I know folks who are very conservative, evangelical Christians who are also Vegans, some who are also vegetarians. I know some very left, very liberal people who are into Earth Religions who are omnivores (one who was even doing the Atkins diet for a while). I just don't think you can lump people into definitive groups like that.

I know hippies, too. Some of them used to be hippies but are now hard-working members of society, some who are still kids trying to figure out how the world works.

Ain't life grand?

I've decided, most of the time anyway, that my political beliefs are my own, my food habits are my own business, my religious beliefs are important to me but usually it doesn't matter if you know them or not and the drugs I take are between me and my physicians. Do I care what you think? Yes, but only because it may give me a better picture of who you are. Will it cause me to put up a box around you? I sincerely hope not. Do I want you to think like I do? Sometimes, but I see no point in badgering you about it.

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I know hippies, too. Some of them used to be hippies but are now hard-working members of society

So, they sold out, huh?

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I just don't think you can lump people into definitive groups like that.

Is that referring to what I said? I didn't think it was, but I can't imagine what else you are referring to.

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Originally posted by Seanahan:

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I just don't think you can lump people into definitive groups like that.

Is that referring to what I said? I didn't think it was, but I can't imagine what else you are referring to.

I think she's referring to my comment that I don't know any Christian vegetarians.

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I've decided, most of the time anyway, that my political beliefs are my own, my food habits are my own business, my religious beliefs are important to me...Do I want you to think like I do? Sometimes, but I see no point in badgering you about it.

Oh, my God...how I wish more Americans believed like you do, CW. I couldn't agree with you more on this.

To me any human life is more important than any animal life, and there we disagree, Cat. Perhaps it's the nurse in me, or maybe it's my optimism that there is some good in everyone. Don't get me wrong; I love my dog and cat and all the various pets we've had over our lifetime (well...the ferrets were a little annoying!), but they were pets and not humans. I also loathe anyone who mistreats animals. However, to me, it is clear...black and white clear...that humans are more important. As CW says, "Ain't life grand!" I love hearing the differing views on this, though this is one time when no one will change my mind.

I also agree that people who are vegans are of different religions, cultures and political views.

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Originally posted by Kalleh:

To me any human life is more important than any animal life, and there we disagree, Cat. Perhaps it's the nurse in me, or maybe it's my optimism that there is some good in everyone. Don't get me wrong; I love my dog and cat and all the various pets we've had over our lifetime (well...the ferrets were a little annoying!), but they were pets and not humans. I also loathe anyone who mistreats animals. However, to me, it is clear...black and white clear...that humans are more important. .

Our views diverge on this matter, Kalleh. To me, it depends on which animal vs. which human we are comparing. I'm afraid I would choose my dog's life over the life of some humans. My dog is innocent; humans are not, and many are far from admirable, as we all know.

If humans were so precious, we wouldn't execute them, send them off to be killed in Iraq, let babies starve to death in Africa, etc.

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To me, it depends on which animal vs. which human we are comparing. I'm afraid I would choose my dog's life over the life of some humans. My dog is innocent; humans are not, and many are far from admirable, as we all know.

If humans were so precious, we wouldn't execute them, send them off to be killed in Iraq, let babies starve to death in Africa, etc.

I don't believe in execution, and I support anything we can do about world poverty. As for the war comment, since this isn't a political forum, I think I will leave that one alone. You know my personal views on that.

However, we just can't get into the situation where we value an animal's life over a human's life. There was the mention above of someone perhaps being a sex offender. Yes, that could be the case. However, as with capital punishment, one must be 100% certain that the crime was committed before we choose death. I never think we can be 100% sure of anything.

Were there a cute dog in the road, perhaps one who has saved a child's life, along with an elderly gentleman, and you were driving along and had to hit one or the other...would you choose the elderly gentleman because, after all, he is about to die soon anyway? It seems so...and that just sounds very odd to me.

No matter what the politics are or what one has accomplished in life or what his/her color or religion or culture is, I consider human life to be very precious, and I always will. Surely not everyone is as productive as the next, but that's what makes people diverse. Wouldn't it be boring if all humans were like Einstein or Sister Theresa? Yes, there are bad people and humans make some bad decisions, but we must value human life highly.

You have every right to disagree with me Kalleh, and I respect your viewpoint, even though mine differs somewhat. As you say, it'd be boring if we were all alike!

One thing though:

would you choose the elderly gentleman because, after all, he is about to die soon anyway? It seems so...

