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How do you feel about eating meat?
Meh, meat is meat, I'll eat whatever.
51%
 51%  [ 15 ]
It bothers me but I don't really know what to do about it.
17%
 17%  [ 5 ]
I only eat grass fed, free range meat and don't support the commerical meat industry
3%
 3%  [ 1 ]
I don't eat any meat at all.
27%
 27%  [ 8 ]
Total Votes : 29

Author Message
Cendrillon
Golly, Poster


I'm becoming increasingly upset with the meat industry and the general cruelty towards animals involved. I like meat, and have no desire to become a vegetarian (also I don't think I could get the proper nutrients if I did so). I'm glad free range meat is becoming easier to find, but it's so expensive. Does anyone else have this dilemma, or feel disturbed by the meat industry? How do you deal with it? And if you aren't, how do you justify eating the typical grain fed stuff? [/i]
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Sprocket
Vintage Newbie


I am vegetarian cause I just don't feel it is justified... however, it has been a gradual process of vegetarianisation since I was around 12. Becoming mammatarian, pescatarian and vegetarian by steps. The most convincing argument for vegetarianism (which prompted me to take that last step in giving up fish, which I kept eating for years) was given to me by my friend Alex.

Namely, that it is dangerously presumptive to eat meat or fish, since we don't know for certain how animals or fish feel or think and to what degree. Unlike plants, they give evidence of sentient life - they eat, avoid predators, sleep, many play, many show happiness or fear. So, in the best possible world, through eating meat/ fish you are deriving pleasure and nutrition from ingesting creatures that ape the signs of life - that are essentially no more than a bunch of classically conditioned twitching neurones and light receptors. As such, all that has happened is that something beautiful has been destroyed and the environment increasingly screwed. Bad, but not the worst possible scenario.

In the worst possible world, through eating meat/ fish you are causing the deaths of creatures who think and feel much like we do; like a baby, perhaps... creatures capable of pain, pleasure and importantly loss and attachment to family. In this instance, one's pleasure and nutrition is at the expense of a monumental amount of suffering.

Since, being a vegetarian only affects one's quality of life a negligable amount - you have to work harder to maintain protein levels, but because you end up eating more fruit and vegetables, your vitamin levels tend to be well stocked, you no longer have the pleasure of eating meat but there is a lot of pleasure to be had in the world and much tasty food which isn't meat or fish - and the meat industry definition is responsible for mass amounts of deforestation at the very least; the mass killing and suffering of creatures not so different from us at the worst; then it seems like a small sacrifice to make imo.

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sully_51
Golly, Poster


I eat all meat. I do prefer homegrown, but if it tastes good, I'll eat it. Yum.
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guitarfreak217
Vintage Newbie


Working on switching to only grass-fed, free range, organic, yada yada yah. But it's difficult at the moment because we are living with my in-laws and while we pay for food, they do the majority of the grocery shopping.

And a word on cost...

I think that if it is too expensive for you to eat ethically obtained meat, then you're just going to have to eat less of it. If it really means that much to you, then you'll either be able to work out your budget so that you are eating better food as a whole. Or, you'll just eat meat when you can afford the good stuff.

That said, cheap cuts of good quality meat is really the way to go. You get more bang for your buck and those cuts generally have better flavour.

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mr pine
Vintage Newbie


i am probably a horrible person, but I just like meat. I don't care how its raised, fed, or killed.
Chicken is wonderful. Beef is better.
it's great stuff.

i wont turn this into it, but I am hoping someone brings up Peta, because I have a lot of great things to say about that horrible horrible orginazation

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olimario
Laughing Citizen


Sprocket wrote:

Namely, that it is dangerously presumptive to eat meat or fish, since we don't know for certain how animals or fish feel or think and to what degree.



Would it make you feel better if I said we did know how they think and feel?
And that we, as a species, generally protect and don't eat more intelligent life like gorillas and dolphins?

Clearly we were designed to eat meat. No reason to avoid it because we've become efficient at hunting it.

But also, whatever makes you happy in life!
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tahruh
Vintage Newbie


olimario wrote:
Sprocket wrote:

Namely, that it is dangerously presumptive to eat meat or fish, since we don't know for certain how animals or fish feel or think and to what degree.



Would it make you feel better if I said we did know how they think and feel?
And that we, as a species, generally protect and don't eat more intelligent life like gorillas and dolphins?

