4 ms·

We should eat what requires the fewest resources (water, land), and is completely nutritious for all stages of life: plants, and plants only. It’s mind bogglin

We should eat what requires the fewest resources (water, land), and is completely nutritious for all stages of life: plants, and plants only. It’s mind boggling how tight the Venn diagram is between People Who Are Fearful of Climate Crisis and People Who Refuse to Stop Eating Animals.

Heffaklump 4y ago
This is true in a lot of places and I agree meat consumption should go down but this is not true everywhere. Animals can convert calories we cannot eat to calories we can eat. Take dry grasslands for example where you could either herd goats and sheep on what nature provides or grow crops which uses a lot more water and fertilizer than the environment there produces.
- sweetheart 4y ago
  This supplies a vast, vast minority of the calories in developed countries. CAFOs, or factory farms, tend to supply animal products to developed countries, and those animals aren’t being sustained on the grasslands. So your point doesn’t really justify the ubiquity of animal consumption.
  - akiselev 4y ago
    The GP's point applies even more to factory farms than grazing animals because animal feed can be transported across the globe. It's the agricultural version of specialization. The vast majority of feed used in factory farms is inedible to humans. The primary ingredient is often the waste product from bioethanol production and distillation [1]. The edible varieties of corn, barley, oats, and alfalfa used in feed aren't that popular with people [2], are mostly produced on land that would otherwise be unproductive, and are mostly used for newborns or in the final stage before slaughter to make the meat fattier and more palatable. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distillers_grains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distillers_grains [2] For example, even though barley is a core ingredient to much of the alcohol industry, animal feed still accounts for two thirds of barley consumption. Most of the rest of the barley ends up in animal feed in the form of distillers grains.
wyager 4y ago
When you consider arability constraints and nutritional efficiency, meat is more efficient and less destructive than plants in many cases. Soy production, for example, sufficient to meet global demand requires destroying the Amazon; meat production is much less destructive to land, taking place either on non-arable scrubland or via consuming human-inedible surplus feedstock. (Or on land already depleted by plant farming, like in the Amazon.) And then in the end you're left with foods with inferior nutrition. I'm not going to stop eating the foods I've evolved to eat (ruminants especially) until I can safely do so without becoming malnourished, weak, and unhealthy. Right now, this is not technologically possible.
- ornornor 4y ago
  > without becoming malnourished, weak, and unhealthy. Right now, this is not technologically possible. Millions of people “survive” on a vegan diet and have for decades. They’re doing just fine and aren’t “malnourished, weak, and unhealthy”
- sweetheart 4y ago
  The majority of that soy you’re worried about is grown to feed the animals… You’re citing things which are actually making the case for eating only plants stronger, while thinking that you’re doing the opposite. It’s wild. This isn’t even addressing the part of your argument where you fallaciously appeal to nature by saying you’re going to do what you evolved to do. What we evolved to do is irrelevant; what we have the ability to do is all that matters.
- greggeter 4y ago

Heffaklump 4y ago

This is true in a lot of places and I agree meat consumption should go down but this is not true everywhere. Animals can convert calories we cannot eat to calories we can eat. Take dry grasslands for example where you could either herd goats and sheep on what nature provides or grow crops which uses a lot more water and fertilizer than the environment there produces.

sweetheart 4y ago
This supplies a vast, vast minority of the calories in developed countries. CAFOs, or factory farms, tend to supply animal products to developed countries, and those animals aren’t being sustained on the grasslands. So your point doesn’t really justify the ubiquity of animal consumption.
- akiselev 4y ago
  The GP's point applies even more to factory farms than grazing animals because animal feed can be transported across the globe. It's the agricultural version of specialization. The vast majority of feed used in factory farms is inedible to humans. The primary ingredient is often the waste product from bioethanol production and distillation [1]. The edible varieties of corn, barley, oats, and alfalfa used in feed aren't that popular with people [2], are mostly produced on land that would otherwise be unproductive, and are mostly used for newborns or in the final stage before slaughter to make the meat fattier and more palatable. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distillers_grains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distillers_grains [2] For example, even though barley is a core ingredient to much of the alcohol industry, animal feed still accounts for two thirds of barley consumption. Most of the rest of the barley ends up in animal feed in the form of distillers grains.

wyager 4y ago

When you consider arability constraints and nutritional efficiency, meat is more efficient and less destructive than plants in many cases. Soy production, for example, sufficient to meet global demand requires destroying the Amazon; meat production is much less destructive to land, taking place either on non-arable scrubland or via consuming human-inedible surplus feedstock. (Or on land already depleted by plant farming, like in the Amazon.) And then in the end you're left with foods with inferior nutrition. I'm not going to stop eating the foods I've evolved to eat (ruminants especially) until I can safely do so without becoming malnourished, weak, and unhealthy. Right now, this is not technologically possible.

ornornor 4y ago
> without becoming malnourished, weak, and unhealthy. Right now, this is not technologically possible. Millions of people “survive” on a vegan diet and have for decades. They’re doing just fine and aren’t “malnourished, weak, and unhealthy”
sweetheart 4y ago
The majority of that soy you’re worried about is grown to feed the animals… You’re citing things which are actually making the case for eating only plants stronger, while thinking that you’re doing the opposite. It’s wild. This isn’t even addressing the part of your argument where you fallaciously appeal to nature by saying you’re going to do what you evolved to do. What we evolved to do is irrelevant; what we have the ability to do is all that matters.
greggeter 4y ago