I don't think that's what Sunflower's saying at all; it certainly isn't what I said. We (correct me if I'm wrong, Sunflower), were saying that we would choose our animal friends over some humans (although again, real life doesn't usually provide one with such choices which is why I'm not keen on 'who would you choose?'-type arguments. If you replaced the animal in your roadkill example with a much younger person I'd find it hard to justify killing the old man just because he was old - I find life to be precious regardless of age and an older person has just as much right to be here - and be just as valuable to society - as a younger one). I also agree that you have to be 100% certain about something before considering capital punishment (or any severe punishment), but that's why I said in my earlier post 'someone you saw kill your family' - I was trying to sidestep the proof issue and concentrate on my opinion that human life isn't more precious than non-human life simply because it is human. The 'some' humans beings I was talking about in response to the 'I'd always choose human lfe over animal life' comment are included not because of age, but because of actions. And not unproductivity or regretted mistakes: objectively evil actions. Which is why I went for sex offenders as the other example. You cannot sexually assault someone accidentally (whereas you can commit some other crimes unintentionally), and someone who's done that kind of thing to a terrified woman or child has a particular evil to them and is more than likely to do it again.

What people have to remember is that by saying that human life is not more precious than animal life, I am NOT saying that the opposite must therefore be true. That's illogical. There's a third option, and this is the one to which I subscribe: All life is precious, regardless of age, sex, ethnicity, sexuality, disability, (...) or species.

I don't expect everyone to agree with me, of course - just as I don't agree with everything everyone else thinks. It's how I feel though, and I'm glad to be part of a community where I can express that without ridicule, only respectful debate .

Surely it is all respectful debate, both with you and Sunflower. I was just trying to understand what Sunflower was saying. With the following statement, I thought she was advocating judging people and animals, as in, "This one is saved; this one is killed; etc."

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To me, it depends on which animal vs. which human we are comparing. I'm afraid I would choose my dog's life over the life of some humans.

I just can't agree with capital punishment, no matter what the person has done. The person should go to jail and stay there. Once you feel that way, you don't have to worry about what is saved, the animal or the person. So that may be the conundrum I am having.

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Surely it is all respectful debate

That's what I meant, Kalleh - I was complimenting everyone! It's so nice to be able to have occasional discussions like this that don't degenerate into something nasty, as I've seen happen on other sites (which has in the past put me off joining sites that I'd otherwise have been interested in).

This tangent though is precisely the reason why I really dislike hypothetical arguments. They detract from the real issue at hand, which to me in this instance is that I value all life equally. No preference according to species; all equal. Different individuals over others: of course; we all do that - we're human. We'll celebrate the fact that our friends are safe after a disaster, even as we feel for those who weren't so lucky.

The thing is that whenever this particular subject comes up in conversation and I give my philosophy, I can guarantee that someone will then come out with the 'who would you save?' question (in the same way I can guarantee that when mentioning my vegetarian status some wag will point out that my shoes are leather. They're not, so nur ). It's like asking a parent which of their children they'd save first: it adds nothing to the argument and is therefore irrelevant. Would I save an unknown dog over an unknown human? My cat over a stranger? An unknown dog over my brother? My cat over my brother? My brother over my (human) best friend? The list goes on, and everyone ends up getting tangled up in the ever-increasing imaginary situations and moving further away from the original point.

Changing the subject to the other issue that's been raised in the last couple of posts, I agree that perpetrators of certain crimes should go to jail and stay there (although sadly, that doesn't happen anymore), and for what it's worth I'm iffy over capital punishment because of the risk of killing an innocent person. But then, being put in prison for the rest of your life when innocent can't be much fun either. I wish I could say that justice and the law are the same thing, because then only the guilty would get punished.

Cat, living in cloud cuckoo land

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As we cannot yet talk properly to non-human animals, we can't say for sure what they're capable of thinking and feeling,

We've come pretty close with some of the primates who've been taught sign language. Clearly they do have feelings AND thoughts!

Yes, good point. It's incredible stuff. And if scientists didn't think animals were capable of emotion they wouldn't use them in those horrific psychological experiements which tell us handy things like 'a baby monkey given electric shocks by that which it considers to be its mother every time it tries to hug 'her' (i.e. simulated maternal rejection) becomes depressed and withdrawn'.

We've come pretty close with some of the primates who've been taught sign language. Clearly they do have feelings AND thoughts!

If I recall, there was an excellent piece published in Language Log about that, with the conclusion being that primates (and animals) really don't learn language. I must see if I can find it; I vaguely remember that discussion.

