists believe that darker skin is an adaptation to protect people from ultraviolet radiation from the sun. This theory is based on the fact that at the equator, you have the highest rate of sun exposure and solar radiation. And the closer any genetic group is to the equator, the darker their skin tone. The reverse is also true. As you go north into the Arctic Circle as an example, the skin tone of genetic groups native to those areas gets lighter. There is less sunlight available as they go north. So, in order to absorb vitamin D from the sun, skin has to be lighter. Rickets, as an example, which is a disease caused by vitamin D deficiency was very common in areas such as the United Kingdom prior to vitamin D supplementation — because they’ve had limited sunlight due to weather conditions as well as their geographic location. But one of the reasons that vitamin D deficiency is more common on average, as individual skin is darker is that the darker skin is blocking absorption like a natural sunscreen.

In this series, I’ll discuss how vitamin D affects your health. And it will become obvious to African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and other individuals whose genetics are from areas such as the Indian subcontinent and other areas where skin tones are darker why they have certain health situations that occur to them more frequently than they do to Caucasians. It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just biology. What has not been discussed in any popular media that I’m aware of, is that at least 50% of Americans are deficient in magnesium.

Some researchers believe that number is as high as 70%. In order for vitamin D to be utilized by the body, it has to work through a rather complex system of enzyme activity. All of these enzymes require magnesium. So, if you’re deficient in magnesium, you will almost certainly be deficient in vitamin D no matter how much vitamin D you are supplementing, or how much vitamin D containing foods you’re eating. Does your doctor know that? The answer is probably no.

The blood test for vitamin D is very straightforward. It’s what’s called a serum analysis. Serum is just a fancy way of saying blood. Doctors are also taught in medical school that a serum analysis of magnesium is adequate to determine if you have normal magnesium levels in your body. This unfortunately, is not correct. Only approximately 1% of the total of magnesium found in anyone’s body will be moving freely in their blood. So, a serum analysis is only going to tell you about the status of a maximum of 1% of your total magnesium.

You see, magnesium is an intracellular mineral. That is to say it needs to be inside of a cell in order to function. To have the most accurate assessment of magnesium in your body, you need a test called red blood cell magnesium or RBC mag. Most insurance companies that I’m aware of don’t cover the test, and most physicians don’t know why they should do the test, because they’re told that serum analysis will give them what they need. Once again, this is not correct.

When I was in practice, I found that RBC mag, and it’s written just that way, the letters RBC for red blood cell and mag, short for magnesium, was indeed the most accurate way to assess functional magnesium levels. Routine serum analysis would almost always show normal, when in fact the patient required more magnesium. I found this routinely with patients who had cardiac issues including arrhythmia, as well as those complaining of muscle cramps, muscle spasms, facial twitching, anxiety, difficulty in sleeping and more issues. I will explain this in the series how magnesium affects those health issues and much more. in future episodes.

The healthy body should contain about 25 grams of magnesium on average. So, folks, that’s 25,000 milligrams between 50 and 60% of your body’s total magnesium will be stored in your bones because magnesium is essential to strong healthy bones. Besides the 1% found in the blood, of course, the remaining level will be in various tissues and cells. So, here’s a logical multiple choice question. Since vitamin D cannot be utilized by the body without magnesium, and at least 50% of people are getting insufficient magnesium, is the main problem for vitamin D deficiency, A, lack of sunlight, B, poor dietary choices, C, magnesium deficiency, or D, all of the above? The science indicates it’s D, all of the above.

According to recent studies, 48% of the population is getting less than adequate levels of magnesium from diet. But there are other factors that contribute to deficiencies magnesium that you may not be aware of and perhaps your doctor is not aware of. People with gastrointestinal diseases, type two diabetes, alcoholics, or those who have, let’s say chronic use of alcohol, but they are not dependent at this point. All of these people are very probably getting less than adequate amounts of magnesium to cope with their particular situations. In fact, these are the indicators that would be most likely associated with deficiencies in magnesium.

Additionally, there are various pharmaceutical drugs that can lower your magnesium including virtually all of the prescription drugs and over the counter products used to reduce heartburn for acid reflux disease. How many physicians who prescribe drugs like Nexium or Prilosec, or other proton pump inhibitors, typically listed as PPIs; how many of them also check magnesium levels and recommend magnesium supplementation? I did a straw poll of a number of people, 36 people, actually. And of course, a straw poll is not a scientific study. Okay. But I found it interesting that of the 36 people I asked who were all taking one of the prescription drugs for acid reflux, 100% of them said, no one had ever told them anything about magnesium. And as far as they knew, their doctors had never tested their magnesium levels. Well, you know what? Even if their doctors had done a serum magnesium, that may not have given them adequate information.

There are conditions where physicians have no choice but to prescribe proton pump inhibitors. I’m not telling you not to take them, that’s between you and your physician. If you need them, you need them. But be aware that magnesium has more than 600 different functions in the human body, much more than bone density, much more than utilization of vitamin D. 600 different functions, folks. Chronic use of PPIs could lead to osteoporosis because those PPIs contribute to magnesium deficiency. And calcium ions can not be transported to the bone without magnesium. That’s only one of many issues when we’re discussing the benefits of magnesium.

In the next episode of The Nugent Report, in this series of episodes, I will continue our discussion not just on the relationship between vitamin D and magnesium. But I’ll cover more aspects of how those nutrients directly relate to your daily health requirements, blood testing for vitamin D as well as sources and benefits. Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent Report. Until next time, stay safe. Be sensible. Stay objective.

Outro: Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent Report. Visit our website at DrNugent.com for more objective facts about health and nutrition and email your questions and feedback to [email protected]. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram at The Nugent Report. Stay informed. Get the facts with The Nugent Report.

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简介：Dr. Nugent报告，以科学方式分析健康与营养。欢迎收听本期“Dr. Nugent报告”，本节目由Dr. Steve Nugent主讲，为您提供健康和营养方面的优质客观信息。Dr. Steve Nugent是著名的心理学家、作家、公共演说家，也是科学、健康、保健和营养方面的专家。请访问我们的网站DrNugent.com，并在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上关注@TheNugentreport。

欢迎收听Dr. Nugent报告，这是“维生素D和镁”主题节目的第二讲。在上一讲结束时，我给大家留了两个问题。大家是否真的需要补充维生素D？大家是否真的需要补充镁？好，本期节目就来回答这两个问题。请记住，Parva及其研究小组指出：“维生素D缺乏症正在美国流行开来。最有可能缺乏维生素D的人群是非洲裔美国人和西班牙裔美国人。”稍后，我会更详细地解释其中的原因。对各个种族的人群而言，肥胖人士或糖尿病患者也极易缺乏维生素D。

各种研究资料显示，39%到42%的美国人口缺乏维生素D。这个比例十分惊人，并带来了严重的健康问题。我采用的是美国统计数据，但请记住，各种族人群没有本质差别。从生物化学角度而言，我们都一样——我们都是人类。这一数据在大多数情况下也适用于你所在的国家，也许具体的百分比有所差异，但这些概念、想法、理解在所有国家都适用。

在本系列的第一讲中，我简要谈到了21世纪相对于过去几个世纪的变化。现在，几乎所有的工作都在室内进行。年轻人沉迷于数字设备和社交媒体，而他们的祖父母年轻时候主要是在户外和阳光下进行各种活动。21世纪有越来越多的人缺乏维生素D，毫无疑问，其中一个因素是阳光照射不足。

维生素D又被称为“阳光维生素”——借助镁和一个神奇的过程，阳光便可以转化为维生素D。几乎毫无例外的是，缺乏镁的人也会缺乏维生素D，即使补充维生素D也无补于事。许多病人遵照医嘱每周长期服用数千单位的维生素D，但维生素D缺乏并没有得到缓解，也许，他们的症结在于缺乏镁。开具处方的医生知道镁的关联作用吗？答案可能是否定的。

科学家们认为，皮肤变黑是一种适应行为，是为了使人免受太阳紫外线的辐射。这一理论的事实依据是：赤道具有最强的日光照射和辐射，越接近赤道的人种，肤色就越深，反之亦然。例如，越接近北极圈，当地的人种肤色就越浅。越靠北的地方得到的阳光越少。因此，为从阳光中吸收维生素D，肤色必须要更浅。例如，佝偻病是一种由维生素D缺乏引起的疾病，在补充维生素D之前，佝偻病在英国等地区非常普遍，由于天气条件和地理位置，这些地方日照有限。其实维生素D缺乏症在深肤色人群中更常见，其中一个原因是，深色皮肤如同天然防晒霜，阻挡了吸收。

在本系列中，我将探讨维生素D对健康的影响。我要向大家说明的是，为什么非裔美国人、西班牙裔美国人以及来自印度次大陆和其他深肤色地区的人群，会比白种人更容易出现某些健康问题。这不是阴谋论，只是生物学。据我所知，尚未有大众媒体报道过至少有50%的美国人缺乏镁元素。

一些研究人员认为，这个数字高达70%。为使维生素D被身体利用，镁元素必须经历相当复杂的酶活动。所有这些酶都需要镁元素。因此，缺乏镁几乎意味着缺乏维生素D，无论补充多少维生素D，吃多少含有维生素D的食物，都无补于事。你的医生知道这些吗？答案可能是否定的。

血液维生素D检测十分简单，称为“血清分析”。血清只是血液的一种花式称谓。医生们在医学院里学到，血清中的镁分析足以确定体内镁水平是否正常。可惜这一知识并不正确。人体内的镁总量，只有大约1%会在血液中自由流动。因此，血清分析最多只能表明镁总量1%的状况。

要知道，镁是一种细胞内矿物。这就是说，它只有在细胞内才能发挥作用。要对体内的镁进行最准确的评估，需要进行红血球镁检测。据我所知，大多数保险公司不涵盖这项检测，且大多数医生不知为何应当做这项检测，因为他们以为血清分析已经足够。再说一次，这并不正确。

我在执业期间发现，红血球镁检测确实是评估功能性镁水平的最准确方法。常规血清分析几乎总是显示正常，但事实上病人需要摄入更多镁元素。我发现，有心律失常等心脏问题以及肌肉痉挛、肌肉抽搐、面部抽搐、焦虑、入睡困难等问题的病人，经常是这种情况。我将通过这个系列节目，在未来几期解释镁元素对这些健康问题产生的影响。

健康的身体平均应含有约25克的镁。这等于25000毫克，而50％至60％的镁储存在骨骼中，因为镁是保证骨骼强健的关键。当然，除了血液中的1%，其余的镁都储存在各种组织和细胞中。下面我出一个考验逻辑思维的选择题。没有镁，维生素D就不能被身体利用；至少50%的人镁含量不足；那么，维生素D缺乏的主要原因是：A：缺乏阳光；B：膳食不当；C：缺乏镁；D：以上全部？科学的回答是D。

根据最近的研究，48%的人口从饮食中获得的镁元素不足。但是，还存在其他你或者你的医生都忽视的镁缺乏原因。胃肠道疾病患者，二型糖尿病患者，酗酒者，或者长期饮酒但现已不再有依赖症状的人群，这些人可能无法获取足量的镁元素来满足自身的特殊状况。事实上，这些是最有可能与镁缺乏有关的指标。

此外，各种药物会降低体内镁含量，包括几乎所有处方药以及用于减少胃灼热的反酸疾病非处方药产品。多少医生会开出耐信、奥美拉唑或其他质子泵抑制剂，又有多少医生同时检查镁元素水平并建议补充镁元素？我对36人进行了民间调查。当然，民间调查并非科学研究。但我发现一个有趣的现象，我访问的这36个人都在服用一种治疗反酸的处方药，所有人都说，从未有人跟他们提及过镁。此外，据他们所知，医生们从未检测过他们的镁含量。但你知道吗？即使医生为他们做了血清镁检测，可能依然无法提供充分的信息。

在一些情况下，医生必须要开质子泵抑制剂。我不是说不能服用质子泵抑制剂，这是患者和医生之间的事。真的需要就是真的需要。但一定要认知到的是镁在人体中具有多达600多种不同的功能，而不单单是确保骨密度和进维生素D吸收。长期使用质子泵抑制剂可能导致骨质疏松症，因为这些质子泵抑制剂导致了镁元素缺乏。而没有镁，钙离子无法被输送到骨骼中。当我们讨论镁的功能时，这只是其中一个方面。

关于这个系列，在下一集Dr. Nugent报告中，我的讨论将延伸到维生素D和镁元素的关系之外。但我将涵盖更多的方面，包括这些营养物质如何直接影响日常健康需求，维生素D血液检测，以及来源和益处。

感谢收听本期Dr. Nugent报告。下期见，大家多保重。保持理性。保持客观。

结语：感谢收听本期Dr. Nugent报告。访问DrNugent.com，获取更多有关健康与营养的事实性信息。如有问题或反馈意见，可发送邮件至[email protected]。请在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上关注Dr. Nugent报告。获取事实性信息，资讯先人一步。

English | 简体中文

The Nugent Report the science behind health and nutrition. Welcome to this episode of The Nugent Report, a definitive source for objective information on health and nutrition. Featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author, public speaker and expert on science, health, wellness and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at ‘drnugen.com’ and follow us on Facebook, twitter and Instagram @TheNugentReport.

Steve Nugent: Hello and welcome to another episode of The Nugent Report. On this Nugent Report, we’re going to be talking about MSG (Monosodium Glutamate). A poll was taken on The Nugent Report Facebook page and the majority of the respondents said, they wanted to hear a podcast or see a blog on MSG. Well, I wasn’t really planning on this, but this is what my subscribers wanted so, so be it. If you’re sensitive to MSG or at least you believe you are, then you already have a good idea of what it is but not everyone does. So, let’s start by explaining what MSG is.