Clearly we were designed to eat meat. No reason to avoid it because we've become efficient at hunting it.

But also, whatever makes you happy in life!
Pigs are more intelligent than 3 year old humans...

And a quick lesson in anatomy and physiology:

Facial Muscles
CARNIVORE: Reduced to allow wide mouth gape
HERBIVORE: Well-developed
OMNIVORE: Reduced
HUMAN: Well-developed

Jaw Type
CARNIVORE: Angle not expanded
HERBIVORE: Expanded angle
OMNIVORE: Angle not expanded
HUMAN: Expanded angle

Jaw Joint Location
CARNIVORE: On same plane as molar teeth
HERBIVORE: Above the plane of the molars
OMNIVORE: On same plane as molar teeth
HUMAN: Above the plane of the molars

Jaw Motion
CARNIVORE: Shearing; minimal side-to-side motion
HERBIVORE: No shear; good side-to-side, front-to-back
OMNIVORE: Shearing; minimal side-to-side
HUMAN: No shear; good side-to-side, front-to-back

Major Jaw Muscles
CARNIVORE: Temporalis
HERBIVORE: Masseter and pterygoids
OMNIVORE: Temporalis
HUMAN: Masseter and pterygoids

Mouth Opening vs. Head Size
CARNIVORE: Large
HERBIVORE: Small
OMNIVORE: Large
HUMAN: Small

Teeth: Incisors
CARNIVORE: Short and pointed
HERBIVORE: Broad, flattened and spade shaped
OMNIVORE: Short and pointed
HUMAN: Broad, flattened and spade shaped

Teeth: Canines
CARNIVORE: Long, sharp and curved
HERBIVORE: Dull and short or long (for defense), or none
OMNIVORE: Long, sharp and curved
HUMAN: Short and blunted

Teeth: Molars
CARNIVORE: Sharp, jagged and blade shaped
HERBIVORE: Flattened with cusps vs complex surface
OMNIVORE: Sharp blades and/or flattened
HUMAN: Flattened with nodular cusps

Chewing
CARNIVORE: None; swallows food whole
HERBIVORE: Extensive chewing necessary
OMNIVORE: Swallows food whole and/or simple crushing
HUMAN: Extensive chewing necessary

Saliva
CARNIVORE: No digestive enzymes
HERBIVORE: Carbohydrate digesting enzymes
OMNIVORE: No digestive enzymes
HUMAN: Carbohydrate digesting enzymes

Stomach Type
CARNIVORE: Simple
HERBIVORE: Simple or multiple chambers
OMNIVORE: Simple
HUMAN: Simple

Stomach Acidity
CARNIVORE: Less than or equal to pH 1 with food in stomach
HERBIVORE: pH 4 to 5 with food in stomach
OMNIVORE: Less than or equal to pH 1 with food in stomach
HUMAN: pH 4 to 5 with food in stomach

Stomach Capacity
CARNIVORE: 60% to 70% of total volume of digestive
HERBIVORE: Less than 30% of total volume of digestive
OMNIVORE: 60% to 70% of total volume of digestive tract
HUMAN: 21% to 27% of total volume of digestive tract

Length of Small Intestine
CARNIVORE: 3 to 6 times body length
HERBIVORE: 10 to more than 12 times body length
OMNIVORE: 4 to 6 times body length
HUMAN: 10 to 11 times body length

Colon
CARNIVORE: Simple, short and smooth
HERBIVORE: Long, complex; may be sacculated
OMNIVORE: Simple, short and smooth
HUMAN: Long, sacculated

Liver
CARNIVORE: Can detoxify vitamin A
HERBIVORE: Cannot detoxify vitamin A
OMNIVORE: Can detoxify vitamin A
HUMAN: Cannot detoxify vitamin A

Kidney
CARNIVORE: Extremely concentrated urine
HERBIVORE: Moderately concentrated urine
OMNIVORE: Extremely concentrated urine
HUMAN: Moderately concentrated urine

Nails
CARNIVORE: Sharp claws
HERBIVORE: Flattened nails or blunt hooves
OMNIVORE: Sharp claws
HUMAN: Flattened nails

