20. Questions & Answers

How many cells are in the body? Does anyone really know?

It's generally agreed that a mature adult possesses cells somewhere in the 100 trillion range. Some medical texts proclaim as few as 75 trillion and others as many as 125 trillion. No one can, of course, really say.

Why do cleansed bodies need less sleep than toxic bodies. Isn't eight hours of sleep the norm for everyone?

Perhaps I can begin an answer by citing an illustrative example. Lions normally sleep 18 to 20 hours daily. Their dietary consists of almost all flesh, bones and other animal parts which contain many toxic substances. On the other hand cattle sleep only two to four hours daily. Their diet is grass which has almost no toxic substances whatsoever.
In humans we find those who eat meat, cooked foods and condiments, and who habitually overeat, often requiring from seven to ten hours of sleep daily. And they're often sluggish at that, a condition often labelled hypoglycemic. Those who live on fruitarian and vegetarian fare sleep one to three hours less and are usually much more vital and active. People who are fasting usually sleep about two or three hours less than those who are eating.
Sleep is a condition under which the brain regenerates nerve energy for the body's needs. It appears obvious that a toxic body requires more nerve energy than a body relatively free of toxin. The more work the body must do, the more nerve energy is required. Sleep varies in length with the amount of nerve energy that must be generated and also by the ratio of efficiency with which nerve energy is generated during sleep.

I've heard of the body having a biological clock and I am familiar with circadian rhythms. This is the first I've heard of certain body processes being conducted more intensely at certain times of the day. Why should anyone become hungry in the morning if the body is in an eliminative phase?

Hunger in the morning is not natural. The body has been marshalling its resources during a night of rest. Liver and cells are charged with some 2,000 calories of glycogen for the following day's consumption and hunger is not likely to occur until the brain's appestat notes a considerable depletion of blood nutrients.
Most people have never experienced natural hunger in their lives. Eating in the morning after a night's rest and sleep when the body has ushered in a heavy eliminative phase that is incompatible with hunger reminds me of a smoker's need for a fix immediately upon arising. When the body is toxic because of habits such as coffee, tobacco, condiments, cooked foods, animal products and so on, a prolonged absence of ingestion gives the body more opportunity to begin the unpleasant task of housecleaning.
When the body begins the eliminative phase, feelings are those of lethargy, headache and dullness. These are but a few of the symptoms of pronounced elimination. Those who toxify their bodies with alcohol call eliminative symptoms a hangover. Those who toxify their bodies with opium, heroin and other drugs call eliminative struggles withdrawal symptoms. But the symptoms are not much different for coffee drinkers, cigarette smokers, condiment eaters, cooked food eaters, overeaters and so on. When the body has a heavy toxic load and it has entered the eliminative phase the symptoms are unpleasant.
Rather than hunger being experienced in the morning, the urges to eat are morbid just as are the smoker's urge to smoke, the coffee drinker's urge to drink and so on. When the "fix" is again indulged, the body must divert its energies from extraordinary elimination to the task in hand of processing the new incoming load of food or drug. When its energies are thus diverted the unpleasant symptoms experienced while elimination was heavy cease. This, incidentally, explains the nature of addictions—new fixes are desired to palliate the pathogenic effects of old fixes.
Hunger does not naturally occur in the morning except in rare cases.

You've said the body can recycle about 70% of its protein wastes. How does this happen?

When cells disintegrate from the action of lysosomes upon their death, the debris floats in the lymph. The lymph is the media of supply and drainage for the cells. Other cells may remove proteinacious debris from the lymph by the processes of phagocytosis or pinocytosis if the amino acid supply is otherwise insufficient. The cells then break down the proteins into their amino acid constituents in a special little vesicle or stomach they have created for the process. Then the amino acids are diffused into the cells for use just as if they been absorbed as amino acids from the intercellular fluids in the first place.
The kidneys play a role in eliminating protein wastes normally, but, if there is a protein shortage, it will recover protein wastes and recycle them into the blood for reuse. The liver prepares wastes for excretion, also. It is involved in innumerable body chemical processes. However, protein recovery is primarily a cell activity rather than that of kidneys and liver.

I fasted for my first time last weekend for two days. I got a horrible headache and a terrible taste in my mouth. I become so weak for the last day I could hardly get around. Is this the usual thing? My bowels didn't move. Is it possible I absorbed some poisons from there?

What you experienced were the symptoms of extraordinary body elimination. Should you have fasted to repletion, your tongue would have cleared up. In fact, your headaches would have soon ceased. The fact that you experienced such marked symptoms is some indication of the amount of filth you're carrying around in your body and of the great need for a much longer fast. In two days the body has eliminated relatively little of its accumulated toxins in a first time faster.
In some Hygienists who fast the tongue may not become coated at all. Their breath may not become strong. Nor do they experience headaches, lassitude, lethargy, weakness nor any other symptoms of elimination. This condition throughout a fast means the tissues, cells, organs and fluids are not polluted. Most Americans, even those who are Hygienists, will have a coated tongue within 24 hours after their last meal, indicating accumulated morbid matters within.
Your bowels are a one-way street out of the body. The colon's skin and walls are developed to hold back all normal wastes and toxic materials that body and bacterial flora generate. Only water and electrolytes are withdrawn by the body through the colon walls and nothing else.

Why do you advocate a low-fiber diet? For years now the importance of a high-fiber diet has been publicized.

I do not advocate a high-fiber or a low-fiber diet. I advocate a diet of our best foods regardless of their fiber content. It seems those who advocate a high-fiber diet are persuaded that the objectives of eating is for the purpose of defecating. We are not defecating machines. We eat for purposes of nourishment. Waste materials will be excreted by the bowels, however much or little. The body is excellently equipped to deal with fermentative waste whether they be in the bowels 24 hours or 24 days. Those who overeat on proteins or eat them in incompatible combinations have a putrefactive colonic environment. While the bowel walls are still proof against the entry of toxins into the body, some terrible diseases can result from a chronic putrefactive state of the colon. Colitis, bowel cancer, hemorrhoids and numerous other destructive diseases can result.

If we can't have condiments, what should ft we use to make our salads tasty? I love a little vinegar and oil on my salad.

The fact that you find salads not very tasty in an unadorned state indicates that you're not an herbivore. Of course salads of green leaves are extraordinarily nutritious except in caloric values. Many of us do cultivate a taste for salad greens. I consider an occasional salad worthwhile, for they contain far more nutrients than do fruits, pound for pound. It's not that fruits do not furnish enough nutrients—it's that many of us eat salads to be satisfied we're getting enough of the variety of nutrient factors we need.
In a vinegar and oil addition you're stimulating your taste buds, not enhancing the taste of the salad. You can get better condiment effects with wholesome foods such as tomatoes. They will give you an acid flavor tastier and more wholesome than vinegar. Avocados or ground nuts as an oil will prove extremely pleasing. You can make a meal of this kind of salad.
Vinegar is indigestible and will retard digestion of other foods considerably. Fragmented oils require a long time for digestion in the first place, whereas salad ingredients normally are digested and passed on within two hours. Free fatty acids from salad oils coat other foods and retard their digestion, also.
Avocados, nuts and tomatoes, on the other hand, are compatible with green salads though they do slow up digestion somewhat.
Many fruitarians thrive in good health and eat few vegetables.