However, that's another subject altogether. While I respect all life certainly (my daughter used to shoo flies and spiders out of the house instead of killing them!), I do value all human life above all plant and animal life. BTW, Cat, do you feel the same way about plants? How is it you separate them, if you don't? If you do, what in the world do you eat and wear?

Lol - now you're just being awkward!

Seriously though, you raise a good point. It's a difficult issue and one to which I've put a lot of thought. There have been studies suggesting plants feel things like pain (or the plant equivalent thereof), and of course they are life forms too, so eating them poses another moral problem. Some people are fruitarians because they believe you shouldn't eat the whole of a plant and extinguish its life completely, but in that case you're concentrating on effectively eating its babies - so where do you stop?

In a nutshell, we're all interdependent on this planet and that means that some of us will inevitably use others for survival (after all, if I ate neither plants nor animals I'd die, so I have to consume some of my fellow Earth-dwellers). The trick is to do it with gratitude and appreciation of what the other life form is giving up, as little impact on the environment as possible, and certainly no cruelty. I try to take the Shamanistic approach: take what you need from the Earth with care, respect and empathy, and give something back whenever possible.

Incidentally, I don't actually have so much of a problem with eating meat per se (it's something I'm in two minds on); the problem I have is with intensive farming and cruel slaughter practices. I'd rather people ate meat less often (which is what we're geared up to do anyway; we're not meant to eat it every day). That way, there'd be less demand for meat, fewer animals being bred, no need for huge intensive farms and those animals still destined for the slaughterhouse would have a better life in the outdoors where they belong.

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fruitarians

Why stop at the ripened ovaries of plants? Become a breatharian. Live on light or prana or prawn salad (whoops). Here and here.

Lol - they scare me.

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Some people are fruitarians because they believe you shouldn't eat the whole of a plant and extinguish its life completely, but in that case you're concentrating on effectively eating its babies - so where do you stop?

Nonsense. Fruit wants to be eaten. That's why it changes color from green to something more noticable like orange, red, or yellow when it is ripe. It's Nature's way of saying "Hello! Eat me! And then poop out my seeds somewhere far away from here, if you don't mind."

Chickens, sheep, cows and other domesticated animals want to be eaten as well. It was a deal we struck with them a long, long time ago: you let us eat you, and we will make sure you don't go extinct. And it was pretty cushy deal for them, since they were going to get eaten in any case. Lesson #1 in biology is Everybody's Gotta Eat Something, and lesson #2 is Everybody's Eventually Gonna Get Eaten By Something, Including You. That's life in the food chain.

Desi Arnaz is presently food for worms, a concept you tend to not want to dwell on if you're an Ameircan.

(And yet another thread comes full circle.)

We did rather get off-topic here, didn't we?

I have been looking through some Language Log links to find that information I mentioned previously about animals not really understanding language. I will continue to look, but in the meantime I did find this conclusion from Mark Liberman of Language Log. He says that he has learned 2 lessons based on the history of research in this area. They are:

~ It's hard to design experiments that distinguish clearly between knowledge of signs and knowledge of symbols, or between the use of communicative gestures as tools and lingustic communication.

~ Some animal communication researchers don't believe that there is a difference. In some cases, this is may be because they have considered the distinction and rejected it; but in other cases, they have not really thought about the issue.

BTW, just think of the weight I'd lose were I a breatharian!

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just think of the weight

Unfortunately, a women in Scotland starved herself to death trying to become a breatharian. Sad.

From Wikipedia:

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Breatharians believe that the body can be sustained solely by prana (the vital life force in Hinduism), or according to some, by the energy in sunlight.

The breatharians have one thing right. We're all sustained by the energy of sunlight. We can't process it directly, except for the production of Vitamin D, sunburn, and skin cancer. All animals get their food directly or indirectly from plants and cyanobacteria (blue-green algae). Only plants and cyanobacteria are able to convert sunlight into food via photosynthesis and, in the bargain, they produce the oxygen we breath. What a deal!

Tinman

Well, what the heck. I have to post this...the Chicago Tribune must have been reading this thread because they had a review today of all the Chicago restaurants that do a fine job of serving both vegans and meat eaters. Here is how they introduced the story:
"The hostess taking the dinner reservation asked if our party would have any special requirements.

One of us is a vegan, we said.

Could she be accommodated?

Of course, the hostess assured us.

No problem at all.

There was a five-second pause.

'Uh, can you spell vegan?'"