MSG is an abbreviation for Monosodium Glutamate and it’s commonly used as a flavor enhancer in many foods. From Bouillon cubes to canned vegetables. Believe it or not, MSG was first isolated by a Japanese scientist back in 1908. He was researching a particular flavor which is found in a seaweed an edible seaweed, which is called Kombu. And he was successful in his effort. So, it’s been around for a long time. Chemically, it’s a sodium salt of glutamic acid. Glutamic acid is a non-essential amino acid and that means it occurs naturally in the body. It’s required for building proteins in your body. It’s found in many different types of animal and plant proteins.

It also is a neurotransmitter, so that makes it pretty important and it’s required for ammonia metabolism. So, please understand that glutamic acid is not MSG. I get that question a lot. So, they’re not the same thing. So, MSG is a sodium salt of glutamic acid. The US FDA says that, MSG is safe but some disagree. Some have even implied that MSG could lead to brain damage. I must point out that there is no peer-reviewed science literature to support that. Remember that The Nugent Report is dedicated to bringing you objective science. That means you’re going to get both sides of this story.

The people who report various symptoms associated with MSG are often said to have Chinese Restaurant Syndrome or CRS. Because it’s most commonly used in Chinese food. The first paper on Chinese Restaurant Syndrome was actually published in the new England Journal of Medicine back in 1968 and the author was RH Quok. In his paper, he reported that after consumption of Chinese food, there was some reports of what he called Transient Subjective Symptoms. Which included some of the classic symptoms discussed in this episode.

To report this episode to you, I looked at quite a number of individual studies and they all unfortunately were reporting inconsistent results. So, that took me to the next step and that was to look at systematic review papers of the individual papers. So, the question that comes up is. Is MSG actually bad for you? According to the FDA and numerous scientific studies, it isn’t. however, there are people who consume food or liquids with MSG and report a number of different unpleasant symptoms. Including headache, flushing, nausea, chest pain, sweating, general weakness, pressure or tightness in facial muscles. As well as numbness, tingling and even burning sensations in the neck or the face.

Some people also report heart palpitations. Could all these people be wrong and the government be right? Is this a simple yes or no answer? Well, the Food & Drug Administration classifies MSG as gras. So, that’s an abbreviation. So, GRAS in capital letters and it means generally regarded as safe. MSG is not only used in Chinese food; it’s also used to enhance the flavor of soups and canned vegetables and canned meats and other things. It’s not just the FDA that says that MSG is safe, joint expert committees from the Food & Agricultural Organization of the united nations otherwise known as the FAO. And the expert committee on food additives of the World Health Organization otherwise known as the WHO or WHO.

They conducted studies on MSG in 1971, 74 and then again in 1987. They determined what they called an ADI or Accepted Daily Intake. And they concluded that the use of MSG did not present a health hazard. How can so many people have such a wide range of symptoms while the government says that MSG is safe? To answer a question like that, would require an exhaustive scientific study and that simply isn’t possible for me to either finance or conduct at this time. So, the most logical approach is to look into peer-reviewed science journals to find what’s called a meta-analysis or a systematic review paper.

Essentially a meta-analysis or a systematic review is simply kind of a study of a bunch of studies. Scientists conducting analyses of these type will study two or more studies to give a better consensus in most cases than simply looking at one study alone. This is definitely necessary when the question is about MSG. This type of analysis was conducted in 2016 by two researchers, named Obayashi and Nakamura. Their study was specifically designed to find out if there was a causal relationship with headaches reported by people using foods containing MSG. And if there was any scientific literature to support it.

These two scientists pointed out that MSG is classified as a causative agent of headache in the international classification of headache disorders third edition. The available scientific literature however gives us mixed messages. That’s what led me to look at a systematic review of a very large group of papers. Obayashi and Nakamura conducted this type of review on human studies, which included the incidence of headache after an oral administration of MSG. An analysis was made by separating human studies with MSG administration with or without food. This was done because different journals have reported inconsistent results based on the use of MSG in food or MSG in liquids.

MSG as an example is commonly used in Bouillon cubes and in soups. One of several individual studies that I looked at in preparation for this episode was by two scientists named Tarasoff and Kelly. This was a double-blind placebo control that was published in a peer-reviewed journal called Food & Chemical Toxicology back in 1993. Tarasoff and Kelly pointed out that conducting a blinded study was extremely difficult, because the taste of MSG was distinctive. And therefore, the placebo would be obvious to most test subjects versus a food or a liquid containing the MSG.

The idea of a double-blind placebo control study is that, no one in the study knows who’s taking the placebo and who’s taking the active agent. There have been other problems reported on individual studies to arrive at firm conclusions, this is not the only one. Once again this is why I looked at an exhaustive systematic review paper of a wide variety of studies. Tarasoff and Kelly reported that only 14% of the human test subjects in their study responded to the placebo and 15% responded to MSG. On the surface, this would suggest that there are almost as many people imagining that they’re having an effect as those who are actually reporting an effect from the MSG itself. So, this wasn’t very helpful.

Obayashi and Nakamura reviewed studies done on a very wide range of circumstances with various levels of dose administration of MSG. Some far above what you would normally get in food and in a variety of different foods and liquids. The results from one study to another were pretty inconsistent. Although, there was a suggestion that there might possibly be more significant effect on some females than males. Again, not conclusive. They acknowledge that doing a double blind with liquids was pretty difficult, in fact pretty close to impossible. Because you can taste the MSG and the liquids distinctly

After analyzing all of the data together their conclusion was that, there was no causal relationship that could be established between the intake of MSG and headaches. Now that’s after reviewing a very wide number of studies under a really broad scope of circumstances. Headaches are of course only one symptom that are reported by people who seem to be sensitive to MSG. So, it’s clear to see why government agencies tell us that MSG is safe. They’re going on the available science that’s been published. In science, you have those things which are proven, those things which are disproven and those things that require further study.

In the case of MSG, clearly further study is required. I have seen many people in my career who I believe sincerely are suffering the effects of MSG. But without the science to substantiate it, we can’t draw the conclusions that many people are looking for at this point. So, just because the study hasn’t been shown yet to validate a causal connection between these unpleasant symptoms and the MSG, that doesn’t mean they’re not real. I believe they are.

So. if you consume a food or a food additive and have any symptoms that are less than pleasant or positive. The prudent thing to do is to avoid that food or food additive in the future. I wish that for the purpose of this episode, I could give you absolute conclusions. But unfortunately, the science isn’t there yet. So, that’s it for this episode of The Nugent Report. Remember be safe, be sensible and stay objective.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent Report visit our website at ‘drnugent.com’. For more objective facts about health and nutrition and email your questions and feedback to [email protected]. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @TheNugentReport. Stay informed get the facts with The Nugent Report.

English | 简体中文

《纽金特报告》，阐述健康与营养背后的科学。欢迎收听本集《纽金特报告》。《纽金特报告》是有关健康和营养客观信息的权威来源。由著名心理学家、作家、公共演说家、科学、健康、保健和营养方面的专家史蒂夫ž纽金特（Steve Nugent）博士主讲。我们的网站是“drnugent.com”，你可以在脸书（Facebook）、推特（Twitter）和Instagram @TheNugentReport上关注我们。

史蒂夫ž纽金特：大家好，欢迎收听新一集《纽金特报告》。在这集《纽金特报告》中，我们要讨论的是MSG（谷氨酸钠）。此前，我们在《纽金特报告》的脸书（Facebook）主页上进行了一项民意调查，大多数参与者表示他们希望听到关于谷氨酸钠的播客或看到写它的博客文章。好吧，虽然我本来没有计划做这个内容，但这是订阅者想要听的，所有就有了本集播客。如果你对谷氨酸钠很敏感，或者至少你相信自己很敏感，这说明你对什么是谷氨酸钠已经有了一定了解，但并不是每个人都是这样。所以，让我们先来解释一下什么是谷氨酸钠。

MSG是谷氨酸钠的缩写，通常在很多食品中作为增味剂。从肉汤块到罐头蔬菜中都有谷氨酸钠。有意思的是，谷氨酸钠最早是由一位日本科学家在1908年分离出来的。那时他正在研究一种在海藻中发现的特殊味道，这种海藻叫做昆布（Kombu），是一种可食用海藻。他成功提取出了谷氨酸钠。所以，其实谷氨酸钠已经存在很长时间了。从化学方面来看，它是谷氨酸的钠盐。谷氨酸是一种非必需氨基酸，也就是说，它天然存在于人体内，是体内构建蛋白质所必需的成份。谷氨酸存在于许多不同类型的动植物蛋白质中。

谷氨酸也是一种神经递质，所以说它相当重要，是氨代谢必需的物质。请注意，谷氨酸不是谷氨酸钠。经常有人问我这个问题，这两者不是同一种东西。谷氨酸钠是谷氨酸的钠盐。美国食品药物管理局（FDA）指出，谷氨酸钠是安全的，但有些人不同意这种说法。有些人甚至暗示，谷氨酸钠会导致脑损伤。我必须指出，没有任何经过同行评审的科学文献支持这一观点。请记住，《纽金特报告》致力于为你带来科学的客观事实。这意味着我们会带你全面了解相关事实。

通常将报告出现与谷氨酸钠有关各种症状的人说成是得了中餐馆综合征或CRS。因为烹制中餐时最常用到它。实际上第一篇关于中餐馆综合症的论文早在1968年就发表在《新英格兰医学杂志》上，作者是RH Quok。在他的论文中，他报告称，食用中餐后出现一些他称之为“短暂主观症状”的反应。其中包括本集中讨论的一些经典症状。

为了准备这一集内容，我翻阅了不少独立研究，遗憾的是，这些研究报告的结果都不一致。为此，我不得不进一步查看这些独立文献的系统综述。那么，问题来了，谷氨酸钠真的对人有害吗？根据美国食品与药物管理局和众多科学研究的结果，它无害。然而，有人食用含谷氨酸钠的食品或液体后，报告出现许多不同的不适症状。包括头痛、面红、恶心、胸痛、出汗、全身无力、面部肌肉压迫或肿胀。以及颈部或面部的麻木、刺痛甚至烧灼感。

有些人还报告出现心悸。难道这些人都错了，而政府是对的吗？这个问题可以简单地用是或不是来回答吗？美国食品药物管理局将谷氨酸钠归类为一般公认为安全（gras）。GRAS是它的缩写名称，全部大写，意思是一般公认为是安全的。谷氨酸钠不仅被用在中餐里，我们还用它来提鲜汤、罐头蔬菜、罐头肉类和其他食物的味道。不仅仅是美国食品药物管理局认为谷氨酸钠是安全的，联合国粮食及农业组织，也就是粮农组织的联合专家委员会，以及世界卫生组织也就是WHO的食品添加剂专家委员会，均认为谷氨酸钠是安全的。

他们分别在1971年、1974年和1987年对谷氨酸钠进行了研究，并确定了所谓的每日允许摄入量（ADI）。他们得出结论，使用谷氨酸钠不会对健康造成危害。为什么政府说谷氨酸钠是安全的，却还有那么多人出现广泛的症状呢？要回答这个问题，就需要进行详尽的科学研究，而无论是经费还是时间，对我来说根本不可能进行这样的详尽研究。所以，最合理的方法是在经同行评审的科学期刊中去寻找所谓的荟萃分析或系统综述。

本质上来说，荟萃分析或系统综述只是一种对数个研究所进行的研究。科学家在进行这类分析时，会研究两个或多个研究，以便在大多数情况下找出更好的共识，这类分析比仅看一篇研究更加可靠全面。而在涉及有关谷氨酸钠的问题上，这类分析绝对是必要的。关于谷氨酸钠的这类分析由名叫大林（Obayashi）和中村（Nakamura）的两位研究人员在2016年进行。他们设计了专门的研究，用来探究食用含谷氨酸钠食物人群报告的头痛与谷氨酸钠是否存在因果关系，以及结论是否有科学文献支持。

这两位科学家指出，《国际头痛疾病分类（第三版）》将谷氨酸钠归类为头痛病因。然而，现有的科学文献却提供了大量相互矛盾的信息。这就促使我仔细研究大量论文的系统综述。大林（Obayashi）和中村（Nakamura）就人体研究进行了系统综述，包括服用谷氨酸钠后头痛的发生率。将食用含谷氨酸钠食物和不含谷氨酸钠食物的人体研究分开分析。之所以这样做，是因为不同期刊根据食物中使用味精或液体中使用味精的情况，报告了不一致的结果。

以谷氨酸钠为例，它通常被用在肉汤块和汤中。在准备这一集内容的时候，我看了几篇独立研究，其中一篇是由名叫塔拉索夫（Tarasoff）和凯莉（Kelly）的两位科学家进行的。这是一项双盲安慰剂对照研究，早在1993年就发表在《食品与化学毒理学》这一同行评审期刊上。塔拉索夫（Tarasoff）和凯莉（Kelly）指出，由于谷氨酸钠的味道很特别，因此进行设盲研究非常困难。大多数受试者很容易分辨出安慰剂与含有谷氨酸钠的食物或液体。

双盲安慰剂对照研究的设计思路是，研究中没有人知道谁在服用安慰剂，也没人知道谁在服用活性物质。得出肯定结论的独立研究还报告了其他问题，设盲不是唯一的问题。这就是为什么我要看一份详尽涵盖各种研究的系统综述论文的原因。塔拉索夫（Tarasoff）和凯莉（Kelly）报告说，在他们的研究中，只有14%的受试者对安慰剂有反应，而15%对谷氨酸钠有反应。从表面上看，这一数据表明想象自己受到谷氨酸钠影响与实际报告受到谷氨酸钠影响的人数一样多。所以，这一结论不是很有帮助。

大林（Obayashi）和中村（Nakamura）的回顾研究范围非常广，包含食用各种剂量水平的谷氨酸钠，有些剂量远远高于通常从食物或从各种不同食物和液体中所能获得的水平。各项研究中的结果相当不一致。虽然有人推论，谷氨酸钠对某些女性可能会比对男性有更显著的影响。但同样，没有确凿的证据可以证实这一点。他们承认用液体做双盲研究是相当困难的，事实上几乎是不可能的。因为你可以轻易区别出含谷氨酸钠的液体。

在分析了所有数据之后，他们得出结论，在摄入谷氨酸钠和头痛之间不能建立因果关系。这是在回顾了非常多的研究，覆盖面很广的情况下得出的结论。头痛似乎只是对谷氨酸钠很敏感的人所报告的一种症状。这样就很清楚的解释了为什么政府机构告诉我们谷氨酸钠是安全的。他们依据的是已经发表的现有科学成果。在科学领域中，有些结论被证实，另一些结论被否定，还有一些结论需要进一步的深入研究。

对于谷氨酸钠，显然需要对它进行进一步的深入研究。在我的职业生涯中，我见过很多人，我真心相信他们受到谷氨酸钠的影响。但是，如果没有科学证据，我们现在还不能得出这个很多人情愿相信的结论。不能仅仅因为研究还没有证明这些不愉快的症状和谷氨酸钠之间存在因果关系，就认为它们不是真的。我相信它们是真实存在的。

所以，如果你食用了某种食品或食品添加剂，出现了任何不愉快或阳性症状。谨慎的做法是以后要避免食用这种食品或食品添加剂。我也希望自己可以在本集中给各位一个确凿的结论。但遗憾的是，相关科学研究还不完善。这就是本集《纽金特报告》的全部内容。请记住要安全、理智、保持客观。

感谢收听本集《纽金特报告》。如需了解更多关于健康和营养的客观事实，请访问我们的网站’drnugent.com’。请将你的问题和反馈发送至[email protected]。请在脸书（Facebook）、推特（Twitter）和Instagram @TheNugentReport上关注我们。《纽金特报告》，带给你最新信息，让你获取客观事实。

English | 简体中文

The Nugent Report, the science behind health and nutrition. Welcome to this episode of The Nugent Report, a definitive source for objective information on health and nutrition. Featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author, public speaker and expert on science, health, wellness and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at ‘drnugen.com’ and follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @TheNugentReport.

