I'm hip to it, I've tried and tried to find some reputable science to back up the claim that phytic acid is as detrimental as the WAPF people make it out to be. The only anti-phytic acid sources I find are mercola, WAPF, and their ilk, and the actual science I find shows that the amounts present in the average plant-based diet aren't a concern, some studies even suggest they may be beneficial.
Sorry if the original post seemed cocky with the wording that I used, reading it now at this point I can see how it could have totally come off that way. I don't think that was my original intention, but I guess by now its hard to say. Phytic acid is a known antioxidant and definately has health benefits! I think that is an important piece that gets left out of the general WAP discussion. After doing a ton more research on these issues as part of a class I've been taking, well just finished taking I should say, I think that is really does vary tremendously with our individual physiological differences in terms of what our individual nutrient requirements for each nutrient and how much of different enzymes our bodies make, specifically phytase. I haven't seen any study on variation of phytase production specifically, but it may be out there. Individual variation in enzyme production is widely accepted enough in the naturopathic community that this is a satisfying way for me to look at it.
I do have to admit that I have a hard time with the phrase "actual science" because I feel like that gets thrown around in discussions as a way of pulling rank in order to throw out the entirety of someone's idea rather than constructively addressing the specifics. I'm not saying that this is necessarily what has happened here, just wanting to point out that that is definately a trigger for me in discussions. Studies and experiments of necessity have to be highly specific and from there require interpretation and adaptation to have any meaning in the context of real life so of course there are differences in interpretations and lots of room for potential "misinterpretations" (although again I think this is a matter of opinion too.) I feel like thats what we're looking at here with the different "sides" of this issue rather than "real" vs. "junk" science.
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