Lesson #1 in biology is Everybody's Gotta Eat Something

Indeed. That was pretty much my point when I said "if I ate neither plants nor animals I'd die, so I have to consume some of my fellow Earth-dwellers".

As for the 'deal' with farm animals, I can see you were being facetious, but even so, I'd say that intensive factory farming/force feeding/growth hormones and massive doses of antibiotics show how humans have reneged horrendously.


'Uh, can you spell vegan?'

Love it, Kalleh! Great example of the service industry promising something before it knows whether it can actually deliver . Of course, reading the article has made me hungry now...

Interesting that the artcle suggested vegetarians eat gelatine and vegans don't. I've never yet met a vegeatarian who doesn't avoid gelatine. The distinction usually is that vegetarians won't eat anything that's involved the actual death of an animal (eggs are a grey area for some, but tend generally to be unfertilised) - so gelatine is definitely off limits, as is cochineal and certain animal-based additives.

Finally, isn't it funny how fruit changes to bright colours because it wants to be eaten, but animals develop bright colours because they don't?

Sometimes, animals develop bright colors for very different reasons. In certain species of bird, the females are predisposed towards liking males with brighter colors. Thus, the brighter males breed more, and a couple thousand years go and all of those birds are bright.

Other species did develop bright colors, mostly to mimic other bright colored species who were venomous/poisonous. Logically, the latter had to develop bright colors first, unless there was some weird dual evolution going on, which seems quite unlikely. Of course, prior to the development of mnemonic devices, no one could tell the difference between many of these species. "Red to yellow, kill a fellow. Red to black, venom lack", is still taught by the Boy Scouts.

Of course, most species develop the opposite direction, and prefer to blend into their environment to avoid predatation. Predators always take the same approach. Often this similarity results in "evolutionary arms races". An example of this in a different category, speed, is the cheetah and the gazelle.

Now that I'm completely off topic, let me say that from a standpoint of millions of years of human evolution, being a vegan is just about the silliest thing a person can do.

We all atart as unorganised collections of atoms and that's how we will all end up, somewhere around a century later. That's pretty simple. The difficult bit to deal with is the intervening period we call "life"

That's where we need to make decisions about "values" - no one of which is absolute, no one of which is universal and any of which can be justified in one way or another. Sadly we can't argue with beliefs and values using facts, since all beliefs and values happen emontionally - although many try to use facts to justify them.

Which is why arguments about such things as the sanctity of life are ultimately pointless since the very concept is a personal value judgement.

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As for the 'deal' with farm animals, I can see you were being facetious, but even so, I'd say that intensive factory farming/force feeding/growth hormones and massive doses of antibiotics show how humans have reneged horrendously.

Facetious? Moi? Not at all. It's a symbiotic relationship. Aurochs are extinct; cattle are doing quite well. Wolves are endangered, dogs aren't. It is actually very difficult to domesticate a species. If I remember correctly, there are only about 60 domesticated species in the world, and about a dozen comprise the vast majority of domesticated animals. Most species won't cooperate. Even elephants aren't included -- they are merely tamed. However, your point about factory farms and antibiotics is well-taken.

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The distinction usually is that vegetarians won't eat anything that's involved the actual death of an animal (eggs are a grey area for some, but tend generally to be unfertilised) - so gelatine is definitely off limits, as is cochineal and certain animal-based additives.

But the girl in the article wouldn't even eat honey???

While in the hospital patients are often on what we call a "clear liquid" diet after certain surgeries or other procedures. Therefore, I know a little about gelatin because often we offer jello to these patients. There are 2 types of gelatin. One type does have an animal base (pork, so our Muslim and Orthodox Jewish patients can't have it), but there is another type of gelatin that has a plant base (seaweed, I think, but I am not certain). Vegans, vegetarians, Orthodox Jews and Muslims can all eat that type of gelatin.

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Originally posted by neveu:
Everybody's Gotta Eat Something

As Farmer Vincent said, "Meat's meat, and man's gotta eat!"

True, fruits "want" to be eaten. Fruits contain the seeds that produce the next generation of plants. Evolution has produced fleshy fruits to ensure that the seeds would be passed along. Not only do the seeds pass through the animal, they are ejected with a good dose of fertilizer!

But animals do not "want" to be eaten. They stick around for the food we give them. Through selective breeding we've produced animals that have the traits we want, traits that are usually not conducive to their survival in the wild but which are conducive to our food supply. Animals no more want to be eaten by us than we want to be eaten by the worms that will eventually invade our coffins.

