A Beneficial Biological Contradiction - Vegetarians and Pheromone Supplementation

Pheromone Science Pheromone Theory & Molecules
1

True, I’m a noob, but I believe I did the appropriate post/thread searches and reading up before starting this thread. . .

Check it out. . . I’ll try to be concise. Also, please be aware that these are “back of the envelope” thoughts/observations and please don’t assume that what I propose is “ready for press” simply because I snagged some citations. . . Critical discussion I encourage.

So, vegetarian and vegan diets are low in cholesterol. “While cholesterol averages perhaps 50 mg/kg total lipid in plants, it can be as high as 5 g/kg (or more) in animals.” (Behrman and Gopalan, 2005) Animal hormones, like testosterone are produced from cholesterol. There is some research that support the view that high-protein animal diets induce greater testosterone production in animals than high-protein vegetarian diets (Raben et al. 1992, David Driscoll) and more testosterone-like physique (i.e. low fat body composition) (Campbell et al. 1999)

Also, as MHarris pointed out in an earlier thread, vegetarian diets are often high in phytoestrogens, plant analogs of animal estrogens that have a different chemical structure, but bond to animal estrogen receptors. Thus the combo of lower testosterone and higher estrogen receptor activation by phytoestrogen consumption might lead to behavioral and physical changes mentioned in the MHarris (Beer “fat tires” ect.) thread by a few users. To reiterate, high phytoestrogen consuming men are likely to be friendly, less aggressive (peaceful) with bellies (your standard Chinese Buddha character, heh heh).

In a study of castrated goats (they don’t make any testosterone without their gonads), testosterone addition was shown to markedly increase pheromone production. (Iwata et al. 2000) While this is evidence, not proof that testosterone is related to pheromone production in humans, it totally makes sense.

I recognize that other factors besides pheromones are bigger factors in social success, but I am thinking in the sense of an entire population and how this factor can shift the game.

A personal aside, as a vegan and biochemist I think about whether the plant I’m consuming is high or low phytoestrogen and try to go easy on soy and high fructose corn syrup among other things. Other legumes (Fabiaceae, ie beans) and certain high protein grains (quinoa) with lower phytoestrogens provide plenty of protein in my diet. I also get a ton of exercise, ya know carbon in/carbon out, you can’t store as fat the carbon you just respired. :slight_smile:

Getting to my point. . . I like the way being vegan makes me feel, both physically and mentally. I feel extremely happy to the point of irritating those haters, but attracting other stoked people and am blessed with many friends, both male and female. It is unlikely I will bald and people usually guess my age at 20-24 (I am 28). It is hard to be sure of the interaction of genetics and diet in the individual case but I less hairy and generally aged than my ominivorous friends of the same age.

In contrast, I recognize the evolutionary benefits of high testosterone and the resulting aggressiveness. For instance, supposedly Ghenghis Khans genes have been dispersed widely throughout the human population. Beyond the biological imperative, I believe high testosterone steak-eating dudes have the advantage of high pheromones effecting all the aspects of human interaction discussed extensively on Pherotalk.

I recognize that the combination of a low internal testosterone and high pheromones is an unnatural biological contradiction. However, I am super excited that topical pheromones might level the playing field for some peaceful vegetarians that deserve to chose equal opportunity for career advancement and mate selection. In my daily life I find that often vegetarians and vegans have crappy attitudes, whether “holier than thou” or just hyper-critical. For me it is a personal choice and if people see it working for me they can make the choice on their own without me telling them what to think. I always attributed the common failure of vegetarians and vegans to advance their social standing to their attitude, but after sorting through the incredible amount of data on Pherotalk and elsewhere on the web on the effect of pheromones over the past day brought on this epiphany.