Elongated:
The Comparative Anatomy of Eating
by Milton R. Mills, M.D.
Humans are most often described as "omnivores". This classification is based on the "observation" that humans generally eat a wide variety of plant and animal foods. However, culture, custom and training are confounding variables when looking at human dietary practices. Thus, "observation" is not the best technique to use when trying to identify the most "natural" diet for humans. While most humans are clearly "behavioral" omnivores, the question still remains as to whether humans are anatomically suited for a diet that includes animal as well as plant foods.
A better and more objective technique is to look at human anatomy and physiology. Mammals are anatomically and physiologically adapted to procure and consume particular kinds of diets. (It is common practice when examining fossils of extinct mammals to examine anatomical features to deduce the animal's probable diet.) Therefore, we can look at mammalian carnivores, herbivores (plant-eaters) and omnivores to see which anatomical and physiological features are associated with each kind of diet. Then we can look at human anatomy and physiology to see in which group we belong.
Oral Cavity
Carnivores have a wide mouth opening in relation to their head size. This confers obvious advantages in developing the forces used in seizing, killing and dismembering prey. Facial musculature is reduced since these muscles would hinder a wide gape, and play no part in the animal's preparation of food for swallowing. In all mammalian carnivores, the jaw joint is a simple hinge joint lying in the same plane as the teeth. This type of joint is extremely stable and acts as the pivot point for the "lever arms" formed by the upper and lower jaws. The primary muscle used for operating the jaw in carnivores is the temporalis muscle. This muscle is so massive in carnivores that it accounts for most of the bulk of the sides of the head (when you pet a dog, you are petting its temporalis muscles). The "angle" of the mandible (lower jaw) in carnivores is small. This is because the muscles (masseter and pterygoids) that attach there are of minor importance in these animals. The lower jaw of carnivores cannot move forward, and has very limited side-to-side motion. When the jaw of a carnivore closes, the blade-shaped cheek molars slide past each other to give a slicing motion that is very effective for shearing meat off bone.http://www.21daydetox.com/p>The teeth of a carnivore are discretely spaced so as not to trap stringy debris. The incisors are short, pointed and prong-like and are used for grasping and shredding. The canines are greatly elongated and dagger-like for stabbing, tearing and killing prey. The molars (carnassials) are flattened and triangular with jagged edges such that they function like serrated-edged blades. Because of the hinge-type joint, when a carnivore closes its jaw, the cheek teeth come together in a back-to-front fashion giving a smooth cutting motion like the blades on a pair of shears.
The saliva of carnivorous animals does not contain digestive enzymes. When eating, a mammalian carnivore gorges itself rapidly and does not chew its food. Since proteolytic (protein-digesting) enzymes cannot be liberated in the mouth due to the danger of autodigestion (damaging the oral cavity), carnivores do not need to mix their food with saliva; they simply bite off huge chunks of meat and swallow them whole.
According to evolutionary theory, the anatomical features consistent with an herbivorous diet represent a more recently derived condition than that of the carnivore. Herbivorous mammals have well-developed facial musculature, fleshy lips, a relatively small opening into the oral cavity and a thickened, muscular tongue. The lips aid in the movement of food into the mouth and, along with the facial (cheek) musculature and tongue, assist in the chewing of food. In herbivores, the jaw joint has moved to position above the plane of the teeth. Although this type of joint is less stable than the hinge-type joint of the carnivore, it is much more mobile and allows the complex jaw motions needed when chewing plant foods. Additionally, this type of jaw joint allows the upper and lower cheek teeth to come together along the length of the jaw more or less at once when the mouth is closed in order to form grinding platforms. (This type of joint is so important to a plant-eating animal, that it is believed to have evolved at least 15 different times in various plant-eating mammalian species.) The angle of the mandible has expanded to provide a broad area of attachment for the well-developed masseter and pterygoid muscles (these are the major muscles of chewing in plant-eating animals). The temporalis muscle is small and of minor importance. The masseter and pterygoid muscles hold the mandible in a sling-like arrangement and swing the jaw from side-to-side. Accordingly, the lower jaw of plant-eating mammals has a pronounced sideways motion when eating. This lateral movement is necessary for the grinding motion of chewing.
The dentition of herbivores is quite varied depending on the kind of vegetation a particular species is adapted to eat. Although these animals differ in the types and numbers of teeth they posses, the various kinds of teeth when present, share common structural features. The incisors are broad, flattened and spade-like. Canines may be small as in horses, prominent as in hippos, pigs and some primates (these are thought to be used for defense) or absent altogether. The molars, in general, are squared and flattened on top to provide a grinding surface. The molars cannot vertically slide past one another in a shearing/slicing motion, but they do horizontally slide across one another to crush and grind. The surface features of the molars vary depending on the type of plant material the animal eats. The teeth of herbivorous animals are closely grouped so that the incisors form an efficient cropping/biting mechanism, and the upper and lower molars form extended platforms for crushing and grinding. The "walled-in" oral cavity has a lot of potential space that is realized during eating.