Tinman

[QUOTE
But animals do not "want" to be eaten. [/QUOTE]

It seems to me that some obnoxious young people are being bred just for that purpose, since I hear them shouting, "Eat me!" an awful lot.

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But animals do not "want" to be eaten. They stick around for the food we give them.

True enough. I don't "want" to go to work. I just stick around for the money they give me.

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Animals no more want to be eaten by us than we want to be eaten by the worms that will eventually invade our coffins.

Speak for yourself. Some of us want to be eaten.

I don't know whether to laugh at that article or just try to get over the creepy crawly feeling I have. Ew!

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It seems to me that some obnoxious young people are being bred just for that purpose, since I hear them shouting, "Eat me!" an awful lot.

I can't say I've heard it said over here. In what context is this plea made?

"Eat me" is used as an epithet, very similar to saying "bite me" or "screw you". It's one of the things said when there is a shouting match or power struggle going on . . . or when someone insults you and you want a pithy (albeit rude) comeback.

Hmm. It doesn't seem to have caught on here - although I confess I find I have little in common with youth these days.

I am a grumpy old man and happy so to be!

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I am a grumpy old man and happy so to be!

I beg to differ. Grumpy old men do not drink cask conditioned ale!

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I beg to differ. Grumpy old men do not drink cask conditioned ale!

Well, Stewart and I agree that we are both grumpy and pedantic - and we surely do drink a lot of Real Ale.

Pedantic....maybe...!

Kalleh, this is what the Vegan Society says about beekeeping. Many vegans are divided on this one, as it is possible to eat honey from bees that are not treated in this way (e.g from a small, local hive).

Because most vegetarians/vegans are that way inclinced because of animal welfare, it'd be possible, I think, for an otherwise-vegan to keep chickens (running free in a huge garden) and eat the eggs - just not kill them when they cease to become prolific layers, instead allowing them a peaceful retirement. Eating them when they die naturally would be a matter of personal choice, I imagine!

As for your comments on gelatine, you're right that there are veggie versions of gelling agents, such as pectin (which means I can eat M & S strawberry trifles - heaven!), but I've never seen anything labelled as 'gelatine' that's also veggie - I wonder if that's a UK/US labelling difference?

And Seanahan, leaving aside your rather insulting comment that people trying to tread lightly on the Earth and not be involved in animal exploitation are 'silly', are you aware that the consumption of dairy is considered by many to be counter-evolutionary and unnatural? The Physician's Committe for Responsible Medicine states that (apoloogies for the long quotation):

'Overall, about 75 percent of the world's population, including 25 percent of those in the United States, lose their lactase enzymes after weaning. (Hertzler SR, Huynh BCL, Savaiano DA. How much lactose is low lactose? J Am Dietetic Asso 1996;96:243-6.) The recognition of this fact has resulted in an important change in terminology: Those who could not digest milk were once called "lactose intolerant" or "lactase deficient." They are now regarded as normal <my emphasis>, while those adults who retain the enzymes allowing them to digest milk are called "lactase persistent."'

I'm not yet a vegan (for personal reasons I'm not going to go into), but I aspire to be one, and I respect those who already are.

I'll miss ice cream like you wouldn't believe, though

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Cat,

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but I've never seen anything labelled as 'gelatine' that's also veggie - I wonder if that's a UK/US labelling difference?

That must be a UK/US difference because it is quite clear here which gelatin can be used for vegans and certain religions, such as Judaism and Muslims.

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are you aware that the consumption of dairy is considered by many to be counter-evolutionary and unnatural?

There's no such thing as "counter-evolutionary and unnatural". Certain populations retained lactase because they co-evolved with domesticated cattle.

The figures I've read suggest that more populations co-evolved with domesticated cattle than actually retained lactase. Throughout the world populations have lived with domesticated bovines for generations, but even then, fewer within them have developed the ability to digest the milk than one would expect. I was surprised when I first read the figures how many people can't tolerate dairy.

My point remains that it is not as 'normal' to drink milk outside of infancy - and from another mammal at that - as we have been led to believe. Carnival geeks have developed the ability to ingest many weird items without ill-effects, but that doesn't mean we all should.

And taking the medical points aside, morally speaking it wouldn't be so bad if we were sharing small amounts of milk with the calf (as would have been the case years ago), but that's not how it happens on intensive dairy farms. There's something a little sick about taking a baby away from his mother so someone else can drink his milk.