The reason I’ve gone to so much trouble to write this out is that I believe that pheromone use by vegetarians and vegans could really have a huge impact on how society views these dietary choices. The stigma that exists towards vegetarians and vegans may have a basis in pheromone physiology. If people that make this lifestyle choice are subconciously percieved as weak and followers it doesn’t make it an appealing behavior to emulate, no? Maybe if a significant number of vegetarians/vegans were supplementing their scent with pheromones that alpha-male/female signal might change how people feel about these people and in effect, this dietary choice.

To summarize my thoughts:

Basically . . .
Meat/Dairy–>higher Cholesterol–>higher Testosterone–>higher natural Pheromones–> opportunity for social success.

Whereas relatively . ..
Plants–>lower cholesterol/higher phytoestrogens–>lower Testosterone–>lower natural Pheromones–>lower opportunity for social success.

I am proposing a hybrid alternative. . .
Plants –>lower cholesterol/higher phytoestrogens–>lower Testosterone –>lower natural Pheromones + Pheromone supplementation–> elevated opportunity for social success.

I would be very interested in feedback from those with experience in pheromone use, especially some of you vegetarians/vegans. I will certainly report my experiences in detail after I get my first batch.

Thanks for reading!

Cheers,
Jonathan

References:
Campbell WW, Barton ML Jr, Cyr-Campbell D, Davey SL, Beard JL, Parise G, Evans WJ (1999). Effects of an omnivorous diet compared with a lactoovovegetarian diet on resistance-training-induced changes in body composition and skeletal muscle in older men. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 70, 1032-1039

David Driscoll: TESTOSTERONE MUSCLE | Unapologetic Muscle-Building Elitists

E. J. Behrman and V. Gopalan (2005) Cholesterol and plants J. Chem. Educ. in press.
E. Iwata, Y. Wakabayashi, Y. Kakuma, T. Kikusui, Y. Takeuchi, and ** Y. Mori (2000) Testosterone-Dependent Primer Pheromone Production in the Sebaceous Gland of Male Goat **

Raben A, Kiens B, Richter EA, Rasmussen LB, Svenstrup B, Micic S, Bennett P (1992). Serum sex hormones and endurance performance after a lacto-ovovegetarian and a mixed diet. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise 24, 1290-1297

Wearing ammo as a standalone: indifference instead of the ammo/IS social vibe
2

I’m not a vegan, but I think it is a pretty huge leap to assume that vegan/vegetarian males have low testosterone just because this has been shown in a few studies with animals.

Dietary cholesterol has little effect on lowering serum cholesterol in people with high cholesterol, and our bodies can make cholesterol from dietary fats. It seems to me that most research indicated that the amount of cholesterol a person makes is largely determined by genetics and BMI.

Have you had your cholesterol tested? If it is not abnormally low, then I don’t see how an absence of dietary cholesterol could be causing low testosterone.

Also, perhaps you should focus on getting plenty of dietary fat, including omega-3 fatty acids.

3

Thanks for the input. I found this:

“For every additional 100mg of cholesterol consumed up to a total intake of 500mg per day, there is a 2-3% increase in the concentration of plasma cholesterol. In contrast further increases in cholesterol intake beyond 500mg per day have little additional effect on the plasma level (Hopkins AJCN 1992; 55: 1060-70)”

If this is true, then people that have high cholesterol due to excessive cholesterol consumption above 500mg per day would have little benefit from lower intake unless they seriously cut back below this limit. For a person with nearly zero cholesterol intake, according to the study above, plasma cholesterol could be decreased by as much as 15% (so 85% of the plasma cholesterol of an individual eating the 500mg per day diet).

I think it is a good point that our bodies can make cholesterol, something I realized and thought about. Also, I would bet that even a plasma cholesterol level of 85% of someone else is plenty of cholesterol to make enough testosterone and subsequently, pheromones. So you could be absolutely right.

It is curious that a number of other studies have shown, in humans, lower testosterone has been indicated in high-protein vegetarian diets compared to high-protein meat-rich diets. Maybe this has more to do with the testosterone still in the meat and/or the effects of phytoestrogens in the vegetarian diet?