These animals carefully and methodically chew their food, pushing the food back and forth into the grinding teeth with the tongue and cheek muscles. This thorough process is necessary to mechanically disrupt plant cell walls in order to release the digestible intracellular contents and ensure thorough mixing of this material with their saliva. This is important because the saliva of plant-eating mammals often contains carbohydrate-digesting enzymes which begin breaking down food molecules while the food is still in the mouth.
Stomach and Small Intestine
Striking differences between carnivores and herbivores are seen in these organs. Carnivores have a capacious simple (single-chambered) stomach. The stomach volume of a carnivore represents 60-70% of the total capacity of the digestive system. Because meat is relatively easily digested, their small intestines (where absorption of food molecules takes place) are short -- about three to five or six times the body length. Since these animals average a kill only about once a week, a large stomach volume is advantageous because it allows the animals to quickly gorge themselves when eating, taking in as much meat as possible at one time which can then be digested later while resting. Additionally, the ability of the carnivore stomach to secrete hydrochloric acid is exceptional. Carnivores are able to keep their gastric pH down around 1-2 even with food present. This is necessary to facilitate protein breakdown and to kill the abundant dangerous bacteria often found in decaying flesh foods.
Because of the relative difficulty with which various kinds of plant foods are broken down (due to large amounts of indigestible fibers), herbivores have significantly longer and in some cases, far more elaborate guts than carnivores. Herbivorous animals that consume plants containing a high proportion of cellulose must "ferment" (digest by bacterial enzyme action) their food to obtain the nutrient value. They are classified as either "ruminants" (foregut fermenters) or hindgut fermenters. The ruminants are the plant-eating animals with the celebrated multiple-chambered stomachs. Herbivorous animals that eat a diet of relatively soft vegetation do not need a multiple-chambered stomach. They typically have a simple stomach, and a long small intestine. These animals ferment the difficult-to-digest fibrous portions of their diets in their hindguts (colons). Many of these herbivores increase the sophistication and efficiency of their GI tracts by including carbohydrate-digesting enzymes in their saliva. A multiple-stomach fermentation process in an animal which consumed a diet of soft, pulpy vegetation would be energetically wasteful. Nutrients and calories would be consumed by the fermenting bacteria and protozoa before reaching the small intestine for absorption. The small intestine of plant-eating animals tends to be very long (greater than 10 times body length) to allow adequate time and space for absorption of the nutrients.
Colon
The large intestine (colon) of carnivores is simple and very short, as its only purposes are to absorb salt and water. It is approximately the same diameter as the small intestine and, consequently, has a limited capacity to function as a reservoir. The colon is short and non-pouched. The muscle is distributed throughout the wall, giving the colon a smooth cylindrical appearance. Although a bacterial population is present in the colon of carnivores, its activities are essentially putrefactive.
In herbivorous animals, the large intestine tends to be a highly specialized organ involved in water and electrolyte absorption, vitamin production and absorption, and/or fermentation of fibrous plant materials. The colons of herbivores are usually wider than their small intestine and are relatively long. In some plant-eating mammals, the colon has a pouched appearance due to the arrangement of the muscle fibers in the intestinal wall. Additionally, in some herbivores the cecum (the first section of the colon) is quite large and serves as the primary or accessory fermentation site.
What About Omnivores?
One would expect an omnivore to show anatomical features which equip it to eat both animal and plant foods. According to evolutionary theory, carnivore gut structure is more primitive than herbivorous adaptations. Thus, an omnivore might be expected to be a carnivore which shows some gastrointestinal tract adaptations to an herbivorous diet.
This is exactly the situation we find in the Bear, Raccoon and certain members of the Canine families. (This discussion will be limited to bears because they are, in general, representative of the anatomical omnivores.) Bears are classified as carnivores but are classic anatomical omnivores. Although they eat some animal foods, bears are primarily herbivorous with 70-80% of their diet comprised of plant foods. (The one exception is the Polar bear which lives in the frozen, vegetation poor arctic and feeds primarily on seal blubber.) Bears cannot digest fibrous vegetation well, and therefore, are highly selective feeders. Their diet is dominated by primarily succulent lent herbage, tubers and berries. Many scientists believe the reason bears hibernate is because their chief food (succulent vegetation) not available in the cold northern winters. (Interestingly, Polar bears hibernate during the summer months when seals are unavailable.)