Steve Nugent: Hello my friends and welcome to another episode of The Nugent Report. This episode is going to be the first in a series about Vitamin D and Magnesium. Two of the most important nutrients for the 21st century. In these episodes, you’re going to learn some things about Vitamin D and Magnesium that you’ve probably never heard before. In fact, I’m nearly 100% certain of that. The scientific research team led by a scientist named NR Parva states that, Vitamin D deficiency is becoming epidemic in the United States. And if we were to use the same statistical measures and apply it to the nutrient called Magnesium, then we’d have to say the same of Magnesium as well.

Every time a nutrient gets mentioned on TV or in popular media, I pretty much immediately get people contacting me from countries all over the world asking me about that nutrient. For many people, it’s the first time they’ve heard about it or they know very little about it generally. So, they want to know if they should be taking that nutrient that they saw on the popular media. The problem with getting your nutrition information from TV shows and other forms of popular media is that, they’re rarely objective. Television shows earn their money through advertisement and the higher the shows are rated, the more money they can charge to their advertisers.

Unfortunately, this means that most media is typically more concerned with ratings than representing information objectively. Journalism students are typically taught the phrase, ‘If it bleeds it leads.’ That’s not about facts that’s not about objectivity, that’s about catching people’s attention. Unfortunately, most people are more likely to be captured by extremes than by objectivity. Objective data typically falls somewhere in the middle of the spectrum versus one extreme or the other. Simply speaking, objectivity is rarely extreme and sometimes not the best thing for ratings, okay.

Let’s talk about Vitamin D and again, this is going to be a series of episodes. Remember, I did promise my subscribers that I would cover all nutrients from A to Z. I didn’t promise that I would do it in alphabetical order. So, with Vitamin D in mind, that’s where we’re going to start. Before a laboratory test became available to practicing physicians, the belief that virtually no one needed to supplement Vitamin D and certainly no one would ever need to supplement more than 400 international units of Vitamin D in a single day. That belief was almost universal.

In fact, physicians were cautioned to avoid giving too much Vitamin D. Because they were told it could become toxic. Well, that’s true just about everything can become toxic if you get too much of it. In fact, if you drink too much clean pure water even that could become toxic, but we’re talking about ridiculous amounts obviously. So, the 400 IU rule was observed pretty strictly for a very long time for decades. Once physicians began to test people for Vitamin D, that tired old belief was shattered very quickly. To the great surprise of all the physicians that I’ve spoken with, the new blood test was showing very high percentages of people who needed more Vitamin D.

And in fact, physicians were finding that they needed to recommend not hundreds of units, but thousands of international units per week just to get their patients back up to adequate levels. Later on, I’m going to explain the difference to you between deficiencies and less than adequate levels, but we won’t cover that right now. When the world’s first minimum daily requirement was established for Vitamin D, that was back in 1941 by the US National Academy of Sciences. The world was very different than it is today. Diet and dietary choices as well as work activities and recreational activities were all very different than they are today.

In the 1940s, most people of all ages got a good deal more sunlight than they get today. Children played outside versus being glued to a video game console or computer or their cell phones nearly every waking hour of the day. Outdoor activities were the norm versus sitting in your living room. watching television. Although the process of turning whole grain into refined white flour began around 1870. Most foods in the human diet were not significantly altered until many decades later. It seems as science advances in the 21st century that there are never ending ways to alter our food from its natural state.

In 1941, corporate farming was yet to be invented, much has changed since that time. Since medical physicians receive almost no training in nutrition. They rely on information from government agencies, medical associations and the various science journals to make their decisions on their patient’s nutritional needs. Throughout the history of medicine, doctors have been basically taught that if you eat right, you’ll get everything you need. In principle, this sounds great and I wish it was that simple. The fact is most people don’t make good dietary choices. For more than 50 years, people have been given misinformation about diet.

Most of that misinformation was unintentional by various medical experts acting as the health expert on TV shows and other forms of media. Advising on things that they were not experts in. The result is, the average person doesn’t have sufficient accurate information to make good dietary choices. Remember as they say in the computer world, ‘Garbage in garbage out’. If your information input is inaccurate, the conclusion that you draw from that information will almost certainly also be inaccurate.

When I was in practice, I would always ask my patients about their diet when I did the initial intake. That’s the first meeting that you have in the clinic with the patient. Almost 100% of the people who were not well, would tell me that they eat right. They make good choices in their diet, they believed that because they were acting on misinformation that they thought was true and correct. Because for God sakes they saw it on TV. It must be true or Dr so and so said it therefore it must be true. Most of the time this is simply not the case there are of course many reasons for those people not being well when they come to see a health care practitioner. Diet is a significant contributing factor in my opinion in most cases. But there are a variety of possibilities obviously.

The problem is the average person has so much conflicting information. They don’t know how to make the right choices. Even doctors are often confused on this topic. I know this because I’ve been teaching doctors for more than 30 years. Assuming that you made perfect choices, which of course is pretty unlikely. You still may come up short according to more recent scientific study. There’s something else to consider. As I said many times in an attempt to explain to people, how nutrient cofactors work with other nutritional cofactors. That biochemistry is kind of like the kids connect the dot games. In that game of course, you can’t see the full picture until you’ve connected all of the dots.

As I said in one of my previous publications, no nutrient is an island onto itself. Forgive me for paraphrasing on that. All nutrients have co-factors my friends. So, for those people who think because they have internet access and they can go on the internet and look up something by who knows who, to give you information about nutrition that they’re suddenly nutritional experts. They’ve got a lot to learn. Nutritional biochemistry is very complicated, human digestion very complicated. I’m going to do the best I can to make this simple and easy to understand and hopefully to keep your attention as we’re going through this list of episodes.

So, this brings us back to the question. Do you really need to supplement Vitamin D? Physicians now know how to routinely test for Vitamin D, but they’ve not been taught that Vitamin D cannot be utilized by the body if you are deficient in Magnesium. So, should we be asking the question, do you need to supplement Magnesium? I’ll come back to that and that’s why I’ve decided to do this series of episodes talking about Vitamin D and Magnesium together. Because without Magnesium, Vitamin D is not going to be utilized by your body. And you probably don’t know a great deal about Magnesium. So, we’re going to cover them both in these episodes.

In the next episode, we’re going to be talking about how Magnesium and Vitamin D work together. We’ll be talking about blood testing, talking about some health conditions and we’re also going to talk about why people of color may be more deficient in Vitamin D than others. Until then stay safe, be sensible and stay objective.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent Report visit our website at ‘drnugent.com’ for more objective facts about health and nutrition and email your questions and feedback to [email protected]. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @TheNugentReport. Stay informed get the facts with The Nugent Report.

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《纽金特报告》，阐述健康与营养背后的科学。欢迎收听本集《纽金特报告》。《纽金特报告》是有关健康和营养客观信息的权威来源。由著名心理学家、作家、公共演说家、科学、健康、保健和营养方面的专家史蒂夫ž纽金特（Steve Nugent）博士主讲。我们的网站是“drnugent.com”，你可以在脸书（Facebook）、推特（Twitter）和Instagram @TheNugentReport上关注我们。

史蒂夫ž纽金特：听众朋友们好，欢迎收听新一集的《纽金特报告》。本集《纽金特报告》是关于维生素D和镁系列节目的第一部分。维生素D和镁是21世纪最重要的两种营养素。在本系列中，你将了解到一些你之前可能从未听说的，关于维生素D和镁的知识。实际上，我几乎可以百分之百确定这一点。由科学家NR Parva领导的科研团队指出，维生素D缺乏症正在美国流行。而如果我们用同样的统计方法，将其应用到营养素镁上，那么我们也不得不说镁也是如此。

每当电视或大众媒体上提到一种营养素时，来自世界各地的人们几乎都会马上与我联系，向我咨询有关这种营养素的信息。 对于许多人来说，这是他们第一次听说这种营养素或对此了解甚少。 因此，他们想知道自己是否应该摄入那种在大众媒体上看到的营养素。 但是，从电视节目和其他大众媒体获取营养信息的问题在于，这些信息很少是客观的。 电视节目通过广告赚钱，节目的收视率越高，就可以向广告商收取更多的广告费。

不幸的是，这意味着大多数媒体通常更关注收视率，而不是客观地反映信息。新闻专业的学生通常会被灌输一句话：”流血的新闻才能上头条“。这里强调的不是事实，也不是客观性，而是要吸引人们的眼球。不幸的是，大多数人更容易被极端消息而不是客观事实所吸引。客观的数据通常处于中间位置，而不是在一个极端或另一个极端。简单来说，客观性很少有极端，有时也不是收视率的最佳选择，对吧。

让我们来谈谈维生素D，这将是一个涵盖多期播客的系列节目。我确实答应过订阅者，我会介绍所有营养素。不过，我可没有承诺会按字母顺序依次介绍。所以，考虑到维生素D的重要性，我们先从它开始谈起。在执业医师可以进行实验室测试之前，几乎没有人认为我们需要补充维生素D，更不要说需要在一天内补充超过400国际单位（IU）的维生素D。这种看法几乎是普遍存在的。

事实上，医生被告诫要避免给患者开过多的维生素D，因为过多的维生素D可能会有毒。诚然，如果你摄入过多，几乎所有的东西都会变得有毒。实际上，如果你喝了太多干净的纯净水，纯净水甚至也可能变得有毒，显然我们谈论的是无比庞大的摄入量。所以，在几十年的时间里，医生非常严格地遵守了400IU规定。当医生开始对人们进行维生素D的研究后，这种陈旧的信念很快就被打破了。让所有和我交流过的医生都感到非常惊讶的是，新的血液检查结果显示，需要补充维生素D的人群比例非常高。

事实上，医生发现，要让维生素D缺乏患者恢复到足够的水平，推荐数百个单位远远不够，他们需要推荐每周摄入数千个国际单位的维生素D。稍后，我会解释缺乏和低于足够水平之间的区别，现在先不谈这个。我想说的是，世界上第一个维生素D每日最低需要量，是在1941年由美国国家科学院提出的。那时的世界与今天截然不同。无论是饮食、饮食选择还是工作和娱乐活动，都与今天大不相同。

20世纪40年代，不论哪个年龄段，大多数人都会经常晒太阳，沐浴在阳光中的机会比今天的人多很多。孩子们在户外玩耍，而不是像今天的孩子几乎每时每刻都玩游戏机、电脑或手机上。那时，户外活动才是常态，而不是像如今大家都坐在客厅里看电视。虽然将全谷物变成精白面粉的过程始于1870年左右。但人类饮食中的大多数食物直到几十年后才发生重大变化。随着21世纪科学的进步，似乎永远都有办法改变食物的天然状态。

1941年时，农业企业化经营还没出现，不过从那时起，很多事情都开始发生变化。由于医生几乎没有接受过营养方面的任何培训。他们依靠政府机构、医学协会和各种科学杂志提供的信息来决定患者的营养需求。在整个医学史上，医生们基本上都受到教导说，只要吃对了，你就能得到你所需要的一切营养。原则上，这一说法听起来不错，我也希望道理是如此简单。但事实却是，大多数人都没有正确选择饮食。50多年来，人们一直在饮食方面不断接收错误信息。

这些错误信息大多是各种医学专家无意造成的，他们在电视节目和其他形式的媒体上充当健康专家，对他们其实并不擅长的事情提出建议。这样一来，普通人就无法获得足够准确的信息，从而做出良好的饮食选择。请记住，就像计算机行业流行的说法：”废料入、废品出”。如果输入的信息不准确，那么你从这些信息中得出的结论几乎肯定也是不准确的。

我执业的时候，每次接收病人时，总是会在初次问诊时询问他们的饮食情况。这是我在诊所里与病人的第一次见面。几乎100%的人都会告诉我，他们吃得很好。这些病人相信，他们在饮食上做出了很好的选择。他们不知道自己的选择是建立在错误信息的基础上，他们认为那些错误信息是真实、正确的。因为他们认为在电视上看到的就一定是真的，或者某某博士是这么说的，所以就一定是真的。但在大多数情况下，那些根本不是事实，当然还有很多原因让这些人感觉不适、前来问诊。但在我看来，大多数情况下，饮食是造成身体不适的重要因素。显然，还有其他多种潜在因素。

