Can a raw vegan diet supply all a person's dietary needs? Of course, that is the diet you were designed to eat! The design of entire digestive system supports a raw, plant based diet, from the teeth and the salivary glands, all the way through to the exit. We were intended to live in paradise, with a perfect climate, pristine, clean, pure environment, water and air. Living in a corrupted environment and living off of factory produced, chemically altered foods is contradictory to the original design.

Why should heated and chemically altered foods be avoided? The value as a food is destroyed. At best the food is "neutral," neither supplying anything beneficial nor contributing anything un-beneficial, but that is rare. At worst, the food is a toxic poison. Usually, the end result of heating or altering is an "at worst" situation. Any time heat is applied to anything - not just fats, but carbohydrates and proteins, minerals, vitamins, and enzymes as well - the food value is destroyed. A change occurs in which the body can no longer recognize the molecular configuration of the food. Think of it this way, if a wooden log is burned in a fire, the outcome is charcoal, not a tree. The body recognizes the "tree," the original, not the "charcoal," the end result of heat exposure.

Fats are mutated by heat, proteins coagulated, carbohydrates caramelized, natural fibers broken down, and vitamins and minerals destroyed by heat. Application of heat causes molecular activity to increase, and molecules crash into each other at high speed, creating bonds between formerly un-associated compounds. If a calcium molecule has been bound to a protein molecule due to heat, for example, neither the calcium nor the protein may be utilized properly by the body. The chemical bond between them prevents the individual nutrients from being recognized. Perceived as a foreign invader, the unrecognizable chemical compound will be treated as such by the body&Mac226;s defense mechanisms. No cooked food is benign. Cooked foods act malignantly by exhausting your bodily energies, inhibiting your healing, and decreasing your alertness, efficiency and productivity.

Another common method of the destruction of food value is tampering with the molecular structure of a food, chemically altering the natural molecular configuration. The result could be the creation of bonds between elements which previously did not exist, as in the heating example above, and the outcome would be the same "at worst" scenario. Or, chemically tampering with foods could break molecular bonds which should remain intact. Certain chemicals need to be found together in order for the body to utilize them properly. An example of this fact can be found on Storm&Mac226;s site, in which he lists the contents of an apple. Enumerable nutrients are contained within a single, naturally occurring piece of fruit, or any other natural food. Isolating any one of them, and placing the isolated substance into our bodies, even in the form of a vitamin supplement is, in fact, a drug, not a nutrient. Our body's perceive the substance as a stimulant and act accordingly.

Consuming chemically altered, commercially produced foods is akin to consuming plastic; the body neither understands nor believes the product to be food. Both cooking and tampering (altering foods) render the product unrecognizable to the human frame. The body reacts the same as you would to a stranger, by going to full alert, and revving up the body&Mac226;s defenses. Often within seconds of consuming a suspect food, the pulse begins to race, and the fight or flight mechanisms of the sympathetic nervous system kick in. The body is undergoing stress, trying to assess how much danger it is in, by the presence of this foreigner. The immune system is activated as well, because this foreign substance may be a real threat to the health and well being of the body. Consider how serious a dilemma most American&Mac226;s are in, when all day, every day, their immune systems and sympathetic nervous systems are in a state of high vigilance from eating cooked or factory produced foods. To your body, this is the equivalent of living in a war zone! The same combat stress, the same psychological trauma, the same war-weary exhaustion applies. No wonder some people feel so run down and traumatized; they are!