So even if the cholesterol link is not valid, vegetarians may still produce lower pheromones. Is there a way to test a person’s pheromone level? This would also be helpful in determining proper dosage without going all the way to the OD ghost-out level experimentally.

Thanks again for the input.

4

Yes, I agree that phytoestrogens are the big wild card. I try not to eat too much soy and I’m female. So, in these studies, was the fat content held contsant also?

If it wasn’t, that opens up alot more hypotheses about what could account for the differences. Fats are the building blocks of cholesterol and many hormones. So eating less fat could have cause the lower testosterone level. Moreover, if the veggies ate the same amount of protein as the omni’s but less fat, that means they ate more carb also. More carb = more insulin response = any number of cascading consequences that could vary greatly from person to person.

I would guess this isn’t feasible yet. It’s probably easier to just empirically determine the amount of pheromone products that work for you by starting with a lower amount and working your way up?

Why are you vegan (besides that it makes you feel better)? You could eat a few eggs per week, or some butter, and avoid these worries.

5

Great points. I would suspect that the vegetarian diet in the studies is also lower in saturated fats and higher in carbs than the compared high-protein meat diet. It probably is easiest to determine your individual pheromone level by titrating up, but the IOIs ect seem kind of subjective. If I was really studying this I think it would be best to send some sweat down a GC-mass spectrophotometer, using pheromone standards for quantitation.

Most people that eat a vegan diet do so to alleviate poor treatment of farm animals. However, with the consumer options we have now like free range eggs and organic beef I think this is less my concern now than in the past. The primary reason I started the experiment of eating only plants was that I was curious how efficiently I could provide for my dietary needs. The energy in the food, whether plant or animal, originates from the sun. However, in the conversion from plant to animal, about 90% of that energy is lost. So it takes about 10 times more acreage of incident light to provide the same energy in a chicken nugget than peanut. Also, there is a lot of petroleum based energy used at every additional step too. Of course, this is not a perfect argument, such as in the case when non-arable land is used to farm animals. . . So at the time I started the experiment I was thinking, “wow, could it be true that we can really get everything we need from plants alone. . . I guess there is only one way to find out.” The experiment has been generally very successful and is ongoing. Eating eggs would be fine, but then I couldn’t use my health or long life as proof that the experiment was successful. As for butter, because I haven’t eaten dairy in so long I don’t express lactase enzymes anyomore and am lactose intolerant.

6

Wow! The more I look into it the more I think the theory I proposed is total bullshit. After speculating for a couple days, I think I’m ready to do the experiment on myself and put the googling to rest!

In rats fed diets with variable amounts of soy, up to 10-fold a high human adult soy isoflavone equivalent, soy isoflavones were shown to increase blood serum testosterone. The** super high soy die**t caused the levels to increase up to 3ng per ml of blood serum up from 0.4ng. They reported 500-600% increases in testosterone.

I wish I had access to the whole article so I could look at it more critically.

Apparently a male my age should have testosterone levels around 270–1,080 pg/microliter (9.00–37.48 nmol/L). I usually try not to eat a crazy amount of soy, but I think the only way to settle the debate in my own mind is to eat a ridiculous amount of soy for a couple months and then get my own testosterone blood serum tested. Without a baseline test it won’t tell me how high soy intake has changed my testosterone level, but it will tell me if my levels are, like the rats, excessively higher or lower than average.

7

Sorry to keep replying to myself, but I keep feeling inclined to correct myself as delve deeper. . .

Apparently, sex hormone binding globin (SHBG) bind testosterone and makes it inactive compared to free testosterone in the blood. The bound testosterone is inactive, so the effects of testosterone on a person are dependent on both testosterone level and SHBG level. According to the study below, estrogen (and I would presume phytoestrogens) increase the level of SHBG. Maybe that is why the rats in the study above were making so much testosterone, as a positive feedback loop to compensate for high levels of SHBG?

How all this relates to levels of pheromone production is hard to guess. . . this is why I love biology, it is so complicated and enigmatic, the molecular workings almost incomprehensibly complex of our finely tuned machines. . .