问题在于，普通人获得了太多自相矛盾的信息。他们不知道如何做出正确选择。即使是医生也经常对这个话题感到困惑。我知道这一点是因为我教了30多年医生。假设你做出了完美选择，当然这不太可能。根据最新的科学研究结果，你仍然可能会存在不足。还有其他因素需要考虑在内。正如我尝试向人们解释的时候，曾多次强调，这些营养辅助因子是如何与其他营养辅助因子一起发挥作用的。这种生物化学原理有点像孩子们玩的连点游戏。在这种游戏中，你只有把所有的点都连接起来，才能看到图片全貌，

正如我在以前出版书籍中所说的，营养素自身并不是孤岛。请原谅我转述自己的话，朋友们，所有的营养素都有共同的作用因素。所以，对于那些认为自己能上网、能查阅资料，能提供营养信息的人来说，突然之间他们就成了营养专家。但是其实他们还有很多东西要学。营养生物化学非常复杂，人体消化作用也非常复杂。我将尽我所能把这些原理变得简单易懂，希望我们录制的这一系列播客，能让你集中注意力倾听。

那么，让我们回到这个问题上。你真的需要补充维生素D吗？现在的医生都知道如何常规检测维生素D，但他们没有接受过教导，如果人体缺乏镁，那么维生素D就不能被人体利用。这样，我们是否应该问另一个问题，你需要补充镁吗？我会谈到这个问题，这也是为什么我决定在这个系列播客中把维生素D和镁放在一起讨论的原因。如果没有镁，维生素D是不会被身体利用的。而你可能对镁了解不多。因此，我们将在接下来的几集中同时介绍镁和维生素D。

下一集，我们将讨论镁和维生素D是如何一起发挥作用的。我们将介绍血液检查，提及一些疾病，我们还将谈论为什么有色人种可能比其他人更缺乏维生素D。在那之前，请大家保持安全、理智和客观。

感谢收听本集《纽金特报告》。如需了解更多关于健康和营养的客观事实，请访问我们的网站’drnugent.com’。请将你的问题和反馈发送至[email protected]。请在脸书（Facebook）、推特（Twitter）和Instagram @TheNugentReport上关注我们。《纽金特报告》带给你最新信息，让你获取客观事实。

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The Nugent Report, The science behind health and nutrition. Welcome to this episode of The Nugent Report a definitive source for objective information on health and nutrition. Featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author, public speaker and expert on science, health, wellness and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at ‘drnugent.com’ and follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @TheNugentReport.

Steve Nugent: Hello my friends and welcome to another episode of The Nugent Report. In this episode of The Nugent Report, we are going to be answering a simple question. Are dietary supplements a luxury or a necessity in the 21st century? Some of you will be very surprised with the information you hear. Some of you may be simply reaffirmed. But in any case, you will be getting scientific information in plain simple language that anyone can understand. That can help you make a decision as to whether or not you should be taking dietary supplements to support your health.

When I say dietary supplement, what am I talking about? A supplement is something designed to supplement what may be missing from your diet. Now that could be a tablet, a capsule, a powder, a drink. Any way that you can get a nutrient that may supplement what may be missing from your diet. Understand that dietary supplements are not medicines. They are not designed to treat or cure or ameliorate disease. That is not their purpose. Your body has a system of mechanisms in its amazing design to deal with almost every kind of natural occurrence that you can possibly imagine.

It does so by fueling the systems through nutrition. Sometimes there are challenges where in some cases a human being is not able to cope with some kind of outside threat. And in those cases, pharmaceutical drugs or medical procedures may be required. Understand that your doctor has been trained well to understand when to prescribe a pharmaceutical drug, when to recommend a particular medical procedure or test. However, medical schools do not teach doctors how to be experts in the clinical use of dietary supplements. So, don’t make the mistake of thinking that all doctors know all things about well everything, because it’s just not the case.

So, what we’re going to talk about today is some science that perhaps your doctor is completely unaware of and that’s fine with me. Because this is an educational podcast.

All right, so a supplement is designed to supplement what might be missing from your diet. But well all governments tell you that if you eat right you won’t get sick, you don’t need supplements our food supply is the best every country will say. Our nutrition is the best every country will say. And discussion of dietary supplements is well, pretty limited by most governments if at all. Your body is the key. Your body is the true miracle. Whether you know this or not, your body has well in my mind the most amazing design ever. In fact, your body is designed to cope with almost any kind of naturally occurring challenge you could possibly imagine.

How does it do this? Well, you have a number of systems in your body that cope with different challenges. And when I say this, most people think about their immune system primarily. Well okay, let’s talk about the immune system for a moment. I want you to think of your body as a big industrial complex and I want you to think of that industrial complex your body, as having many factories inside of the complex. One of those factories would be your immune system. Well, let’s say as an example that you know you got yourself pretty rich one day and you decided to buy an automobile factory.

In order to run that factory, of course the factory will have to be powered naturally. But you’re gonna have to have certain materials certain supplies nutrition for that factory if you will. That would include things like steel and rubber and plastic and all manner of things that are necessary to make a car. If you’re missing any of those materials to make a car, guess what? No matter how good that automobile factory is, it’s not going to produce a car that functions. Is it? Think about your immune system and all the other factories inside of your body. So, you think of your glandular system as a factory, okay. All of them requiring supplies, materials in this case nutrition from various foods.

Again, the hope is that everyone eats properly and that everyone eats sufficient levels of nutrients necessary to fuel all those various factories within the body. So, that you have the ability to meet the challenges as your body was designed to meet those challenges. That’s the whole idea. Well, that would be ideal. In life, how many things are ideal? Not many. Well in the 21st century you have very very different conditions than our ancestors faced throughout the majority of human history. Some of those conditions are obvious you’re aware of. Such as pollution, air pollution and water pollution today is more severe than it has ever been in the history of the world.

Scientists can take ice core samples that they know go back thousands of years. They can date these samples with pretty good accuracy. And they know from these samples what was in the air during each of those centuries. We can tell you for sure that the pollution today is far more serious than pollution has ever been in recorded history or even in pre-history. Wow. Is air pollution a problem? You bet it is. Air pollution can cause well oxidative stress and you’ve heard the term free radicals and other terms related to that. Oxidative stress can damage the cells of your body.

There are some oxidative molecules that can even damage human DNA. This is serious stuff and most of these chemicals that are found in the pollution today on planet earth did not exist on planet earth before the year 1930. That essentially is the beginning of the age of synthetic chemistry. Synthetic chemistry is pretty amazing, I mean it really is amazing. When you look at some things that synthetic chemists have been able to create, it’s well astounding. But there are also synthetic chemicals which are very harmful to life on this planet, not just to humans but to animal life as well. And these chemicals are growing every year.

We know that according to the US Environmental Protection agency, there are more than 75,000 synthetic chemicals on planet earth registered with that agency. And I use them as an example because more chemicals are registered with them than any other federal agency in the world. They tell us that these 10,000 of chemicals are really only the beginning. We know from scientific study and this was sort of an accidental discovery really. Where scientists found that when different synthetic compounds come in contact with each other in water, they frequently make brand new compounds that were never intended.

Now with that idea in mind, when you’re starting with more than 75,000 chemicals to begin with and now you begin to combine them at random. There is no possibility of knowing how many chemicals are on this planet today. Simply no possibility. So, that’s a stress. You better know it. When your oxidative stress goes up, your cells are damaged and it’s I like to describe it as well rust. Rust is probably the best way to describe it. If you’ve watched rust on metal and you see how it sort of eats it away, that’s oxidative stress on metal. All right, you’re not made of metal I understand. But the effects on your cells are very very similar to what happens to metal when it is having oxidative stress or rust.

To have sufficient nutrient to cope with that, you need a type of nutrient called an Antioxidant. Antioxidants are found in various colorful fruits and vegetables. Now you will find antioxidant phytochemicals, phytochemical comes from an ancient Greek word which means plant. So, plant chemicals, now these are not vitamins. They’re not minerals, they’re not amino acids, they are their own category of nutrition, phytochemical antioxidants. Then there are vitamin antioxidants like Vitamin A, C and E. Phytochemical Antioxidants are things that most people can’t pronounce when they see them. And I wouldn’t worry about it too much.

Other than to say, that you are supposed to eat adequate levels of fruits and vegetables in order to have those phytochemical antioxidants to help you fight the oxidative stress of the 21st century. Back in 1995, the US Department of Agriculture or USDA, they did a study. A study using a test developed by their agricultural research service which is a division of the USDA. And this test is called Serum ORAC. Serum means blood and ORAC is an abbreviation that stands for Oxygen Radical Absorption Capacity. Or the capacity of any nutrient to potentially neutralize the harmful effects of an oxidative free radical or oxidative stress. So, when they did this study, what they did was they checked the blood of volunteers who were eating various fruits and vegetables and at various numbers of servings. I’ll explain servings in a couple of minutes.

And what they found was that, most people they tested were not getting adequate levels of antioxidants from fruits and vegetables. So, they made a standard and they said, we think everyone should have between 5 and 7 servings of fresh fruits and vegetables every day. This was 1995 now. And 5 to 7 servings every day, fresh. Not canned, not frozen, not packed in syrup but fresh. Every time they repeated this test, they found that the requirements had gone up. Now this is logical, because pollution continues to go up every year. So, the stress from pollution keeps going up. It makes perfect sense that a human being would need then more fuel to cope with that.

I’m going to use this analogy a couple of times. I’m talking about an automobile under stress. Now you know that if you drive your car on a level road, it will burn less fuel than if you drive your car uphill. Now think about it. So, for Americans let’s say if you’re driving 5 miles on a level road versus 5 miles uphill, you will use a lot more fuel driving uphill. For the same distance, 5 miles or for the world outside of the united states let’s put that into kilometers, okay. So, the point is the more stress the car is under, the more stress the engine is under. The more fuel it burns and the more wear and tear there is on the parts of the car.

You’re no different, no you’re not made of steel and rubber but you still have more stress. So, that means you require more fuel. So, as the pollution continues to increase, air and water pollution and even chemicals that are in various foods. Then our needs for those nutrients go up, the antioxidant nutrients goes up. This is an important thing; I want you to remember this as we proceed. Now that was 1995. In 2006, there was a study published in the journal of the American Dietetic Association. And in this study, they said that about 40% of Americans were consuming at least 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day. Only 40%, 60% were not.

By 2015, there was another study published and this said depending on sex and because men require more of various nutrients than females do almost across the board. So, it’s about age, it’s about gender and so on. So, depending on the test subject involved, you need anywhere between according to the 2015 report, anywhere between one and a half to two cups per day of fruit and two to three cups per day of vegetables. Now I know that the majority of people listening on the planet are on the metric system. There are still three countries in the world that are not and the United States is one of them. And a large portion of my listening audience is in the United States and so I have to do this both ways.

So, people they’ll say to me, so what’s a serving? Well, a serving is a cup, okay. Now a US cup is going to translate approximately to about 227 grams of solid material. Now in cooking in the US, there’s a standard 8-ounce cup and it’s meant for liquids, but we’re also using which of course would then translate to MLS for the rest of the world. But in this case, we’re talking about solid material fruits and vegetables placed in that same container. So, that’s going to translate to roughly 227 grams of solid material per serving. In 2017, another report came out and this was from the American Centers for Disease Control from their morbidity and mortality weekly report.

It said, only one out of every 10 American adults were getting the minimum recommendation of fruits and vegetables daily. So, see the trend here. The trend is showing us that as we progress in time people are eating less healthy diets each year. They’re getting less of the nutrition they need. While at the same time, the stress on their bodies from the environment alone just the environment just from air pollution and water pollution, and there are certainly other stresses today, okay. But just those stresses alone tell us that, that’s increasing while dietary choices are apparently decreasing in terms of good dietary choices. This is not a good scenario, is it?

So, what we’re up to right now is a recommendation of between 7 and 13 servings per day of fresh fruits and vegetables. Realistically my friends, I don’t know even if a dedicated vegan would eat that much fruit and vegetable per day. That would be very time consuming and boy, you’d have to have a really efficient digestive enzyme system to digest that much fruit and vegetable without feeling well pretty miserable and producing a lot of gas and so on. So, overall it’s not really a good scenario, is it? Then here’s a study that was published by someone named Mare. And she decided that she would check the content of 20 different fruits and vegetables and compare them for nutritional value between the 1930s and the 1980s.

She selected 20 fruits and vegetables from a published report from the united kingdom’s composition of food tables. And here’s pretty much what she said, I’m paraphrasing here but this is basically what she said. By the way, this was published in the British Food Journal in 1997. So, mayor said that as she compared these that there was a statistically significant reduction in the levels of Calcium, Magnesium, Copper, and Sodium in vegetables. And a statistically significant reduction of Iron and Copper in fruit. The only mineral that showed no significant difference over the 50-year period was Potassium.

Now there’s a reason for that, so stay with me. Another finding that Mare had was that the water content of the fruits and vegetables had increased over that 50-year period. Well, that’s primarily due to farming methods. Many people don’t know this but farmers have a really tough life, I mean really tough. First of all, farming today is a science. It’s not a question of well you go find some soil dig a hole and throw a seed in it and hope for the best. That’s not the way it works. The profit margin on farming is so small. That farmers have to become almost scientists and mathematicians and use all manner of high-tech equipment to make sure that they have a yield large enough just to stay in business.

Because countries like the United States and like Canada as an example, these two countries produce far more food than the population of the US or Canada could ever possibly eat. And they’re producing more food because if they don’t produce that level of food, many of these farmers simply can’t stay in business. So, that food is sold to other countries obviously and sometimes given to other countries. The point here is that farming is pretty close to a science these days. Now produce is sold by weight, isn’t it? And water is heavy. If you could change your farming methods where your fruits and vegetables had higher water content than previous years. They would be heavier and they’d sell for more. Because you sell by weight.

