Excession by Iain M. Banks

🤎🤎🤎🤎🤎 Top of the tops. My favourite Culture book so far but it isn't perfect. Excession is not about the Excession, a mysterious object which randomly appears in our space and which seems to have come from another universe (or reality). Excession is about what happens to the Culture's Minds and outside species once the strange object is discovered. The Minds' behaviour and rationale are super interesting to see and at points reminded me of human politics. Humans are not the protagonists, although there is a story line with humans, which didn't make much sense to me at the end. A great read regardless. 

 Recommend.

The Salt Fix. Why the Experts Got it All Wrong and How Eating More Might Save Your Life by James DiNicolantonio

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 

An excellent and extremely important read. For anyone who believes that salt causes high blood pressure, this book offers insight into why that may not be the case. 

What I learned: 

Salt cravings are our body telling us it needs more salt to remain in homeostasis. Those signals are instinctual drives, an evolutionary fact which aims to keep us in an optimal state. 

Our body has the capacity to automatically control the levels of salt and water it needs at all times by eating, reabsorbing and excreting it. 

Evolutionarily speaking, we came from the sea. Even when we left the sea and moved to the land we took part of that sea with us. This is why we have kidneys and salt cravings. “We evolved on a high-salt diet.” Our body needs normal levels of salt to work. 

All those claims about salt causing hypertension are not true. These claims were created either by people with bad intentions or the accumulation of misunderstandings of bad quality scientific studies, or both. (Read about Lewis K Dahl, George Meneely, Harold Battarbee and John D. Swales). 

There is another product which can be blamed for all the illnesses salt has been wrongly accused of causing. Data shows how during the first half of the 20th century hypertension chronic disease levels raised but salt consumption decreased following guidelines based on the mentioned claims. (Also with the invention of the fridge, salt was no longer used to preserve food.) Data also shows that at the same time sugar intake considerably increased. Think. 

Normally, people (who follow their body signals) would consume 3 to 4 grams of sodium per day. This is also true for animals. 

Low levels of sodium (90% of salt is sodium) in our diet and body will cause water going from the blood into our cells to increase the levels of sodium in blood. This generates cellular swelling. High levels of sodium would cause cellular shrinkage. Swelling and shrinkage are harmful. This is why the body has mechanisms to keep our sodium levels normal in the blood.

Sweat contains seven to eighty times more sodium than tap water, so when we sweat, it’s important to rehydrate with both water and electrolytes. Lowering salt content in packaged/ultraprocessed food requires the addition of preservatives. 

This is a list of harms low salt consumption causes: 

Increased heart rate – reduction of blood and oxygen circulation - risk of heart attack. 

Compromised kidney function. 

Hypothyroidism. 

Higher triglyceride, cholesterol, insulin levels. 

Insulin resistance, obesity, type 2 diabetes. 

Blood volume goes down 10-10% - low blood volume. 

Dehydration. 

Contributes to hypertension. 

Sensitises our brains for an excessive reward from refined sugar and drug abuse. 

Anxiety, hypochondriasis, invalidism. 

Decreased fertility. Iodine deficiency. 

Reduced energy and increased fatigue. 

 Recommend - if you are a health conscious person... or not.