4 ms·

A basic vegetarian argument is that meat is inefficient compared to grain, and there just isn't enough resource. But if this were true, then older cultures with

• pdx 12y ago
  Exactly. I grew up on cattle ranches in Montana and Wyoming. The short growing season, rocky soil, and dry conditions would make any attempt at farming laughable, but the cattle did just fine. Driving them into the high mountains for summer grazing allowed the mountain grass to also be converted to beef. None of that land was appropriate to farming, which means that any beef grown there is extra food for the planet. What always amazes me about capitalism is how it often manages to allocate resources efficiently. Nobody is raising large cattle herds down in farm country. Land that can be farmed is generally farmed, because that provides the best return. Land that can't be farmed, is ranched. This idea that you have to give up farming to have meat doesn't take this into account.
  • beat 12y ago
    This doesn't mean corn-fed meat isn't wasteful, of course. But it does mean that meat itself isn't the cause of hunger elsewhere.
    • Lawtonfogle 12y ago
      If it is wasteful, I wonder how much is caused by corn subsidies.
  • astazangasta 12y ago
    Yes, it does. You just don't realize that we've used up all available pasture land.
    • pdx 12y ago
      Nonsense. There is pasture land that is not being used to capacity that would be used if beef prices increased. Go take a drive through rural America and Canada. You and Malthus like to extrapolate, but extrapolation is rarely a smart idea, unless you're trying to scare people. Just like there will never be a day when we go from having oil to not having oil, the same will occur with meat. As the demand for a commodity outpaces supply, the price will rise. Some people will find ways to use less of the commodity, some people will find ways to replace the commodity, and some people will find ways to increase the supply of the commodity, now that the higher price allows more expensive methods to be profitably used.
• koberstein 12y ago
  What resources did older cultures have less of?
  • beat 12y ago
    Energy, information, and complex machinery. Try moving 500 bushels of stuff a quarter mile with a tractor, and without it.
• astazangasta 12y ago
  This is only true when there is plenty of grass available. In fact, you're wholly incorrect because of the extent to which we've used up this planet as an input for meat production. We've essentially turned all of the available arable land into farmland, and all of the available grassland into pasture. There is nothing left but forest, and we are quickly replacing that to our great detriment. We are tapped out. If the rest of the planet starts eating meat at the rate that the first world does (~150 kg of beef per person per year), we'll need another planet to feed them. There is literally not enough land to do it on. I recommend this XKCD for an idea of the scale to which we've appropriated Earth for raising our livestock: https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/ And this UN FAO report, "Livestock's long shadow", on how much of Earth we've actually used for raising livestock, and the devastating environmental consequences: http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.htm http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.htm edit: adding this figure from the report about land usage just so you understand the situation clearly: http://i.imgur.com/rvbCwA0.png http://i.imgur.com/rvbCwA0.png
  • beat 12y ago
    Historically, my argument is correct. There is a strong argument that Green Revolution agricultural techniques have changed the equation substantially, and our current meat consumption is without historical precedent. But that doesn't make my argument incorrect - just opens up the fact that we need to think differently now. Green Revolution agriculture would be destructive even if it were 100% vegetarian.
    • astazangasta 12y ago
      No, it really wouldn't, not to the same extent. 90%, literally, of agriculture is used to feed animals for meat production. If we were all vegetarian, our impact on the planet would literally be 10 fold lower in these terms. Historically, your argument is correct, but you're inferring that meat is efficient in the present, when it plainly is not. The planet is resource-strapped, and meat consumption is the main reason. And this is without a majority of earth eating a meat-heavy diet.
      • 12y ago
• plongeur 12y ago
  Your argument is wrong for obvious reasons. Of course you have to invest loads of resources into a single cow before you can eat it ... I mean that's not hard to grasp. Furthermore it is completely pointless to compare economics of ancient cultures with a modern industrialized civilization.
• DanBC 12y ago
  > But if this were true, then older cultures with far less resources would never have wasted food on raising meat. Clearly, they did. Partly they didn't, they hunted the animal. Or the animal provided other stuff - milk, eggs, leather, bones. People need a source of protien that contains all the amino acids they need and for earlier societies meat is an easy way robust way to get that. And earlier societies were not great anout effificent ise of land and animals. The near extinction of the Amercan bison is one examples.
  • beat 12y ago
    Agricultural societies completely trounced hunting societies. Hunting has been mostly sport in all but far corners of humanity for thousands of years. Humans have been raising cows, pigs, sheep, chickens, llamas, and other animals for food (and other things) since even before plant agriculture. And if you can't till the land efficiently, sheep and cattle are a very efficient use of it. If you can, having pigs and chickens eat the plant waste is also very efficient.