So many times the more we know, we realize the less we know. Sadly, the free testosterone elisa kit I want for testing the effects of high soy intake, beer, copulins ect. is about $450. So I’m going to just have to let this curiousity rest until more conclusive research has been done. . .

Source: American Journal of Epidemiology (144:642-44, 1996) American Journal of Epidemiology (144:642-44, 1996), American Journal of Epidemiology (144:642-44, 1996),

8

If you’re looking at SHBG then I assume you’re looking at doing a blood test, not a spit test, correct? A proper androgen profile should include things like DHT (dehydrotestosterone) and, as you mention, SHBG. I don’t think those things can be found in a spit test.

9

This topic is extremely interesting to me. I realize this topic is over three years old (not sure if the above poster knew that) but I think many of the points brought up by OP are still valid.

For instance, it is fairly well documented that all- or nearly all- plant diets are high in phytoestrogens, which translates to high levels of estrogen compounds, and low in fats and cholesterol, which is essential to producing steroid hormones such as testosterone. By contrast, carnivorous diets are usually high or comparatively high in fats and cholesterol, and therefore have an ‘easier’ time producing steroid hormones.

However, OP is right in saying that SHBG is essential to steroid hormone production as well, or more precisely, essential to regulating steroid hormone production. Steroid hormones are fat-soluble (lipids) and are found in two states, either bound to SHBG or free in the blood stream. Only when a hormone molecule is free can it penetrate a cell wall and activate a hormone receptor; SHBG regulates hormone levels by binding to a larger or smaller amount of testosterone (et al) as needed or as directed by other biological signals.

So- SHBG is produced mostly by the liver, but also by the brain, testes, uterus and placenta (when/if present). It also appears to be regulated largely by age and sex, although obviously diet and other environmental factors play a part as well. Generally, males have lower levels of SHBG, while women (in particular pregnant women) and children have higher levels, which translates almost directly to more and less testosterone produced, respectively. (see this chart)

What does all this mean in layman’s terms? Basically, it means that simply changing your diet to include more meat will not necessarily increase your natural pheromone levels, because SHBG is there to bind to the excess testosterone, thereby reducing or even negating the affect of diet change.

Now, I’m an armchair biologist, so take my opinion with a grain of salt. Most (okay, almost all) of my research was done through wikipedia, but I generally tend to trust them with medical entries; I followed a fair few of their linked source materials to verify the veracity of their claims. There isn’t much incentive to lie about hormone production (as opposed to history, cultural or political entries), and there are plenty of med students out there with nothing better to do than create encyclopedia entries for fun.

Nevertheless, I do believe that diet can have an affect on hormone production, especially if, like OP and I, you choose a plant-based diet. This will decrease natural testosterone production and/or increase SHBG production; I believe this to be fact.

To bring this all back to the topic of pheromones, I agree with OP’s opinion regarding topical pheromones replacing naturally lower testosterone production in vegetarians. In fact, it’s one of the reasons I originally sought out this place. I was looking for more information on the old theory (wives’ tale really) that men that eat red meat are somehow more attractive on a chemical level than men who follow vegetarian diets.

I’m a “buddha belly” vegetarian myself, and I’ve witnessed significant IOIs when using AdroticsDirect products at work and in social settings. I believe wholeheartedly that my diet lowers natural testosterone and androgen production, and increases SHBG and/or estradiol, an estrogen byproduct of testosterone degradation.

Obviously topical pheromones cannot replace the other functions of testosterone and similar androgens, such as secondary sex characteristics. But they can replace the pheromones that would have been naturally produced with elevated levels of testosterone in the body.

Unfortunately, there is very little scientific research into this field of late, which is surprising considering that Adolf Butenandt received a Nobel Prize for his work in the field as far back as 1939. What a pity.

10

The topic is old, but it’s still interesting. :wink:
I might as well post here rather than start a new thread, right?

