I've been using Alexei's life tracking app, which is quite convenient for this sort of thing, if you have a droid.
Be careful with what you're testing, and be mindful when you're performing cognitively demanding tests. Simple arithmetic (e.g. 5+6) for the most part is a single memory look up, not actually doing math. Times for me did not really suffer much under severe sleep deprivation, though my overall performance did. MCT oil did show improvements here (by the time I started jotting numbers down I had fully incorperated dairy fat so it's harder to test). You might want to try dual N back or something to test other dimensions.
Playing guitar has been a pretty sensitive cognitive ability sensor. Piracetam makes me noticeably faster (even to friends who see me play less than monthly), but butter doesn't seem to speed up my absolute speed much. What it does is help me reach my top speed with sequences of notes that I'm not quite as used to playing. I'd guess that single look up arithmetic would under report the awesomeness of butter.
Agreed that it's a simple memory look up. I think the benefit of it over dual n-back (something I've started but have only done a little bit) is that the practice effects are much smaller, since I've already heavily practiced doing simple arithmetic, whereas results with dual n-back will also show my normal learning.
But, I suppose if I'm also interested in learning speed (and I am) and not just memory speed, then that makes DNB a better choice.
I've got experience with serious sleep dep and have a PVT program already ready to go, but that's really boring to use and I don't expect it would give any interesting results when I add fat to my diet.
So, I know a number of friends on Paleo who recommend it. I recently read through a lot of bulletproofexec, who recommends his own variant of paleo. I care about my health, and so I need to resolve my diet and their advice somehow. Summarized data points:
I find the logic behind paleo questionable. Yes, hunter-gatherers are adapted to a different diet, but fire was first used to cook food 2 million years ago, and appears widespread by 100 kiloyears (ky) ago, with noticeable adaptations in humans (from smaller teeth to resistance to air pollution). Lactose tolerance demonstrates the ability of human biology to adapt to new diets. Civilization dramatically speeds up evolution- it probably took about 25ky for European hunter-gatherers (and later farmers) to go from a mean IQ of 85 to 100, and about 1ky for urban European Jews to go from a mean IQ of 100 to 115. Am I really supposed to believe that there aren't genes floating around that wheat (domesticated 10ky ago) is good for?
My interpretation of this data is that my current diet works well for me, and paleo is unlikely to work better. I am willing to experiment, though- if I will actually live better on a different diet, there is little holding me back besides a lack of information. My values, in descending order of importance, are: brain function, overall health, appearance, mood, and cost. (Note that those are weights- something can improve brain function but be so costly in dollars, prep time, and terrible taste that I'm not interested.)
So my question for you is: Should I try paleo (more likely, the bulletproof diet)? If I do, what data should I collect? Better yet, what data can I collect now to determine if I have any nutritional deficiencies?