Remember, the problem I have is mainly with the animal exploitation involved (over-milking; constant pregnancies; unwanted calves sent to veal crates, etc). The health-related figures I've quoted to show that even if one isn't bothered about animal welfare, there are other issues that suggest veganism (or whatever) isn't 'silly'.

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Originally posted by Cat:
The figures I've read suggest that more populations co-evolved with domesticated cattle than actually retained lactase.

Cat, you know I respect your views even when we disagree so I'm a bit hesitant to mention this but you yourself pointed out in another thread that statistics can be used to "prove" anything. Your moral arguments have some force but I'm skeptical of the medical ones.

(And while I'm cross-threading how about "you yourself" for a repetetive redundancy?)

Oh absolutely Bob - I thought the same myself when posting it!

I was just trying to point out that there are sound reasons - medical and moral - for veganism as opposed to it being a mere folly, and that the resources are out there for anyone to look up should they want to check it out for themselves. I quoted the first website I found that wasn't potentially inflammatory and that backed up its argument with quotations from studies, but there are plenty more out there that will agree or disagree, and that will be able to find studies that back up their arguments.

It's up to the individual to study them if they want to and draw their own conclusions. For what it's worth, after doing so myself, I've come to believe that dairy intolerance is widespread enough that milk isn't as staple or necessary a foodstuff for human beings as it's marketed to be. I'm fully prepared to change my mind if I ever find enough studies proving otherwise: for example, it may be that modern milk is difficult to digest because intensive farming procedures have led to an inferior type of milk being produced, in the same way that (apparently) modern wheat bears little resemblence to the wheat our ancestors ate, which is why many wheat-intolerants can eat spelt flour, which has remained pretty much the same. You never know.

As for 'you yourself' - I don't know. On the one hand it is redundant, on the other it emphasises the original pronoun, and can work to point it out a little more strongly than just 'you' (or 'I' or whatever). Have you cross-posted it? *goes to check*

There's a Russian religious sect called the Molokons (Milk drinkers) that sprang up under the reign of Ivan the Terrible, so the idea of drinking milk outside infancy isn't just something promoted by our present dairy industry.

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Molokons

A friend of mine's landlord when he was growing up was a Molokan named Rassokhin. More informations.

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My point remains that it is not as 'normal' to drink milk outside of infancy

I think you could make this case for just about any kind of foodstuff. Humans are probably the most ominiverous of all animals and, as humans lack the specialised mouths and digestive systems of other animals, there will surely be times when a particular kind of foodstuff that suits one, won't suit another. Lactose intolerance is only one example - many people cannot tolerate gluten - but I suggest that such intolerances do not indicate that a particular foodstuff is "naturally" wrong - just that a particular human's digestive system can't deal with it. I would challenge anyone to define humankind's "natural" foodstuff - although one Science Fiction story did make a strong case for one particular kind of meat.

Most animals, especially those in the "lower" orders, have very particular requirements as to foodstuff - this plant, that flower, the other animals fur - and thus have no intolerances. Of course, if that foodstuff isn't avaliable, they just die out. No more Ragwort? No more Cinnabar moths. I prefer the human way of adapting one's food to oneself rather than adapting oneself to one's food.

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Originally posted by Richard English:

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My point remains that it is not as 'normal' to drink milk outside of infancy

I think you could make this case for just about any kind of foodstuff. Humans are probably the most ominiverous of all animals and, as humans lack the specialised mouths and digestive systems of other animals, there will surely be times when a particular kind of foodstuff that suits one, won't suit another. Lactose intolerance is only one example - many people cannot tolerate gluten - but I suggest that such intolerances do not indicate that a particular foodstuff is "naturally" wrong - just that a particular human's digestive system can't deal with it. I would challenge anyone to define humankind's "natural" foodstuff - although one Science Fiction story did make a strong case for one particular kind of meat.

Most animals, especially those in the "lower" orders, have very particular requirements as to foodstuff - this plant, that flower, the other animals fur - and thus have no intolerances. Of course, if that foodstuff isn't avaliable, they just die out. No more Ragwort? No more Cinnabar moths. I prefer the human way of adapting one's food to oneself rather than adapting oneself to one's food.

Pseudo-science.

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although one Science Fiction story did make a strong case for one particular kind of meat.

Which SF story are we talking about?

Which SF story are we talking about?

I'm assuming Richard's talking about Soylent Green, but I can't remember the name of the original story as I've never read it.

To be fair, Jonathan Swift came up with the same solution to overpopulation several centuries earlier with his Modest Proposal .

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I can't remember the name of the original story as I've never read it.

Harry Harrison's Make Room! Make Room!