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The problem of nutrition and human evolution
Last reviewed: 08.07.2025
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The idea of constructing ideal food and making nutrition ideal, feeding all the hungry, preventing numerous diseases and ultimately changing human nature seemed extremely attractive. Indeed, in the distant past, one of the greatest revolutions took place, namely the transition from hunting and gathering to tillage and cattle breeding, and then to industrial production of food products. It was assumed that the creation of artificial food would allow the restoration of the ecology, and the problem of critical and non-critical natural situations for crops, etc. would disappear.
However, now that the 21st century is upon us, we cannot say that we are much closer to solving the problem that Berthelot and many others formulated at the beginning of the century. Moreover, although technology and chemistry are ready to implement the program for producing ideal food, it can be said with certainty that the solution to this problem will not be achieved either in the present century or in the foreseeable future, for very important reasons of a biological rather than chemical or technological nature.
Thus, in the course of the supposed evolution, man, not associated with heavy work, is transformed into a kind of purely thinking organism. It is clear that the nutrition of such a person must change radically, as a result of which he will not be able to chew food, and as a result of the shortening and weakening of the functions of the gastrointestinal tract, his organism will assimilate only pre-digested food substances. If human evolution were to proceed along such a path, then the intravenous administration of substances or elemental nutrition, so brilliantly anticipated and characterized by Anatole France, would be obligatory in the more or less distant future. However, the question arises: do we expect such an evolution and ideal nutrition? The answer to this question today will be different from yesterday. For a correct understanding and analysis of the problem of ideal food and ideal nutrition, we will allow ourselves to once again consider some provisions of the theories of balanced and adequate nutrition and trophology.