So, what Mare found was that there was in fact an increase in the water weight of various fruits and vegetables and a decrease in the amount of solid mass of those fruits and vegetables. This may be one of the reasons that we have a decrease in various nutrients that she found in her particular study. Now I want to point out, remember objectivity is the key to good science, I want to point this out. Her study needed to go a few steps further, but in virtually every study that I’ve ever known about including the ones I’ve been involved in you have a limitation of money and time. And you can only study certain things, you can’t possibly study everything in one study. It just can’t be done, and this is why you have yet another study in another study.

And it’s why at the end of almost every science paper you’ll see anywhere, it usually will have a statement that says something like more study is needed. No matter how good their data was. And in this case, I would say more study is needed because there could be other reasons that the mineral content of these 19 of the 20 fruits and vegetables that she checked. There could be other reasons that the mineral levels were down, okay. It didn’t necessarily have to be that it was simply about water. The water weight was changed obviously okay, so that’s a fact. But more study is needed to figure out what else may have been going on.

In the United States and I will use the US a lot because it’s simply easier to obtain statistics for the US in most areas not every area. There are some areas where statistics are better kept in as an example Sweden or Denmark or in some other countries like that. But generally overall, it’s easier for me to get a broader level of statistics related to this subject from the United States. And of course, all human beings do have the same basic biological requirements. So, back to the example. In the US, of course we’re told that the modern diet is fantastic. The American food supply is amazing, it’s wonderful never better.

Well, if that’s true and if Americans are making good food choices and if we add the fact that according to the council on responsible nutrition. They say that approximately 75% of all Americans take dietary supplements and about 73% of Canadians by the way take dietary supplements. Then you shouldn’t find too many people who aren’t getting enough Vitamin and mineral every day. In fact, if you were to put those things together, you would say well there’s probably nobody who’s not getting an adequate level of Vitamin and mineral every day. Well according to the US government the US Department of Agriculture, they tell us that more than 90% of Americans are getting less than adequate levels of at least one or more nutrients. And again, that depends on age and gender and so on.

But what this tells us is that despite the fact that there’s plenty of food to eat, despite the fact that government guidelines have been put up telling people the recommended way to eat. We still have 90% of the US population who are not getting adequate levels of Vitamins or minerals. More than 70% several different vitamins and minerals are missing and some of these are very key. As an example, close to 50% of Americans get inadequate levels of Magnesium. Now right away you say, oh that’s about Calcium right. Well, of course it is. It is about breaking down calcium so that you can utilize Calcium. But Magnesium has about 600 functions in the body not one.

So, it’s super important and having about 50% of the American population not getting sufficient Magnesium, this is a very big deal my friends when you’re talking about 600 functions roughly. Well, let’s take this another step. We’ve been talking about minerals, we’ve been talking about phytochemicals, antioxidants. Now let’s talk a little bit about Vitamins. Specifically, there was a study done by a couple of doctors Fletcher and Fairfield. And this is a blood study with human volunteers. Their research question was. Do people get sufficient vitamins? Now they’re only testing for vitamin nothing else, okay. Do people get sufficient vitamin by diet alone? What they found was that the vast majority do not.

In fact, the words, their words not mine from their study. Most people do not consume an optimal amount of all vitamins by diet alone. It appears prudent for all adults to take vitamin supplements. Wow, two medical doctors published in the journal of the American Medical Association. Does your doctor know this? Probably not. In the United States about 50% roughly of medical doctors are subscribing to the journal the American Medical Association are our members of the association. And even so doctors are human beings my friends. I mean give them a break, okay. Doesn’t every human being want to have personal time? Doesn’t every human being want to have time with their family their loved ones? Doesn’t every human being want to have some relaxation time or recreational time? Of course.

So, don’t expect that your doctor can magically read the millions of studies that exist right now let alone try and keep up with them as new one comes out. So, don’t be hard on your doctor if your doctor doesn’t know this information. Give them a break, okay. So, now we’ve talked about phytochemical antioxidants and we’ve talked about Vitamins and we’ve talked about minerals. This should be enough right there to help you make your choice. But I want to make sure that you have a clear idea of a couple of words that I’ve used. Adequate versus deficiency. And when you look at your labels and in every country it’s different. I wish it wasn’t makes me crazy. My own country the US, is just constantly changing this identifier if you will.

So, you may see the required daily allowance, you might see the required daily intake, you might see the daily value. You might see the minimum daily requirement, whatever it’s labeled in your country. And you look at this on a Vitamin product, okay. Now by the way Fletcher and Fairfield their recommendation was for people to take a multivitamin every day. Just so you know just to be clear and keeping with our theme of objectivity. They were not recommending anything more than that, simply that everyone take a daily multiple vitamin mineral product, okay. And I didn’t recommend anything particular because they’re scientists and scientists don’t recommend products. They just report their science, okay.

So, when you look at those labels and let’s say that the label says, required daily intake. All right. So, if it says this is 50% of the required daily intake what that means is. it has 50% of what is considered adequate to feed your body that nutrient for its functions for that day. That’s different than deficient okay, it’s a different definition. When we start talking about deficiencies, that can imply disease states of various types you know like Scurvy and Beriberi and so on, okay. And that’s not what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about adequate levels to maintain healthy levels of function of all of the factories in your factory complex. So, of all of your systems that’s the point, okay. So, that’s adequate versus deficient.

All right, so now that we’ve looked at just these categories of nutrition, and oh Gosh we could do so much more. But podcasts need to be limited to a certain length, so that people actually be able to listen to it in a reasonable period of time. So, then the question is. Do you eat a perfect diet? Its unlikely statistics show us that it’s very unlikely. In fact, statistics are showing us that about 90% of you do not, okay. Is your life stress free? Psychological stress causes you to need more nutrition. Did you know that? It does and this is why psychological stress can affect your health and your immune system. The more psychological stress you’re under, the less likely your immune system is able to respond to an immune challenge.

And it’s unlikely in the 21st century that you live a stress-free life, really unlikely. Stress vitamins by the way are considered the B Complex and C in general Vitamin C. so, B Complex in Vitamin C. It’s more complicated than that but that’s generally what we look at. And then you ask the question. Are you immune to the effects of pollution on planet earth in the 21st century? Well of course, you’re not. So, this means more antioxidant protection, more nutrition, more fuel for that car driving uphill. And there are many other stresses as well.

So, my friends the decision always from The Nugent Report will be yours. My job is to provide you with information which is scientifically accurate. So, that you can make the right decisions for your health. The choice is yours. And I truly enjoy, as I say this is a labor of love The Nugent Report. I want to help as many people on this planet as I can. You cannot make an informed decision unless you’ve been informed. So, that brings us to the end of this episode of The Nugent Report and I look forward to the next with you. In the meantime, be safe be sensible and stay objective.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent Report. Visit our website at ‘drnugent.com’ for more objective facts about health and nutrition. And email your questions and feedback to [email protected]. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram @TheNugentReport. Stay informed, get the facts with The Nugent Report.

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《纽金特报告》，阐述健康与营养背后的科学。欢迎收听本集《纽金特报告》，《纽金特报告》是有关健康和营养客观信息的权威来源。由著名心理学家、作家、公共演说家、科学、健康、保健和营养方面的专家史蒂夫ž纽金特博士主讲。我们的网站是“drnugent.com”，你可以在脸书（Facebook）、推特（Twitter）和Instagram @TheNugentReport上关注我们。

史蒂夫ž纽金特：朋友们好，欢迎收听新一集的《纽金特报告》。在本集《纽金特报告》中，我们将回答一个简单的问题，即在21世纪，膳食补充剂究竟是奢侈品还是必需品？有些人或许会对听到的内容感到非常吃惊；有些人可能只是再次简单地确认自己已经了解到的信息。但不管怎样，通过我通俗易懂的讲述，你将获得科学的信息，帮助自己决定是否应服用膳食补充剂保持身体健康。

当提到膳食补充剂时，我在指什么？补充剂是为了补充饮食中可能缺少的营养，其可能是片剂、胶囊、粉末或饮料等各种形式。你可以通过任何方式补充饮食中可能缺少的营养。不过，要注意膳食补充剂不是药品，服用膳食补充剂的目的不是为了治疗、治愈或改善疾病。你的身体有一套设计惊人的系统机制，几乎能应对你能想象出的所有自然事件。

身体之所以能做到这点，是由于营养为系统提供燃料。当然有时也会存在一些挑战，在某些情况下，人类无法应对某种外部威胁。在这种情况下，就需要服用药物或进行手术。要知道，医生接受过良好的培训，知道何时开药，何时建议进行特定的手术或检查。但医学院并没有教授医生如何成为临床使用膳食补充剂的专家。因此，不要错误地认为所有的医生都知道与健康相关的一切知识，事实上并非如此。

所以，我们今天要讲的是一些科学知识，也许医生完全不知道这些知识，不过这没有关系。因为我们是教育性质的播客。

言归正传，补充剂是为了补充饮食中可能缺少的营养。不过，所有的政府都会告诉你，如果你吃得对，就不会生病，也不需要补充额外营养，每个国家都会说本国的食物供应是最好的，同时也会说本国的营养是最好的。虽然这样，大多数政府或多或少都会限制有关膳食补充剂的讨论。要知道，你的身体才是关键。你的身体才是真正的奇迹。无论你是否知道，你的身体在我心目中是最神奇的设计。实际上，你的身体设计可以应对你能想象出的几乎所有自然发生的挑战。

身体是如何做到这一点的？其实，你体内有很多系统可以应对不同的挑战。当我说到这里的时候，大多数人肯定首先会想到自身的免疫系统。行，那我们就先来谈谈免疫系统。我希望你把自己的身体想象成一个大型工业中心，把这个工业中心想象成你的身体，在这个综合体里面有很多工厂。其中一个工厂就是你的免疫系统。举个例子，假如有一天你特别有钱了，你决定买一家汽车厂。

要想让这个汽车工厂运转起来，自然要有动力。如果你愿意的话，你必须要为工厂提供一定的材料和营养，像是钢铁、橡胶、塑料在内等各种材料 以及制造汽车所需的各种材料。如果缺少任何一种制造汽车的材料，你猜会怎么样？无论那家汽车厂有多好，都不能生产出一辆可以开动的汽车。对吗？想想你的免疫系统和你身体里面的其他工厂。你把腺体系统视为一个工厂。所有工厂都需要物资材料，在这种情况下，物资材料指来自各种食物的营养。

我们希望每个人都能正确地吃饭，摄取足够的营养，为体内的所有不同工厂提供必要的燃料。这样你就有能力迎接挑战， 因为你的身体本就可以迎接这些挑战。这就是整个构想。这个想法是理想的，对吧。然而在生活中，有多少事情是理想的？并不多。在21世纪，你如今所处的环境与人类历史上大部分时间中我们祖先曾面对的环境非常不同。其中一些情况是显而易见的，比如污染，今天的空气污染和水污染比世界历史上的任何时候都要严重。

科学家可以采集数千年前的冰芯样本。他们不仅能准确地确定这些样本形成的日期，还能从这些样本中了解到每个世纪以来的空气状况。我们可以肯定地告诉你，今天的污染远比有历史记录以来、甚至比史前时期的污染都要严重得多。你可能会问，空气污染有问题吗？当然有。空气污染会造成严重的氧化应激，你应该听说过自由基和其他相关的术语。氧化应激会损害身体细胞。

有些氧化分子甚至可以破坏人类DNA。这是破坏性很强的东西，从当今地球污染中发现的这些化学物质，其中大部分在1930年之前在地球上并不存在。从本质来说，这就是合成化学时代的开始。合成化学是相当惊人的，它真的非常惊人。当你看到合成化学家能够创造出的一些东西时，真是令人震惊。但也有一些合成化学物质对地球上的生命非常有害，不仅是对人类，对动物也是一样。而且这些化合物每年都在增加。

我们知道，根据美国国家环境保护局的数据，地球上有超过75000种合成化学物质在该机构注册。我之所以用他们举例，是因为与世界上其他任何联邦机构相比，在那里注册的化学物质更多。他们告诉我们，这10,000种化学物质其实仅仅是一个开始。我们从科学研究中了解到，有时新的化合物是一种意外的发现。真的，科学家们发现，当不同的合成化学物质在水中相互接触时，经常会制造出全新的、意料之外的化合物。

知道这一点之后，我们可以想象一下，从超过75000种化学物质开始随意组合，你根本不可能知道如今在这个星球上有多少化学物质。根本不可能！所以，这就存在应激，你最好认识到这一点。当你的氧化应激水平升高时，你的细胞就会受损，我喜欢把细胞受损比喻为生锈。在我看来，生锈可能是最好的描述方式。如果你看过金属上的锈迹并观察锈迹是如何把金属腐蚀的， 那就是金属上的氧化应激。我当然知道你不是金属做的。但是氧化应激对细胞的影响，与金属发生氧化应激或生锈时发生的反应极其相似。

要想有足够的营养来应对氧化应激，就需要一种叫做抗氧化剂的营养成份。抗氧化剂存在于各种五颜六色的水果和蔬菜中。你会注意到抗氧化的植物化学物质，植物化学物质这一名称来自古希腊语，意思是植物。所以，植物化学物质不是维生素、不是矿物质也不是氨基酸。它们属于自己单独的营养类别，植物化学物抗氧化剂。当然，还有维生素抗氧化剂，比如维生素A、维生素C、维生素E，植物化学物抗氧化剂是大多数人看到后却念不出来名称的东西。但这不是重点，读不出来也没关系。

你应该吃足量的水果和蔬菜，获得植物化学物抗氧化剂，帮助你对抗21世纪的氧化应激。早在1995年，美国农业部（或USDA）做了一项研究。这项研究使用的检测方法由农业研究服务部（美国农业部下属的一个部门）开发。这种检测方法叫做血清ORAC。血清表示血液，而ORAC是“氧自由基吸收能力”的缩写，代表任何营养素潜在中和氧化自由基或氧化应激造成有害影响的能力。当他们进行这项研究时，让志愿者吃不同份数的各种水果和蔬菜，然后检测这些志愿者的血液。我等下再来说明份数问题。

