For nearly two million years, humans ate one way, more or less. Then, in the blink of an eye—at least from an evolutionary standpoint—we changed everything. We went from hunting and gathering to farming. Then, just as our bodies were still adjusting to that, we changed again. In the last 100 years, in a blink of an eye, for our bodies, we industrialized food, refining it, stripping it of nutrients, and mass-producing it for efficiency and profit.

We assume that because we perceive 10,000 years as a long time, our bodies must have fully adapted. But biology doesn’t work that way.

Slow Body, Fast World

Evolution is a slow process. While individual humans can cope with new diets in the short term to survive, real genetic adaptation takes far longer—tens or even hundreds of thousands of years. Our bodies are still wired for the world we left behind, not the one we created.

We see this principle clearly in the wild. When an animal’s natural food source disappears, it doesn’t just “adapt” overnight—it often dies out. The idea that humans can fundamentally change their diet in just a few thousand years (let alone a few decades) without consequences is naive.

Yet, modern society acts as if food is just another technology—something we can improve, manipulate, and mass-produce without side effects. But our rising rates of obesity, diabetes, and metabolic disorders suggest otherwise. We’ve pushed the limits of what our biology was built for, and now we’re paying the price.

Hunting was unpredictable. One bad season, and people would starve. Farming changed that to a degree. It allowed us to settle, build cities, and sustain larger populations. The problem? Our diet shifted from one based on nutrient-dense animal foods to one dominated by grains—high in carbohydrates but low in essential vitamins, minerals, and proteins.

Early agricultural societies actually show signs of declining health compared to their hunter-gatherer ancestors. Skeletons from farming communities were shorter, had more signs of malnutrition, and showed weaker bones. Teeth, once largely free of decay, suddenly showed cavities and enamel erosion. Farming may have been practical, but it wasn’t an upgrade for human health.

Farming and Oil

If you zoom out, this shift wasn’t just about food. It’s the same story that played out when we discovered oil.

For most of history, the human population remained relatively low, limited by energy—just like all other animals. We could only expand as far as our resources allowed. Then, suddenly, we learned how to refine crude oil into gasoline. Transportation exploded. Industry boomed. And the global population skyrocketed.

Farming did the same thing. It wasn’t just a way to feed people—it was a way to grow civilization itself. Without grain, we wouldn’t have cities, empires, or the billions of people alive today. But just like oil, it came with hidden costs.

Burning oil transformed the planet, pumping carbon into the atmosphere and reshaping the environment. Farming transformed human health, shifting our diet toward foods our bodies weren’t designed for and creating the chronic diseases we battle today. Both were revolutions that allowed us to expand far beyond our natural limits. But at what price?

Profit or Nutrition

Fast forward to today, and the situation has only worsened. Industrial farming isn’t about health—it’s about maximizing yield. High-yield wheat strains were developed to grow faster and resist pests, not to be more nutritious. Synthetic fertilizers replaced natural soil health. And processing techniques stripped whole grains down into refined white flour—removing fiber, vitamins, and minerals in the process.

At no point in this chain of decisions did anyone stop to ask, Is this actually good for human health? That was never the goal. The goal was to feed as many people as cheaply as possible, then find ways to make that food more profitable.

Despite all of this, we still cling to an outdated, romanticized vision of food. We picture golden wheat fields, fresh-baked bread, and wholesome farm traditions. But those images belong to marketing, not reality.

The wheat we eat today isn’t the wheat people ate even 100 years ago. The cows on the milk carton aren’t living in green pastures. The ingredients we think of as simple and traditional have been engineered, processed, and stripped down into products designed for shelf life and efficiency—not for human health.

Our bodies were never consulted in this process. And now, the evidence is piling up. Our ancient biology and modern diet are at odds, and it shows in the way we feel, the way we gain weight, and the way our health declines.

Survive or Thrive

The human body is an incredible machine. You can shovel just about anything into your pie hole—fast food, refined grains, chemical additives—and your body will do its best to keep you going. It will adapt, compensate, and fight to survive.

But survival isn’t the same as thriving. You can feed your body junk for years, and it will hold on—until one day, it won’t. Disease, chronic fatigue, weight gain, and inflammation are all warning signs that the body’s ability to “just deal with it” is breaking down.

If you want to feel great—not just not yet sick, but truly alive—you have to stop asking what’s good enough to keep you running and start asking what’s optimal. That means looking back, beyond industrial food, beyond agriculture itself, to the way the human body was designed to function.

Conclusion

The real issue isn’t wheat. It’s the assumption that our bodies can keep pace with the way we manipulate food.

We didn’t just change what we eat—we changed how we produce it, refine it, and consume it. But our biology doesn’t evolve on human time. It doesn’t care that farming was more practical or that industrial food was more profitable.

You can run on cheap fuel for a while, but sooner or later, the engine pays the price. If you want to thrive, you have to go back to what your body was built for.

We’re living in a food system designed for scale, not for health. And our bodies are still waiting for us to catch up.