Just as vitamin C deficiency causes scurvy, nutrient deficiency in the brain may be causing of a host of mental problems from depression to aggression.
New research calls into question the very basis of criminal justice and the notion of culpability.
It suggests that individuals may not always be responsible for their aggression.
Violent behavior may be attributable at least in part to nutritional deficiencies.
A UK prison trial at Aylesbury jail showed that when young men there were fed multivitamins, minerals and essential fatty acids, the number of violent offences they committed in the prison fell by 37%.
Although no one is suggesting that poor diet alone can account for complex social problems, the former chief inspector of prisons Lord Ramsbotham says that he is now “absolutely convinced that there is a direct link between diet and antisocial behaviour, both that bad diet causes bad behaviour and that good diet prevents it.”
The Dutch government is currently conducting a large trial to see if nutritional supplements have the same effect on its prison population.
In a US study, results are simply what you might predict if you understand the biochemistry of the brain and the biophysics of the brain cell membrane — industrialised diets may be changing the very architecture and functioning of the brain.
Research commander Joseph Hibbeln at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, which is part of NIH, asserts, “We are suffering from widespread diseases of deficiency.”
Story, with naysayers, at the Guardian