他们发现，接受检测的大多数人没有从水果和蔬菜中获得足够量的抗氧化剂。因此，他们制定了一个标准，认为我们每人每天应该吃 5 至 7 份新鲜水果和蔬菜 。这项研究是在1995年做的，而且是每天吃5到7份新鲜的、不是罐头的、不是冷冻的，更不是果酱制品，而是新鲜的水果和蔬菜。每次他们重复这个研究时，都会发现，需要摄入新鲜水果和蔬菜的份数有所增加。这一结论合乎逻辑，因为污染每年都在持续增加。污染带来的应激不断上升。人类需要更多的燃料来应对这个问题，这很合理。

我要用压力下的汽车来做个比喻。我之后可能还会多次用到这个比喻。各位都知道，如果汽车在平坦的道路上行驶，耗费的燃料比在上坡时少。现在仔细想想，对于美国人来说，在平坦的道路上行驶5英里与上坡行驶5英里相比，上坡时需要更多的燃料。同样的距离，5英里或者在美国以外的地方，我们把单位变成公里就可以。要强调的重点是，汽车承受的压力越大，发动机承受的压力就越大。这样一来就需要燃烧更多的燃料，汽车零部件的磨损也越厉害。

你们也不例外，当然，你不是钢铁和橡胶做的，但你还是要承受更多的压力。所以，这意味着你需要更多的燃料。随着污染的不断加剧，不仅是空气污染和水污染，甚至是各种食物中所含的化学物质。我们对这些营养素的需求就会增加，对抗氧化的营养素的需求也会增加。这一点很重要，我希望大家往下收听的时候要记住。那个研究是1995年进行的。而在2006年，美国饮食协会杂志发表了另一项研究。在这项研究中，研究人员发现只有约40％的美国人每天至少食用5份水果和蔬菜。只有40％，而60％的人没有。

到2015年，又有一项研究发表。这项研究声称对营养物质的需求根据性别而有所不同，因为男性对各种营养物质的需求量几乎全面超过女性。因此，对营养物质的需求与年龄、性别等都相关。所以，根据2015年的报告，按照所涉及的试验对象，你每天需要食用一杯半到两杯的水果加上两杯到三杯的蔬菜。我知道，世界上大多数听众用的是公制。还有三个国家没有，而美国就是其中之一。但我的听众有很大一部分在美国，所以我必须两者兼顾。

所以，人们会问我，一份是多少？其实，一份就是一杯。一个美式杯子能装大约等于227克的固体物质。目前在美国烹饪时，会用一个标准的8盎司杯专门测量液体， 但我们现在也在使用它测量固体，然后转换成毫升 以方便世界上其他地区的人。但在这种情况下，我们讨论的是将固体物质水果和蔬菜放置在同一个容器。按这样转换过来，每份食物大约是227克的固体物质。2017年，又有一份报告发表，这份报告源自美国疾病控制与预防中心发布的发病率和死亡率周报。

这份报告说，每10名美国成年人中，只有一人达到每天水果和蔬菜的最低推荐摄取量。大家注意到这其中的趋势了吧。这一趋势告诉我们，随着时间的推移，人们每年摄入的健康饮食在减少。他们越来越缺乏所需要的营养。与此同时，人们身体所承受的环境压力，仅算上来自空气污染和水污染的压力，当然还有其他的压力。但是单单这些压力就告诉我们，身体对营养的需求肯定在增加，但现实情况是健康的饮食选项正在减少。这不是一个好现象，对吧？

因此，我们目前的建议是每天吃7到13份的新鲜水果和蔬菜。实际上，朋友们，我不确定即使是一个纯粹的素食主义者，每天会不会吃这么多的水果和蔬菜。吃下这么多东西是非常耗时的，而且朋友，你的消化酶系统必须高效运转才能消化这么多的水果和蔬菜，否则你会感到相当痛苦并产生大量的气体。所以，总体来说，这并不是一个很好的方案，对吧？这里有一份名为梅尔（Mare）的人发表的研究。她决定检测20种不同水果和蔬菜中各成份的含量，并比较它们在20世纪30年代和80年代的营养价值。

她从已发表的英国食品成分表报告中选择了20种水果和蔬菜。她的意思差不多是这样，我在这里大致转述一下。顺便说一下，这篇报告是1997年发表在英国食品杂志上的。梅尔（Mare）提到，当她比较检测结果时，发现蔬菜中钙，镁，铜和钠的含量在统计学上显著降低，而水果中铁和铜的含量也在统计学上显著降低。在那50年期间唯一没有显著差异的矿物质是钾。

产生这样的结果这是有原因的，请大家听仔细了。梅尔（Mare）的另一个发现是，在那50年里，水果和蔬菜的含水量提高了。这主要是由于耕作方法的原因。很多人或许不知道，农民过着非常艰苦的生活，我的意思是农民真的很辛苦。首先，当今的农业是一门科学，不是你去找些土壤，挖个洞，扔个种子进去，然后就祈祷能够获得好收成的问题。这不是现代农业的工作方式。农业的利润空间非常小。农民几乎必须成为科学家和数学家，使用各种高科技设备才能确保他们获得足够的产量以继续经营下去。

以美国和加拿大这样的国家为例，这两个国家生产的食物远远超过了美国或加拿大人口能够消耗的食物总量。农民之所以生产更多的食物，是因为如果他们不生产这么多的食物，许多农民根本无法继续经营。所以，这些食物显然卖给了其他国家，有时还送给了其他国家。这里的重点是，现代农业几乎已经快要成为一门科学。现在的农产品是按重量出售的，对吧？而且水很重。如果能改变耕作方法，使水果和蔬菜的含水量比往年高。那它们就会更重，就会卖出更多价钱。因为买卖是按重量计算的。

梅尔（Mare）发现，实际上各种水果和蔬菜的水分含量增加了，而固体质量却减少了。在她的这个研究中，这可能是各种营养素减少的一个原因。我想指出的是，要记住客观性才是科学的关键，我想说，她的研究还需要继续深入。 但实际上，我知道的几乎每一个研究，包括那些我亲自参与的研究，都有时间和经费上的限制。而且你只能研究某些问题，不可能在一项研究中研究所有问题。这是不可能的，这就是为什么有一项研究又有另一项研究的原因。

这就是为什么几乎在每篇科学论文的结尾某处，通常会有一个声明，指出无论研究结果的数据有多好，都还需要进行更多的研究。在这种情况下，我想说，可能还有其他原因造成了梅尔（Mare）检测的20种水果和蔬菜种有19种的矿物质含量下降，这需要进行更多的研究。矿物质含量下降并不一定只是因为水分。没错，水分的含量确实有所增加，这是一个事实。但还需要更多的研究来弄清楚是不是还有什么其他的原因。

在美国，顺便解释下，我会经常引用美国的研究数据，因为基本上在大部分领域美国的统计数据比较容易获得。瑞典、丹麦或其他一些国家在有些领域的统计资料保存较好。但是一般来说，我比较容易从美国获得与这个主题相关的、更加广泛的统计数据。好了，言归正传，所有的人确实都有相同的基本生理要求。回到这个例子，在美国，我们当然会被告知现代饮食是非常棒的。美国的食物供应令人赞叹，再也没有比这更棒的了。

但是，如果这是事实，如果美国人真的选择了健康的食物，如果我们再考虑到另外一个事实，根据可靠营养品协会调查显示，大约有75％的美国人服用膳食补充剂，而大约73%的加拿大人服用膳食补充剂。那么你应该找不到太多的人每天没有得到足够的维生素和矿物质。如果你把这些信息结合，你会得出结论，可能绝大部分人每天都获取了足够的维生素和矿物质。而根据美国政府美国农业部的说法，超过90%的美国人至少一种或多种营养素的摄入水平不足。同样，这一结论因年龄和性别等因素而异。

所有这些信息告诉我们的是，尽管有很多食物可以吃，尽管政府已经制定了指导方针，告诉人们推荐的饮食方式，但仍然有90%的美国人没有摄入足够的维生素或矿物质。超过70%的人缺少数种不同的维生素和矿物质，而其中一些维生素和矿物非常重要。例如，接近50％的美国人镁的摄入量不足。或许你马上就会说，那与钙有关 对吧。对，当然有关。镁与分解钙有关，所以你可以吸收利用钙。但镁在体内有大约600种功能，而不仅仅是这一种功能。

这一问题真的非常重要，有大约50％的美国人没有摄入足够的镁，朋友们，镁可是具有大约600种功能，这一点不容小觑。现在，我们再来谈论另一个话题，我们刚才一直在讲矿物质、植物化学物质、抗氧化剂。现在让我们来谈谈维生素。具体来说，有一项研究是由两位医生弗莱彻（Fletcher）和费尔菲尔德（Fairfield）共同完成的。这是一项针对人类志愿者的血液研究。他们研究的问题是：人们是否摄入了足够的维生素？在这项研究中，他们只检测维生素，不检测其他的成分。人们仅通过饮食就能获得足够的维生素吗？他们发现，绝大多数人都没有。

实际上，这一结论来自他们的研究，而不是我说的。大多数人单靠饮食并不能摄入所有维生素的最适量。让所有的成年人都服用维生素补充剂是稳妥的做法。这两位医学博士的研究发表在美国医学协会杂志上。你的医生知道这些吗？可能不知道。在美国，粗略估计有50%的医生订阅了美国医学协会的杂志。即使如此，医生也是凡人，朋友们。我们不能奢望他们时刻都在努力工作，对吧。难道不是每个人都想拥有自己的时间吗？难道不是每个人都想有时间和亲人挚爱在一起吗？难道不是每个人都想娱乐放松一下吗？当然想。

所以，不要指望医生能神奇地全部读完现存的数百万份研究，更不用说紧跟当下趋势，在新的研究发表后，立刻有所了解。如果医生不知道这些信息，也不要责怪他们。放过他们，行吗？到目前为止，我们已经谈到了植物化学物抗氧化剂，谈到了维生素和矿物质。这些信息应该足以帮助你做出选择。但我想确保你对我使用的几个词有清晰的认识。足够或是缺乏。当你查看产品标签时，要注意标签在每个国家都是不同的。我希望那不会让我发疯。在我自己的国家，美国，如果你愿意的话。可以不断地改变这个标签。

因此，你可能会看到每日所需建议量、每日所需摄入量；你还可能会看到每日需要量。和每日最低需要量，各国产品标签上的说法可能有所不同，请各位留意维生素产品上的这类标签。弗莱彻（Fletcher）和费尔菲尔德（Fairfield）的建议是让人们每天服用多种维生素，仅此而已。由于他们必须保持研究的客观性，所以这两位医生并没有提出更详细的建议，只是让大家每天服用多种维生素矿物质产品。他们也没有特别推荐任何产品，因为他们是科学家，而科学家不推荐产品，他们只负责报告研究发现。

因此，当你看到那些标签后，让我们谈谈标签的含义，关于每日所需摄入量。如果标注每天所需摄入量的50％ 则意味着什么？如果这样标注表示它可以为你的身体提供当日所需足够营养的50%。记住，这与缺乏不同，二者的定义不同。当我们谈到缺乏时，则可能意味着各种类型的疾病状态 ，如坏血病（Scurvy）和脚气病（Beriberi）等等。我们指的不是这些。我们说的是要保持足够水平来维持体内所有系统的正常运作。注意，是所有系统中，这才是重点，好吗？因此，这就是足够与缺乏的区别。

好了，现在我们只关注这些类别的营养，其实我们还可以做得更多。但是播客需要限制在一定的时长内，让人们真正能够在合理的时间内听完。所以，总结一下，核心问题是：你的饮食完美吗？统计数字告诉我们，很有可能并不完美。事实上，统计数据显示，大约90%的人都没有达到这一要求。你的生活毫无压力吗？你知道吗，心理压力会导致你需要更多的营养。确实如此，这就是为什么心理压力会影响你的健康和免疫系统。你承受的心理压力越大，你的免疫系统就越不容易对免疫挑战做出响应。

在21世纪，你真的不太可能过着毫无压力的生活。顺便说下，一般认为复合维生素B和维生素C是可以抗应激的维生素。复合维生素B和维生素C。其作用机制比较复杂，但我们知道这些就够了。你或许有疑问，你对21世纪地球上的污染影响有免疫力吗？当然，你没有。所以，就像那辆开上坡的汽车，这意味着你需要更多的抗氧化保护、更多的营养、更多的燃料。同时我们还面临着许多其他方面的压力。

所以，朋友们，听完《纽金特报告》后决定权永远在你自己手中。我的工作是为你提供科学准确的信息。这样，你就可以为自己的健康做出正确决定。这是你自己的选择。 我真的很享受这一过程，正如我所说的，《纽金特报告》是一份充满爱的劳动成果。我想尽我所能帮助这个星球上的人，多多益善。只有清楚告知你之后，你才能做出明智决定。本集《纽金特报告》就到这里， 我期待着在下一集与你相会。 同时再次提醒各位，请记住要安全、理智、保持客观。

感谢收听本集《纽金特报告》。如需了解更多关于健康和营养的客观事实，请访问我们的网站’drnugent.com’。请将你的问题和反馈发送至我们的邮箱 [email protected]。请在脸书（Facebook）、推特（Twitter）和Instagram @TheNugentReport上关注我们。《纽金特报告》带给你最新信息，让你获取客观事实。

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Intro: The science behind health and nutrition.

Welcome to this episode of The Nugent Report. A definitive source for objective information on healthy nutrition, featuring Dr. Steve Nugent, the renowned psychologist, author, public speaker, an expert on science, health, wellness and nutrition. Be sure to visit our website at drnugent.com. And follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at The Nugent Report.

Dr. Steve: Hello, and welcome to the first episode of The Nugent Report. I’m Dr. Steve Nugent. The Nugent report is dedicated to presenting any information that relates to human health, science and the environment in a thoroughly documented objective way, versus opinions. To make the best decisions for your health, you need accurate, objective information. This first episode is designed to lay the foundation for what you can expect in future episodes, and to introduce you to terms and definitions that you may be unfamiliar with. All support these terms with some examples that should make sense to anyone regardless of their level of education. This first episode will be longer than the others because of the content necessary to establish the foundation of the report.

