AHR 30: Privilege, Identity Politics, and the Transhuman Agenda with Daniel Vitalis (Part 1)

Did you know that some scientists say that oaks produce more nuts annually than every other nut tree—both wild and commercial—combined?

Nuts, right? (Yeah, yeah—laugh it up. The pun was intended.)

Acorns, or oak nuts, are nutritional powerhouses.

Depending on the species, a single acorn can contain up to 18% fat, 6% protein, and 68% carbohydrate—with the rest just being water, minerals, and gut-healthy fiber. 

Acorns are also great sources of both vitamins A and C, as well as having a long list of essential and nonessential aminos acids. 

With those numbers, it’s easy to understand why the native people here in California never resorted to agriculture and why—interestingly—they never spoke of—or created traditions for—famine.

To speak more about this abundant wild food, I'm excited to introduce to you someone I've mentioned many times on Ancestral Health Radio before: Daniel Vitalis.

I waited for what seemed like a couple years for this interview... Which, by the way, is a solid two hours. So I decided to break it up into a two-part episode, so your ears can have something to munch on later.

Daniel's helped me, as well as many of my friends, better understand ecology through ancestral lifeways.

In today's episode, you'll learn...

• Why Daniel says he no longer has a morning routine,
• The wild food Daniel believes is going to revolutionize food production (hint: It's "not a grain"),
• Why Daniel's use of technology scares him (and why technology should scare you, too), and...
• Much, much more.

• Episode Breakdown

  • Welcome Daniel onto the show

  • The significance of being a symbol and the impact that idea has on Daniel

  • Why Daniel separates the mundane intricacies of his personal life from his business life

  • Daniel's opinion on actors and sports figures as political commentators

  • Why Daniel says he's not the person to speak about productivity or systems related to entrepreneurship

  • How Daniel is currently prioritizing in his personal life 

  • Why Daniel no longer subscribes to the idea of morning routines

  • Why Daniel and his partner don't live together

  • Four of Daniel's daily practices

  • The one skill Daniel's currently spending most of his time on

  • Why processing food takes president over many facets of Daniel's lifestyle

  • Daniel's favorite foraging season

  • Daniel explains the anthroposcene era and its significance to modern hunting and gathering

  • Why Daniel says you'd be hard pressed to find any true hunter-gatherers these day

  • The wild food Daniel believes is going to revolutionize food production (hint: It's "not a grain")

  • The role grains have played in the civilizing of the modern world

  • What Daniel says is more exciting, and bigger work, than any one food

  • The two-pronged idea behind Daniel's episode, "Is Wild Food A Privilege?"

  • Daniel opens up and shares his traumatic background growing up in the United States

  • Why building a loyal team of people who share your vision can be one of the hardest things you can ever do

  • Daniel's thoughts on white privilege and America's self-correcting constitution

  • Why Daniel won't touch the topic of evolutionary and biological psychology 

  • Why we're currently fighting an information-based civil war

  • Daniel's personal conservation efforts

  • Why most of the people Daniel says he's inspired by are not people who specifically identify with the word rewilding

  • The four guests that have most impacted Daniel over the span of 175+ episodes of the Rewild Yourself podcast (Stephen Jenkinson, Dan Flores, Gabor Maté, and Neil Strauss) 

  • Why Daniel says he likes to find inspiration outside of the rewilding community rather than from within it