In general, bears exhibit anatomical features consistent with a carnivorous diet. The jaw joint of bears is in the same plane as the molar teeth. The temporalis muscle is massive, and the angle of the mandible is small corresponding to the limited role the pterygoid and masseter muscles play in operating the jaw. The small intestine is short ( less than five times body length) like that of the pure carnivores, and the colon is simple, smooth and short. The most prominent adaptation to an herbivorous diet in bears (and other "anatomical" omnivores) is the modification of their dentition. Bears retain the peg-like incisors, large canines and shearing premolars of a carnivore; but the molars have become squared with rounded cusps for crushing and grinding. Bears have not, however, adopted the flattened, blunt nails seen in most herbivores and retain the elongated, pointed claws of a carnivore.
An animal which captures, kills and eats prey must have the physical equipment which makes predation practical and efficient. Since bears include significant amounts of meat in their diet, they must retain the anatomical features that permit them to capture and kill prey animals. Hence, bears have a jaw structure, musculature and dentition which enable them to develop and apply the forces necessary to kill and dismember prey even though the majority of their diet is comprised of plant foods. Although an herbivore-style jaw joint (above the plane of the teeth) is a far more efficient joint for crushing and grinding vegetation and would potentially allow bears to exploit a wider range of plant foods in their diet, it is a much weaker joint than the hinge-style carnivore joint. The herbivore-style jaw joint is relatively easily dislocated and would not hold up well under the stresses of subduing struggling prey and/or crushing bones (nor would it allow the wide gape carnivores need). In the wild, an animal with a dislocated jaw would either soon starve to death or be eaten by something else and would, therefore, be selected against. A given species cannot adopt the weaker but more mobile and efficient herbivore-style joint until it has committed to an essentially plant-food diet test it risk jaw dislocation, death and ultimately, extinction.
What About Me?
The human gastrointestinal tract features the anatomical modifications consistent with an herbivorous diet. Humans have muscular lips and a small opening into the oral cavity. Many of the so-called "muscles of expression" are actually the muscles used in chewing. The muscular and agile tongue essential for eating, has adapted to use in speech and other things. The mandibular joint is flattened by a cartilaginous plate and is located well above the plane of the teeth. The temporalis muscle is reduced. The characteristic "square jaw" of adult males reflects the expanded angular process of the mandible and the enlarged masseter/pterygoid muscle group. The human mandible can move forward to engage the incisors, and side-to-side to crush and grind.
Human teeth are also similar to those found in other herbivores with the exception of the canines (the canines of some of the apes are elongated and are thought to be used for display and/or defense). Our teeth are rather large and usually abut against one another. The incisors are flat and spade-like, useful for peeling, snipping and biting relatively soft materials. The canines are neither serrated nor conical, but are flattened, blunt and small and function Like incisors. The premolars and molars are squarish, flattened and nodular, and used for crushing, grinding and pulping noncoarse foods.
Human saliva contains the carbohydrate-digesting enzyme, salivary amylase. This enzyme is responsible for the majority of starch digestion. The esophagus is narrow and suited to small, soft balls of thoroughly chewed food. Eating quickly, attempting to swallow a large amount of food or swallowing fibrous and/or poorly chewed food (meat is the most frequent culprit) often results in choking in humans.
Man's stomach is single-chambered, but only moderately acidic. (Clinically, a person presenting with a gastric pH less than 4-5 when there is food in the stomach is cause for concern.) The stomach volume represents about 21-27% of the total volume of the human GI tract. The stomach serves as a mixing and storage chamber, mixing and liquefying ingested foodstuffs and regulating their entry into the small intestine. The human small intestine is long, averaging from 10 to 11 times the body length. (Our small intestine averages 22 to 30 feet in length. Human body size is measured from the top of the head to end of the spine and averages between two to three feet in length in normal-sized individuals.)
The human colon demonstrates the pouched structure peculiar to herbivores. The distensible large intestine is larger in cross-section than the small intestine, and is relatively long. Man's colon is responsible for water and electrolyte absorption and vitamin production and absorption. There is also extensive bacterial fermentation of fibrous plant materials, with the production and absorption of significant amounts of food energy (volatile short-chain fatty acids) depending upon the fiber content of the diet. The extent to which the fermentation and absorption of metabolites takes place in the human colon has only recently begun to be investigated.
In conclusion, we see that human beings have the gastrointestinal tract structure of a "committed" herbivore. Humankind does not show the mixed structural features one expects and finds in anatomical omnivores such as bears and raccoons. Thus, from comparing the gastrointestinal tract of humans to that of carnivores, herbivores and omnivores we must conclude that humankind's GI tract is designed for a purely plant-food diet.