In this episode, I will also give you some insights into my personal history that even my lecture audiences from around the world have never heard. The Nugent Report will always be clear and easy for virtually everyone to understand, regardless of how complex the topic is. Typically, I will state the science and then translate it into plain language. So, don’t panic when you hear the science. Just stay with me, and you’ll understand it.

First, I’ll give you some brief examples of what to expect in future Nugent reports. Did you know that there’s about a 50% probability that you’re not getting adequate levels of magnesium? Did you know that many people in North America are consuming a diet that has too much calcium? Did you know that there are cases where vitamin D deficiency is actually caused by magnesium deficiency? Did you know that there are industrial chemicals that can affect not just your physical but also your psychological health?

Chances are, you’ve never heard this information and chances are you’re still getting the same tired old information that’s been printed and reprinted hundreds of thousands of times, without anyone bothering to check to see if anything has changed. All people have opinions, and I’m just as human as anyone else. But, scientific objectivity is the key to making the best possible decisions for your health, and the health of our planet. Fortunately, I’m not beholding to any company products or politics for this podcast. I’m an objectivist and that’s someone who thinks objectively. The Nugent report will always bring you the most objective, thoroughly documented information in health science and the environment. information that you can always trust, unbiased and accurate. The new GAO report is a labor of love. It started as a paper newsletter with Volume One, issue one back in 1994. At that time, I had an integrative medicine practice. I was the author of a desk reference for Applied Clinical Nutrition, which was used by many thousands of practitioners. I lectured to doctors of all disciplines on a monthly basis, and I had a co-authored a manual for understanding how to interpret blood chemistries for nutritional versus medical needs. I was an internationally respected expert in the field of integrative medicine, and the clinical use of dietary supplements. Doctors from 17 countries subscribed to that paper newsletter.

For more than a quarter of a century, I’ve lectured on Integrative Health to audiences on every continent, well, except Antarctica of course. I’m trained in many areas of science, but I will devote a great deal of time in future episodes to integrative medicine, dietary supplements, and diet. I’ve also written some books for public consumption, which are currently out of print. One of these, which is my favorite was titled. “How to Survive on a Toxic Planet.” That book written in 2004 was a little bit ahead of its time. It was a report really of how modern environmental toxins adversely affect human health. Writing that book got me a great deal of hate mail. Many conservatives hated the book, because they assumed I was a left wing sandal wearing anti American hippie, and those on the left were angry because they thought the book was not severe enough against industry. It takes courage, perseverance, and a pretty thick skin to be an objectivist.

In future episodes of the Nugent report, I’ll report on the effects of environmental toxins on both human and animal health. I know that the vast majority of people do not think objectively, and I will probably have equal levels of hatred from both sides of the aisle. Because objectivity is not an extreme, and most people are only comfortable if you are 100% in agreement with their belief system.

After retiring from practice, and beginning a new phase of my career, I stopped publishing the Nugent Report. That was about 25 years ago, I’ve been wanting to disseminate purely objective information about health science and the environment for many years and finally, the time has come. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been trained in many areas of science, so this podcast will not be one dimensional. Before I go too much further, I probably should fully define objectivity, and what it means to be an objectivist. In the sciences, graduate students and doctoral candidates have to take classes in objectivity, whether it is specifically called that in the title or not. Students have to be taught the difference between information which is objective, and that which is not. I’ve spent a great deal of time and universities and shared classrooms with a great number of students. What I’ve seen as a consistent struggle among even the smartest of students is trying to be objective in their presentations, some never succeeded.

My observation is that humans are genetically programmed to arrive at decisions as quickly as possible. And in most cases, that means without knowing all the facts. During this episode, I’ll give you an example of how that genetic programming may have come to be. As an expert in human behavior, I can tell you clearly that the majority of people prefer extremes and clean, quick, simple answers to questions. Thought requires energy and time and unanswered questions can be stressful, and delay a person from carrying out their essential or perhaps their enjoyable activities. So in this episode, I will define and discuss some ideas that some people may be unfamiliar with. And these include absolutism, objectivity, realism, versus optimism or pessimism, and some of the thoughts. Some of you will be very surprised with what you’re about to learn.

Here are some examples. Few people care what the most average building in the world is. But if you say to someone, would you like to know which building is the tallest, or which is the smallest in the world, you may command their attention. Average typically isn’t very interesting to most people. Average is in the middle of the spectrum. Keep the idea of extremes in mind, I’ll come back to it.

There are certain behaviors in humans and animals, which are innate versus learned. Another way to describe an ape behavior is instinctive behavior. Researchers in the field of psychology believe and of course, they argue about the percentages, but they believe that much of human behavior is genetically influenced. And some say that it’s even genetically programmed. Clearly, some behaviors are genetically influenced. Every time I say that there are people who are troubled by it, because they’re reading something into it that I didn’t state. Genetic behaviors are quite a subject and I’ll deal with that in a different podcast. Because researchers cannot take humans and isolate them for their entire lifetime to study them. Because human lifetimes are so long, animal studies have been done to obtain more information about the question of innate survival behaviors.

Experiments with animals have shown that behaviors which improve survival of the species are passed on from parents to offspring. These are innate or genetic behaviors. Understanding this, here’s my theory of how our early ancestors may have been genetically programmed to default to absolute is thinking, which leads of course to prejudice. Imagine that you are back in time many eons ago, a member of a hunter gatherer tribe. Your tribe meets a new tribe for the very first time. Each of these tribes was unaware that the other tribe existed. A mix of emotions races through your head, your adrenaline surges. One tribe has always lived on the shoreline of an inland freshwater sea, supporting themselves primarily with sea life, and adorning themselves with necklaces made of beautiful seashells. We’ll call those people the shore people. The shore people have always had an abundance of food from the sea. They have rarely had to struggle to survive and rarely encountered predatory animals. Violence was rarely necessary, and therefore rarely seen. Experiencing a constant moderate temperature and a dependable gentle breeze. They were only loincloths.

The second hunter gatherer tribe has always followed the herds across the vast plains of the interior. We’ll call them the land people. The land people adorn themselves with skins of animals they have killed, and were necklaces made of the teeth of ferocious carnivores. They are well armed and all too familiar with violence, because they’ve always had to be in a struggle for survival. There are tough and rugged group who’ve had a long history of violent encounters with other interior tribes fighting for the same food supplies. They’ve learned over generations to be wary and to react with violence quickly if their tribe or their food sources are threatened. As the two tribes look at each other for the first time, they must assess if this new group of humans is possibly a threat. The assessment is done visually, without having time to learn the facts about the other tribe.

The two tribes look very different. Each group has maintained its specific genetics. So one group has fair skin, hair and eyes and the other group has dark skin, hair and eyes. The leaders of each group attempt to speak to each other, but their languages are completely different. And the communications fails. The land people appear fierce and muscular, with weapons at the ready. While the shore people appear gentle, friendly, and even curious. They look different. They sound different. They dress differently. The two tribes are in complete shock when they meet each other for the first time. They must make a quick decision. Is this new group of humans a threat or might it be possible to make friends with them and trade. Should one tribe run from the other or should one tribe attack the other quickly to ensure the survival of their own tribe. Whatever decision they make, they need to make that decision quickly without hesitation because their survival may depend on it.

Both tribes are going to have to prejudge the other tribe without knowing the facts. This is the root of prejudice.

In our world today, many people don’t even understand what the word prejudice means. If you prejudge someone based on their appearance, without knowing the facts, this is prejudice. This is almost certainly the way it would have gone the first time, two very different peoples encountered the other. Unfortunately, human history shows all too often, these initial encounters resulted in violence. The unknown often causes fear and fear will initiate either a fight or flight response. In almost all cases. Encounters with the unknown can cause a person to prejudge before knowing all the facts or to be prejudice towards a person that is different than they are. I believe that prejudice has its roots in early survival mechanisms of our distant ancestors, and has been imprinted into our genetic memories, like many other mechanisms that we refer to as innate.

Even the friendliest, gentlest, and most caring of people will still prejudge individuals based on their appearance. In most of the civilized world today, people with different appearances who meet on the street know that they’ll be safe from violence. This allows people to have friendly encounters and learn about each other, as well as from each other. Prejudging human beings based on appearance or other immutable characteristics is subjective.

Subjectivity is opinion based on the information which is available or psychological influences from others, which is biased, and if that information is not accurate, then the conclusion will not be accurate. As they say in the computer world, garbage in, garbage out.

Objectivity allows you to gather information without bias, analyze information without bias and report information without bias. Objectivity is so rare in daily life, that it is foreign to the majority of the population. Here’s another personal example that I experienced when being called for jury duty. I live in Dallas County, Texas, USA. It was my time to serve on a jury in that county. As is always the case 36 prospective jurors were assembled in a courtroom and then interviewed by the attorney for the plaintiff, as well as the attorney for the defense. The final outcome, of course, is to select that jury of 12. This particular case was an injury accident case, then the attorney for the plaintiff was looking for jurors that he could sway with emotional arguments about his clients, pain and emotional suffering. This is a strategy which is certainly not unusual in cases like this.

There’s no way to objectively quantify pain and emotional suffering, it will quite literally be different for each individual. So swaying a jury of 12 will require some strong emotional arguments.

The attorney for the plaintiff started going around the room, asking each perspective jury to define the word objectivity. To my astonishment, I was the only person in the room who could correctly define the word. Many of the prospective jurors had absolutely no idea what the word meant, literally, as though they had never even heard the word before. When it came to my turn, I said, objectivity is being able to gather information without bias or favoritism, and then use that unbiased information to draw an unbiased conclusion. The attorney paused for a moment, stunned, I think, and he said, “Doctor, I wonder if you could give me an example.”

I was standing up at the time, and I pointed to the wooden bench that I had been sitting on, and which is common in courtrooms all over the US. Then I said, and objective analysis of this bench is that it is a bench made of wood, designed for people to sit on. A subjective analysis of this bench might say that it’s a beautiful bench, a comfortable bench, a wonderful bench, or something to that effect. But anything other than saying the bench is made of wood, and designed for people to sit on would be subjective, a matter of opinion. Well, guess what?

Objectivity got me excused from jury duty. He didn’t want someone like me on that jury of 12. Hopefully, now the difference between objectivity and subjectivity makes sense to you.

I want to give you some examples as it relates to media because this will make sense in future episodes of the Nugent report on various subjects that sometimes will be controversial. So, I want to take you back to my media days. Many years ago, I did a radio talk show on what was then an ABC owned station in Detroit, Michigan. Well to be precise, it was in Southfield, Michigan. But, most people won’t know where Southfield is. The station call letters were WXYZ. And it was one of America’s first radio stations, first going on the air in October of 1925, when it was owned by CBS Radio, and then in 1946, it was purchased by ABC Radio, who still owned it when I worked there. WXYZ was famous for creating and broadcasting some of the most popular radio series of the early days of radio, including the Lone Ranger, the Green Hornet, and the Challenge of The Yukon. I had the great honor and privilege of doing the sign off broadcast for that historic radio station. When the Federal Communications Commission decided that the TV networks owned too many radio stations, and that that was pushing the envelope on monopolies. Each network had to decide which radio stations they were going to sell, and WXYZ, and Detroit was one of the victims in that cut. When I worked for W XYZ, the day of radio drama, of course, had been long gone. At that time, when I worked there, it was political talk radio.

Yes, I did a political talk show on a station that had many conservative hosts, one only one liberal host. Then there was me.

After that, I did an ask the doctor show for seven years on a different radio station, and also a morning TV show. But, that’s really not pertinent to our conversation about objectivity. Because the default setting for human thought appears to be absolutism. I had my audiences constantly confused by being objective. My station manager advised me that if I went 100%, to the right, that my ratings would go through the roof. Well, I’m sure he was right. But, I chose accuracy and objectivity over ideology. I’m an objectivist, not an ideologue. If you observe the most highly rated shows on TV or radio, you’ll find that those shows are completely biased either to the right or the left of the political spectrum. As an expert in human behavior, I can tell you, it’s perfectly normal for human beings to want to tune into a host, who says what they want to hear, and who agrees with their personal philosophies. This reinforces their beliefs, and makes them feel better about themselves. In an objective sense, this is neither good nor bad. It’s simply normal human behavior.

My radio show was live with live call ins, you know, the format, I’m sure you’ve listened to them before. I had to work very hard to make sure that the information I presented to my listeners was objective. Objectively gathered, objectively analyzed, and objectively reported. If as an example, I reported an objective fact, which favored someone on the left side of the political spectrum. Then my callers who were on the right, would phone in immediately, reacting emotionally. They call me up pinko and lefty and communist, and all manner of other names. Because they were reacting emotionally they weren’t thinking about what I was saying. But, this was the same when I presented information, which was accurate and positive about someone on the right. Then people on the left would call up, and they would be angry. They would tell me I was a Nazi. I was a fascist I was a racist. Because they were reacting emotionally, they were not thinking objectively.

Well, you have to remember that this was the time of the Cold War, and the biggest threat to world peace, perhaps world survival was the communist Soviet Union and their arsenal of nuclear weapons. Well, thank to this, that’s passed. But the point is, back then we had a very polarized group, either on the left or the right. Sounds kind of familiar. Not too different from what we’re experiencing today. But, for other reasons.

I found it fascinating that month after month, the vast majority of my listeners who tuned in loyally on the left and on the right, never understood that I was simply a objectively reporting was neither a Nazi nor of communist, simply an objectivist. But, if I said things that a person didn’t want to hear, it would evoke an emotional response, rather than an intellectual response. This, again, is normal behavior. It’s not good or bad. It’s just normal behavior. I have to say that some days were pretty tough for me. And when I did public appearances, often for charity fundraising, I had people on the left and the right that hated me equally, assuming that I was their enemy, because I was not 100% biased in one direction, or the other. Human behavior is fascinating.