Long story short; I agree that high androgen levels are good for pheromone production and androgen production requires fat, but I question whether androgens have to be free in the blood to exert a pheromonal effect.

So it seems that total T typically correlates with free and bound T. But when Total T appears normal, then SHBG levels are checked.

This suggests to me that SHBG doesn’t directly diminish androgen secretion but I could be reading things wrong. If I’m reading things right, then total androgen levels, and not free androgen levels (Both T and DHT), should drive pheromonal effects.

Lower levels of SHBG tend to be associated with stress, higher levels of DHT, and hair loss as well as a predisposition to diabetes and various health problems such as thyroid dysregulation.

P.S.

Higher SHBG is associated with a lower risk of diabetes, incidentally.

It doesn’t seem that higher levels of mean free androgens are causitive of diabetes, but rather that they are the body’s way of boosting metabolism to deal with high blood sugar levels.

11

We all know a healthy diet has positive effects on hormone production thus theoretically it should increase your natural pheromone output.

I dont think the question is whether your vegetarian, vegan or a meat eater. Its the processed chemical ridden foods that are affecting the hormones negatively.

After using mones for close to 15 years now and during that time eating different diets I notice one thing. When I eat whole real organic or untainted food as opposed to processed chemical ridden foods not only do I feel better and think better but people react differently to me.

Your body is like an engine, if you put crappy fuel in you get crappy exhaust. Its really that simple.

I love biology as well and it can be enigmatic but sometimes its because we make it that way. We are so busy looking at the complexities we miss the obvious.

Tisha

12

Tisha makes a great point here. Studies of mice have shown that injecting a virus or causing inflammation can cause urine of male mice, which usually attracts female mice, to become as attractive as water. Inflammation kills natural mone production. And, conversely, signals of immune health are highly attractive.

It’s interesting how Cassanova seems to have not just been a famous lover, but also had an amazingly succesful immune system. (Yes, I’m familiar with the MHC and its relation to compatibility)

13

Tisha makes a great point here. Studies of mice have shown that injecting a virus or causing inflammation can cause urine of male mice, which usually attracts female mice, to become as attractive as water. Inflammation kills natural mone production. And, conversely, signals of immune health are highly attractive.

It’s interesting how Cassanova seems to have not just been a famous lover, but also had an amazingly succesful immune system. (Yes, I’m familiar with the MHC and its relation to compatibility)

14

Hi there, Chimericallyone. It’s nice to see another fellow vegan in these forums! I would just like to briefly throw in my two cents.

First of all, phytoestrogens are not like regular or xenoestrogens. They may take the place of these estrogen, but they do not activate the same hormonal responses. Phytoestrogens actually help your testosterone levels, if anythig, because they prevent estrogen that don’t promote testosterone production from reaching receptor sites.

Secondly, most vegan/vegetarian diets make you much slimmer. For most people (in America) this means losing quite a bit of fat, and estrogen can be stored in fat at alarming rates. The natural cleansing of a vegan diet can actually put testosterone levels back to normal, especially in overweight men. Think of the strain all that excess weight puts on your ball’s ability to circulate blood/produce testosterone efficiently.

Third, there are other ways to increase testosterone without harmful products or eating something that’s bad for you. I know it sounds gross but i juice one raw onion a day as a supplement and although i have not had blood work done, i can tell you for a fact that i was pushing more weight in just a few days. There have been studies showing 300%+ increases in rats after onion juice supplementation for two weeks! Garlic is said to have the same effects. Did you know cooking garlic/onions is a common remedy in third world countries for impotence? Also celery does this at around 30%. So there you have it, eat some raw veggies and you could easily have higher test. levels than your meat eating counterparts! Thinking about or having sex, full on sprinting, weight lifting with your heaviest sets, going to sleep when the sun goes down and supplementing with zinc are all ways to increase you test levels as well. It all comes down to how bad you want it.

Lastly, if you must stoop to that level, oysters are considered vegan. They have no brain or nervous system, although i still feel they are very much like animals…