Just because we can conclude that humankind has been consuming meat (including human) for a VERY long time (although likely in much smaller amounts than the first world), it doesn't mean that we were actually designed to.

One thing is for certain, though: we were meant to forage. We were meant to get a wide variety of fresh plant nutrients, and this cannot be replicated in our industrialized agricultural society.

@Pine
No one's gonna bring up PETA! I'm fairly certain they're meat industry fronts.

@Cendrillion
"Also I don't think I could get the proper nutrients if I did so..."

Is that because you're a bit lazy (not trying to be accusatory, I get it), or because you don't think it's possible? Just wondering, because I see the latter used as reasoning pretty often, even though it's not true. How much protein one needs is largely dependent upon his or her weight, or ideal weight, rather. 1 gram per kilogram. Eggs are the best source of animal-derived protein, and plants are the best all around source, though many must be used together so as not to be an "incomplete source." It's honestly not too difficult to reach the rec'd 50 +/- grams a day; it's mostly thoughtless at this point, but I've also made it a habit to eat healthy now, which helps tremendously.

Anyway, I've been a vegetarian for about 10 years. I find the idea of killing animals in general to be disturbing, but yes, the meat industry is especially heinous. The abuse is unspeakable. You should check out the documentary Earthlings. I couldn't get through the entire thing (they started to skin rabbits alive, which is the common method), but I was already a vegetarian. Seems like most people who eat meat and generally support seriously exploitive industries should be forced to watch it. Just seeing an animal slaughtered isn't enough; it's important to see how horrific the abuse is leading up to it. I forget if it was in that movie, or something else I saw, but one scene that's always stuck with me was when this (slaughter-er?) went into a pig's pen, where three or four of them were huddled, and started taunting them, shot one, and then the pigs started screaming and crying because they were so scared, and the piece of $#@! continued to taunt them while picking them off. It's a "career" that attracts a lot of psychopaths. And remember, they were the equivalent of pre-school children (since we seem to value our own intelligence so much).

Also, good point, GuitarFreak re: eating less.
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Sprocket
Vintage Newbie


olimario wrote:
Sprocket wrote:

Namely, that it is dangerously presumptive to eat meat or fish, since we don't know for certain how animals or fish feel or think and to what degree.



Would it make you feel better if I said we did know how they think and feel?
And that we, as a species, generally protect and don't eat more intelligent life like gorillas and dolphins?

Clearly we were designed to eat meat. No reason to avoid it because we've become efficient at hunting it.

But also, whatever makes you happy in life!


Sure, we can make pretty good stabs at ascertaining how a creature thinks and feels, but we can never see through its eyes. Also, pigs have been proven in experiments to have long memories and complete basic problem solving tasks.

I'm never particularly swayed by any arguments by design or nature. Most animals have sex while in heat by mounting a partner without consent (male moles in particular are astonishingly violent about this) however only a psychopath would suggest this would be justifiable human behaviour; namely due to the fact that we have developed notions of consent and respect, which are alien to much of the animal world. Just because something is 'designed' does not necessarily make it ethical.

As for whatever makes you happy in life - for good or for bad, we can't just act like desiring machines that expect our every whim to be satiated! For example, I have absolutely no problem with nudity and find it slightly bewildering that much of society does and sees being naked as inherently sexual. I'd be much happier naked. That said, most of the time I wear clothes, because if I'm around other people I have to respect that while my nudity makes me happy, it certainly doesn't make them so! Razz

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wilsmith
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Not enough options to vote.

