Human illnesses can be understood as damage to those adaptations that we took on at various stages in our evolution from pre-life molecules to modern Homo sapiens. Preventing these illnesses entails avoiding what causes the damageвЂ“вЂ“ which too frequently are the everyday hazards of twenty-first-century life, as the chart below shows:                  Level of Evolution            Cause of adaptive failure            resulting disease or problem                  Pre-life            Environmental  poisons            Certain birth defects                  Single cell (bacteria and amoeba-like)            Viral infection            Colds/flu/HIV                  Morula (sponge-like)            Cellular stress            Cancer                  Chordate            Physical stress            Back pain                  Fish            Excess dietary salt            Hypertension/heart disease                  Amphibian            Tobacco smoke            Lung cancer/emphysema                  Lower primate            Excess dietary sugar            Diabetes mellitus                  Higher primate            Vitamin C deficiency            Scurvy                  Ape            Excess dietary protein            Gout                  Homo sapiens            Reduced dietary variety            Nutritionaldiseases/food allergies

Evolving Health: The Origins of Illness and How the Modern World is Making Us Sick PDF

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