My show was indeed quite lively. I never had a shortage of callers, who had strong opinions about what I had to say in the previous segment. Perhaps that’s why my audiences were so loyal, because they were excited and entertained by the political combat on both sides that seemed to never end. The greatest example of subjectivity today, is from individuals claiming to be journalists. Objectivity is the foundation of both science and journalism. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of people in journalism today either never learned objectivity when they studied journalism, they forgotten the principles of objectivity, or they deliberately choose to be biased in their reporting. Reporting that is not objective is by definition, not journalism. The danger in this, of course, is that the public makes their decisions based on the information that’s available to them. If that information is flawed and inaccurate, then their conclusions will also be flawed and inaccurate. Remember, garbage in, garbage out.

The state of your health is the key to the quality of your life. So, you need to have trusted, accurate information on which to base your health decisions. It’s a major point of frustration for me that the majority of health, and particularly nutrition information that I see posted on the internet is biased and inaccurate. The Nugent Report offers you a trusted alternative.

With every fiber of my being, I hope that the majority of my listeners will understand that if I say something they’ve never heard before, or something that their personal gurus disagree with, this is not about opinion, but rather pure objective fact. Once again, just to be clear, if there is anything that I report, which currently has insufficient data to draw an objective conclusion, I will report clearly that this is the case. At no time, will I attempt to sway my listeners, to my private views. All scientists and journalists have their own opinions, beliefs, we all do. But a person calling themselves a scientist or a journalist who does not analyze and report objectively, simply is someone else with another opinion, and they’re doing a great disservice to their professions.

Realistically speaking, and I am a realist, the best rated TV shows and podcasts are the ones that are the most biased. Interestingly, however, the majority of people surveyed, don’t seem to know that their favorite shows are biased. Fascinating. Another topic of discussion for a different podcast.

There are a few rare exceptions but very rare. Here’s one more example to explain objectivity versus subjectivity in the modern world. There are many TV networks especially now with cable making-almost anyone can start a TV network on cable if they have the basic resources. But, there are six networks, which are the most viewed in the United States, listed in alphabetical order not in order of importance or preference. There are three free air original networks. They are ABC, CBS, and NBC.

Each of these three of course have their own so called news divisions, and I use the word news lightly. I hesitate these days to use the word journalism in conjunction with those organizations. When it comes to journalism, there’s only one standard and that is objectivity. Once again, by definition, if it’s not objective, it’s not journalism, its opinion. Besides the three original free air networks, there are three cable networks which are most watched and once again in alphabetical order, not in order of importance or preference. There is CNN, FNC, and MSNBC.

Back in my radio days, I gathered information from both sides of the political spectrum every day, because I never wanted to be the guy on the radio who didn’t know the answer. I worked really hard at this. Understanding that TV ratings vary literally vary by the hour. I’m going to talk to you about current averages at the time of this podcast, which may be different. If you listen to this podcast on a different day obviously. There is an average that’s done by the day by the week by the month in terms of ratings. So you can get yourself confused with these in cable news at this time, and I use the term news lightly once again. The number one rated news opinion host most weeks is a man named Sean Hannity on FNC or the Fox News Channel. He’s constantly saying that he is fair and balanced. But it’s clear that his broadcast is highly biased to the right. Objectively speaking, he does not claim to be a journalist, but rather a news opinion host. That is clearly to his credit. There are, however, other hosts on TV today who claim to be journalists, but are simply opinion hosts pushing their personal agendas. That misrepresentation annoys me greatly.

In Hannity’s defense, I think he sincerely believes that he is fair and balanced, I really do. It would only be accurate to say that he presents arguments from the right side of the political spectrum, which then offers balance against the other five networks, which are clearly biased to the left side of the spectrum. As an expert in human behavior, I do not detect any malice or secret agendas in his broadcasts. He is sincere. He sincerely believes that position. He’s honestly representing what he believes to be true.

I support the dissemination of information on both sides of any argument, because that’s how you work towards an objective analysis and finally, an objective conclusion. I support anyone’s right to express their views, as long as there is no potential harm from those views.

The number three rated show in cable news most weeks is with a host named Rachel Maddow, and she’s on MSNBC. To be fair, I haven’t watched every show she’s ever aired. But, every time I have watched her show, she’s been entirely biased to the left. And I’m sure most of our viewers don’t know that. The viewers are strong and loyal for both Hannity and Maddow. Because those viewers are tuning in to reinforce what they want to hear not to hear a fair and balanced presentation. There is a ray of hope for me I’ll ever as an objectivist. That’s the number two rated cable news opinion show host almost every night of the week. This is a man named Tucker Carlson. Carlson is trained and experienced as a journalist. He understands objectivity, obviously. But, as a news opinion, host it’s his job to give his opinion and to entertain enough to keep up the ratings. His job as a host is not to report the news objectively. That would be his job if he were acting purely as a journalist. I was trained in broadcast journalism more than 40 years ago. And yes, for the absolute is listening right now, it is possible to have expertise in more than one field. Here’s a rare case where I will give my opinion. In my opinion, Carlson is an expert writer.

Most news opinion show hosts begin their programs with a monologue of the various hosts. I’ve watched it on the various networks. I typically but will emphasize not always find Carlson’s monologues to be the best written of the three hosts mentioned. I’ve also read many books from people on the left and the right. What I found after reading a book written by Carlson, which is called, Ship of Fools, his writing in that book was, in my opinion, excellent. Well, now you’re getting some opinion. But in most of the new Joe report going forward, it’s going to be pretty cold, hard, objective facts.

Now saying what I’ve just said, is neither an endorsement, nor a condemnation, of any of the content of any of the programs have the three hosts mentioned. I’m simply giving my opinion about Carlson, as a writer. Carlson makes it clear that he hosts a news opinion show, he’s not acting as a journalist and making that disclaimer is to his great credit. Perhaps Maddow also makes that disclaimer, that she’s an opinion show host and not acting as a journalist. But, if she does, I haven’t seen it yet on the programs of hers that I’ve watched. Not making the distinction between opinion host and journalist could lead some viewers to draw a conclusion that everything presented is objective, and is an irrefutable fact. That’s what you would expect from a true journalist.

Realistically, it’s unlikely that most people understand the distinction or even hear the comments. But, at least for me, making the disclaimer is important.

It seems Carlson has a mixed audience of conservatives, liberals and independent as I once did on my radio show. His is a political opinion show, as I’ve stated, and it’s important that his viewers know where he comes from on the political spectrum. If he was presenting as a journalist, on the other hand, it would be essential to maintain his objectivity, and for no viewer to ever be able to detect what his opinions or views were. He makes no secret that he’s a conservative. So, he’s fully transparent in that respect. But, he’s not the stereotypical conservative as he rather consistently disappoints hardcore right wing conservatives by saying things that sound to them to be well, too liberal. This is most likely the reason that Carlson keeps coming in at number two, rather consistently, because he’s not doing his broadcast as an absolutist.

Unlike the programs I’ve viewed by Hannity and Maddow, Carlson frequently interviews guests with whom he disagrees, and he actually allows them to speak, which is very uncharacteristic of opinion show host. Carlson’s approach is not unlike the way I conducted my radio show years ago. On the Fox News Channel, they have one host lead into the next show without a commercial break. And I’ve seen on more than one occasion that Sean Hannity, who’s clearly conservative, and follows Tucker’s program was actually speechless, after hearing something that Carlson had said. Not expecting any deviation from conservative ideology, from someone who is declared as a conservative. Sometimes, that gives me a chuckle from an otherwise long and stressful day. Personally, I don’t have a lot of time or desire to watch a great deal of television. I find most of it to be a waste of precious minutes of my life that can never be reclaimed.

The definition of value becomes much more serious to you as you age and that is, the less you have of something, the more valuable it becomes. As I age, the minutes of my life become far too valuable to be wasted on nonsense. I simply have too much left to accomplish. This is also the main reason that as a public speaker, I no longer engage in circular arguments with the audience. They are pointless and a waste of time. However, as I mentioned previously, I try to watch some alleged news information broadcasts by people biased on the left as well as those biased on the right and I try and budget the time to watch Carlson as often as I can. I confess, because of my workload, I don’t meet this goal for any of the shows I mentioned, on a regular basis. So, objectively speaking, I do not have complete data to draw conclusions regarding these three hosts that I’ve mentioned. Thank goodness for DVRs. Because I’m typically hard at work while the shows are on at night. My typical work day is 16 to 18 hours, sometimes longer, seven days a week. And no, for those of you who are absolutist, I’m not a workaholic. I am however, mission driven. I have things to accomplish with the years I have left. This does not allow for me to waste time.

So why do I do all this? Why do I care about getting information from all sides? Why don’t I just tune into the things that make me feel good personally, like most people do?

If something affects my life, and especially the life of my community, or even the world community, it’s important to know what each side of the political spectrum is attempting to convince you of each day. Otherwise, your opinion will be inaccurate. I spent time on this because when I do my podcasts and blogs about environmental issues, particularly, I will be attacked strongly by people on both sides of the political spectrum. Just as I was when I wrote my book, How To Survive On A Toxic Planet. The people who have fanatical views on the left and the right, will probably hate me about equally, because my reporting will be objective, and not 100% bias to either end of the spectrum, for the absolutist This is in comprehensible and intolerable.

So, when someone asked me if I’m a liberal or a conservative, my response is, I’m an objectivist, for an objectivist and I must emphasize that we are extremely rare. A cold hard fact, is neither a good thing nor a bad thing. It’s simply a fact. A fact is emotion and bias free.

However, people with bias often twist facts or use facts out of context to support their agendas. This is what I work against.

If you’re one of the millions of Star Trek fans, you might be familiar with a character from the original series, often referred to as classic Star Trek, called Mr. Spock. He represented a race called Vulcans, and they were devoted to pure logic. They worked hard to ensure that they didn’t experience or express emotion. Even though according to the storyline, they had to work very hard to suppress their emotions, which were in fact more intense than those common to humans. If everyone conducted themselves objectively, like the mythical volkens, prejudice, hate, violence, war, dishonesty, virtually every other negative emotion that you can conjure up would cease to exist. We would live on a clean, safe and healthy planet. Unfortunately, Star Trek isn’t real and neither are volkens. Star Trek fans, please don’t send me hate mail.

Life is short, all too short.

I believe life must have purpose. I want to make a difference in the lives of other human beings while I’m here. Everything else to me is secondary. If I can teach even a small number of people to think of objectively, they may be able to do the same with a small number, who eventually will make a difference with a much larger number. In terms of health, it is crucial that your health decisions are based on solid, objective data, because without good health, you will either struggle through life, or potentially shorten your life.

Finally, we need to talk briefly about realism, optimism and pessimism. This probably could make a good blog or podcast by itself.

The majority of people think that there are only two kinds of people. Once again, go into my example of extremes.

People think there are optimists and there are pessimists. What they miss is the middle of the spectrum and those are people called realists. In my time as an expert on human behavior, I’ve encountered many people who appear to be either intellectually or psychologically incapable of being anything other than optimists or pessimists.

I’m not speaking to those people in this podcast as much as I am to the person who has the ability to change to better their own lives and the lives of others through realistic thought. Optimists think that realists are pessimists and pessimists think that realists are optimists. Did you follow that? To the optimist, everything will eventually turn up just fine. Everything’s always going to be all right. To the pessimist, well, they believe that everything will eventually go bad no matter what you do. The realist, however, is in the middle. The realist knows that sometimes things will go well, and sometimes they won’t. That’s reality.

The overwhelming majority of human beings tend to be basically optimistic. And realists are pretty darn rare.

Let’s give a classic example and this will be our last example in this podcast of the glass of water. Is it half full or is it half empty?

Well, everyone knows about this. You’ve all seen the example before. But, I’m going to present this to you a little bit differently this time, from a realistic point of view. All right, you know how this goes, you take an ordinary eight ounce kitchen glass, you pour water to about the four ounce mark, and then put the glass in front of an optimist, a realist and a pessimist. They didn’t see you pour the water in, you did that in a different room. So, they don’t know if the glass was originally full, and someone drank half of it or if it was empty, and you filled it half up with four ounces. Even though the crucial information is missing, the optimist will still think in absolute terms, and will say that the glass is half-full. The pessimist even though that person does not have the crucial information, will also think in absolute terms and say, “no, the glass is half-empty.”

Well, the realist has an entirely different point of view. The realist sees this objectively. You see, the glass is neither half-full nor half empty to say that is an opinion. It’s subjective, and it’s not provable. Well, the realist looks at it and says this is simple. You have an eight ounce glass that contains four ounces of fluid, that’s objective, that’s realistic, no opinion, no bias. And it is provable. It is an eight ounce glass that has four ounces of water, you can prove it objectively.

So, this is a great example of how objectivity and realism blend together. Objectivism is not about passing judgment. So to me, if you’re the person who says the glass is half full, or the person who says the glass is half empty, each of you are equally important to me. Objectivism is the opposite of judgment. We don’t pass judgment. So, you’re both important. I want to help both of you. Just understand that my approach in the Nugent report will always be objective, and realistic. There’s a lot of people I know that will listen to my podcast, they’ll read my blogs, and I will never ever be able to convince them to think objectively. I know this, that’s simply a fact that just the way it’s going to be. But, some of you will learn and some of you will improve your lives, and therefore you will affect the lives of others objectively. And remember that Vulcan Mr. Spock, if there is no subjectivity. You avoid things like prejudice and hate and you come to objective conclusions that give you accurate information. That’s what the Nugent report is all about.

Sorry, this one was as long as it was, the others will be shorter. I hope that you will want to listen to the Nugent Report episodes and read our blogs on the Nugent Report website because this information is for you, to help you, to help your health and to help our environment.

Thanks for listening. I’m Dr. Steve Nugent. Be safe, be sensible and be objective.

Outro: Thanks for listening to this episode of The Nugent report. Visit our website at drnugent.com for more objective facts about health and nutrition and email your questions and feedback to [email protected] Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram at the Nugent Report. Stay informed. Get the facts with the Nugent Reports.