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So basically, you have reasons other than ethical ones now to become a vegetarian. (Sorry to have opened this can of worms :-).

• mistercow 14y ago
  More reasons, and ones that are even more clear-cut. But the silly "I'd rather die young and happy than old and miserable" argument will never die.
  • clicks 14y ago
    I never had the view that 'die young' was a good way to go when I was as a teenager, but I did generally have the idea that being old sucked because you'd inevitably get bogged down by diseases and ailments. That was until I met my neighbor, who's in his late 70s. He is simply the smartest person I know (a biomedical engineer, with knowledge of nearly everything you can bring up)... it seems as if he's still at the height of his intellect. My perception of things since meeting him has changed -- if you take good care of yourself now, exercise, take your vitamins, etc. you can really genuinely enjoy life when you're older. The guy spends the morning of every other day at the gym for about an hour. He can lift more weight more comfortably than I can -- he's almost 80, I'm in my mid-20s. Also see William Shatner: http://www.reddit.com/user/williamshatner http://www.reddit.com/user/williamshatner The guy is 81 years old and so very astute and smart.
    • xenophanes 14y ago
      Thomas Szasz was writing good books past 90.
  • gdubs 14y ago
    Right, but the response to that argument is that most diet based health problems are slow-burning, chronic and painful.
    • mistercow 14y ago
      There are a lot of responses to it, really. After all, eating healthy doesn't just make you live longer; it improves your immediate quality of life. The hypothesis that a healthy lifestyle will make you miserable is easily disproved by simply observing people who live healthy lifestyles.
• maxerickson 14y ago
  Just for scale, ~25 billion pounds of beef is consumed each year in the U.S. (http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/animal-products/cattle-beef/statistics-information.aspx http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/animal-products/cattle-beef/s...) So about 1 pound of antibiotics for every 800 or 900 pounds of beef. Apparently a beef steer dresses out to about 60% meat, so those 800 to 900 pounds of beef represent 1300 to 1500 pounds of cattle. So on average each animal is getting a little less than 1 pound of antibiotics each year (edit: Oops, I ignored that the Wired numbers roll up all livestock antibiotics. So there is pork and poultry further diluting that 1 pound).
  • icegreentea 14y ago
    Yes. But the human numbers gives something like 8 million pounds of antibiotics over something like 300 million people, or something like 0.03 pounds per person per year. By weight, there are something around... 8-10 people in a cow. Remember what the antibiotics are being used for here. It's not just 'oh, we're not sure if the animals are getting sick cause we have so many of them so we'll just give them antibiotics in case', it's 'oh hey, if we give them antibiotics, they gain weight faster'. The level of antibiotic use (along with nearly all business practices in large scale animal farming) is almost directly dictated by consumer demand for cheap meat. There's simply no way around that - and this comes from a lover of meat. We really need to adjust our expectations of our food supply.
    • maxerickson 14y ago
      Well, my point was not to dismiss the concerns of the article, it was literally to have a closer look at the scale of things. I didn't do any comparing to human uses because most people are familiar with the facts that they don't usually take antibiotics and that when they do, they take a small amount for a couple of weeks. The human dosing for tetracyclin is ~1 gram per day (http://www.drugs.com/dosage/tetracycline.html http://www.drugs.com/dosage/tetracycline.html), so I would want to look a lot further into the impact of giving that amount to animals before I got too worried about it (I favor careful regulation of animal antibiotic use whether I am worried about it or not). I would also want to see some reliable reporting on the actual administration patterns (i.e., is it literally mixed into the feed or is it simply the case that industrial animal growers have a lot of sick animals to treat?).
• shiny 14y ago
  Or you could just eat pastured meat.
  • graeme 14y ago
    Yeah, I've never understood why people automatically make this argument. Industrial meat != meat It's like saying that because most restaurants are unhealthy (e.g. fast food) you should zealously avoid all restaurants.
  • whyenot 14y ago
    I buy much of my meat and eggs now from Hidden Villa in Los Altos Hills. Selection is very limited, and their prices are 2x-4x the cost of similar items in a supermarket, but their farm is literally down the street from my house and their livestock is pastured and well cared for. Money doesn't grow on trees, I eat a lot less meat than I used to, but I find that I enjoy my meals a lot more now.
• guard-of-terra 14y ago
  Yes, if you eat healthy you will live a longer life. But why lenghten the agony?
  • mistercow 14y ago
    If you eat healthy, you'll also feel better. As you get used to different foods, you'll find your tastes shift and that things you previously found unappetizing are actually really delicious. The only real downsides to improving your diet are completely temporary.
• vanderZwan 14y ago
  Or on a similar note, demand better treatment of animals.