Lots of thought provoking information, if you feel like being provoked. I don't.

I quit meat, then came back to poultry years ago. I don't like red meat in general, unless it's smoked or BBQed with Hickory Chips. That always very tempting. I was always a picky eater, but sometimes the smell of pepperoni just calls to me as well. So on a daily basis I don't usually eat much if any meat, and when I do it's primarily poultry. I'll do soy stuff etc, cause flavor and texture is more important to me than what it is. I'm usually more concerned with fat and cholesterol content than I am the conditions of cultivation. That said, all the lab food we are eating may have side effects we can't even imagine yet, cause it is after all, new to our biology. But meat has it's place in my diet as an indulgence. This coming from a guy who only kills 1 kind of bug (with extreme prejudice) Mosquitoes.

I don't defend my actions. I also accept that to some wayfaring alien that may someday show up, we might be it's Shrimp Scampi and we'll have to deal with that if it happens, relativistically. I could live by some grand higher moral code of life preservation through and through (I try to most of the time) but honestly, as far as diet is concerned I am jaded and ambivalent. There is nothing pure on this Earth. The entire planet floats in a cosmos of radiation. We screw it up with everything we do, and it renews itself as best it can regardless of our own lack of effort to do the same.

My point: Regardless of our biological construction or predisposition, the highest moral values that put all life in high esteem, you know the eastern ones, that would see starving one's self to death as a eloquent moral statement on the value of other life, it looks good on paper, but it's contradictory if you believe the measure our sentience and humanity is our capacity to think ourselves into actions and imperatives that overcome the limits of our biology. Eating whatever we want is just as much a testament to our sentience as abstaining from things, and I think that's represented in forms of Buddhism that into full exploration of the senses rather than denial of them.

I guess if you take the moral aspect of it away, it because a question of health and resources. Is it healthier for a person to have a diet of one sort or another? Do I take a statin for cholesterol because of my diet, my genetics, or my genetic make-up's reaction to generations of poor dietary choices? Are we having to take such precautions with our food cultivation and preparation because we've ruined them over centuries of agriculture and horticulture? Ishmael???

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mr pine
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hey tahruh i hear veggitarians have gas up the wazoo (no pun intended). is this true?

i think we have talked vegitarianism before on this board. and i stand by what i said back then. It is a product of abundance.
go to africa and tell them it is wrong to eat meat (not saying anyone on here is saying it is wrong, but you get my drift) when they don't eat for days on end.
there are literally millions starving in india, but there are cows there that they won't eat. tell me if they (and i understand it is there relgion) decided it was ok to eat them that it wouldn't help their cause?

so i am saying, we choose to be veggitarians, because we have that choice. we have abundance. i can say that I don't want to eat fish, because i dont like it,a nd i have plenty other foods to choose from. but if i had the choice of starving to death, or eating cod, i'd choose the cod.

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wilsmith
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^ Yeah, know I wish I would have played up that point in my ramble:

We indulge ourselves with food in the developed world. Go back 10k years when people were at the mercy of what their environment produced, that was a game changer. But to be human is to overcome. It's what we're known for. The issues with starvation are a byproduct of inadequate distribution of products. There is more than enough for everyone. Heck Walmart could distribute the majority of it and UPS would have no problem delivering it, they have logistics down pat globally if you take their word for it. But where is the profit in that?

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Cendrillon
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Quote:
Is that because you're a bit lazy (not trying to be accusatory, I get it), or because you don't think it's possible?


Not offended (I am rarely directly addressed on the internet, so all this attention is positively thrilling! Wink )

Um, It's not exactly a protein thing, I'm more concerned about iron really. But also just like...not having enough things to eat. I'm not a huge meat eater or anything, but it's nice to have (and cooking is my passion...so eliminating meat would be hard on that front as well)

And while I'm find eating the components individually, (most of the time) I really dislike salad. I would never willingly order a salad. Too many textures and flavors mixing and touching. I eat vegetables, but not frequently or happily enough, I guess, to constitute a meal. So I think I'd start turning to more and more processed foods when I was hungry, which at this point, I do a pretty good job of avoiding. It's hard to say though, I'm just speculating.

Also, a note on soy and soy meat type things. I don't really have a problem with soy (the textures of seitan and tempeh are kind of off putting though) but I have a history of breast cancer on my mom's side, and she had the estrogen receptor positive kind, which is negatively affected by soy consumption. So I'm kind of wary of it.

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wilsmith
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Well, I just learned something about Soy products (always had my suspicions). Idea

One thing I have learned over the last few years (and though I don't get into on the board alot, but I really like to cook, but don't study it or dabble in terminology freely ) is the ability to slice and cook a Mushroom goes a long way in dishes that would normally require meat. I've found them to be great flavor retainers, and sauteing them properly, sometimes sprinkling a little dried Parmesan on them in oil to give them a bit of a crisp, works really well. I never cared for them in the past, but it was because I'd only had them raw in salads, or mushy in canned soups. It wasn't until I'd had them in a good curry, and prepped in a wonderful broccoli tortellini dish at a REAL Italian restaurant that I realized their potential.

The same goes for Artichoke hearts. Sauteed in olive oil in minced garlic with salt, they are a good replacement for Chicken in Italian style dished or salads. The only problem is learning how to pick a proper artichoke and cut it. I failed at that, so I just bought frozen artichoke hearts to save time (the jarred ones are disgusting).


@mrpine - the Gas thing has more to do with Fiber than anything else

RE: Low Iron. I had that problem when I went vegetarian. My family tend to favor anemia/ low iron + High Blood Pressure & Cholesterol, AND a history of Cancer so you can't win for losing. What makes it a lot easier to stay away from meat, and also starchy processed food is developing a knowledge and taste for different styles of cooking from different parts of the world. The more I had and attempted to prepare Asian/ Indian food the more open I was to different uses of vegetables, for the better. It really enhanced my use of spices and sauces.

Getting into Latin (for lack of a better term) food, and just down home southern cooking got me to do more with kidney and black beans as a base for dishes (albeit beans are starchy).

Doing more Italian helped me learn how to best use pasta and started me in on making sauces. Once you get a good White Sauce base down, the world is yours, it will prep you for Curry etc. down the line. It allowed for me to make my own spinach alfredo (and spinach artichoke dip!)

Between comfort dishes like stir fries with or without potatoes, rice, & pasta, plus all manner or veggies, sauces, caramelizing peppers and onions, and using fajitas soft or crisped, pita bread there are lots of options.

And there's always CHEESE.

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sebas
Golly, Poster


mr pine wrote:

i think we have talked vegitarianism before on this board. and i stand by what i said back then. It is a product of abundance.
go to africa and tell them it is wrong to eat meat (not saying anyone on here is saying it is wrong, but you get my drift) when they don't eat for days on end.


Vegetarianism is a product of consciousness. Would there be vegetarians in a setting where people were very hungry and meat was sometimes available for eating? No. But what the hell does that have to do with anything? All this means is that starving people will eat what they can to survive.

The mass production of meat in the 1st world (and sometimes in the 3rd world) is terrible for the environment and contributes to the depletion of our resources. Based on the simple fact that much less energy is acquired from meat than is required to "grow" it, the meat industry can be considered to be entirely wasteful. Vegetarianism isn't a product of abundance, meat consumption is.

mr pine wrote:

there are literally millions starving in india, but there are cows there that they won't eat. tell me if they (and i understand it is there relgion) decided it was ok to eat them that it wouldn't help their cause?


It most definitely would not help 'their cause'. Cows serve several important functions in India, slaughtering and eating them would be downright stupid.

Here's an essay on the function of the cow: http://sociology101.net/readings/Indias-sacred-cow.pdf

mr pine wrote:

so i am saying, we choose to be veggitarians, because we have that choice. we have abundance.


Why don't you try looking at it the other way and say that we can afford to eat meat because we have a choice, and because we have abundance? After all, eating meat in a developing country is often times a rare occasion and a luxury. Veggies provide all the nutritional ingredients needed by humans and are much more available.

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olimario
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Like I said, whatever makes you people happy.

I say we were "designed" to eat meat because there are so many good sources of protein and and vitamins like B12 in meat that we don't get in any substantial or efficient way from fruits and vegetables.

Our evolutionary ancestors also ate red meat.

There's no case for humans as carnivores, but omnivores we most certainly are.
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