[HN Gopher] The richer people get, the more meat they eat
___________________________________________________________________
The richer people get, the more meat they eat
Author : pseudolus
Score : 94 points
Date : 2022-07-30 16:57 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (spectrum.ieee.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (spectrum.ieee.org)
| paulpauper wrote:
| I wonder how much this accounts for obesity
| pravus wrote:
| >This probably explains the obesity crisis too >Meat is much
| more calorie dense compared to vegetable
|
| >I wonder how much this accounts for obesity
|
| From my experience, probably very little. I've been hard-core
| keto for almost 10 years now. I initially lost 100lbs and I've
| easily maintained a healthy weight ever since. The vast
| majority of my diet is meat and fat and I do not count
| calories.
| bicijay wrote:
| Yeah... i doubt it. My bet would still go to carb rich diets
| with sugar and processed foods...
| dominotw wrote:
| that has opposite correlation with wealth, atleast in the west.
| ianai wrote:
| Past is not indicative of the future when dealing with hugely
| Complicated systems. Empirical models are only as good as the
| data under them. The pricing models used in the infamous mortgage
| backed securities that brought the world the 2008 Great Recession
| were trained on data before the SL crisis. Further, fully all of
| human pollutions until the mid 90s were subsequently surpassed in
| the emissions from then until now. There just is no reason to
| argue about these topics with simple graphs and lazy "theories".
|
| This article is just slightly better than middlebrow drizzle in
| data. But worse because it promulgates bad ideas.
| captainbland wrote:
| I find the biology argument a little strange as it's quite clear
| that humans can happily survive whether they eat animal products
| or not. Whether somebody is vegan or not in the modern world is
| much more to do with the social situation that they find
| themselves in, along with the availability of vegan foods that
| appeal to their tastes than anything to do with chimpanzees.
|
| It's also the case that there has been an explosion of choice in
| vegan foods, particularly meat substitutes, that has really only
| come around in the last few years. So looking at trends over a 50
| year window isn't going to capture that.
|
| I'm not even a vegan, for what it's worth. But this article
| basically seems to hold up historical trends as immutable facts
| and extrapolates from there which is not very convincing in the
| changing situation that we find ourselves in.
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| I tried going almost meat free for a good decade (largely
| thanks to huel, which allow you to eat enough protein to
| workout).
|
| Everything was fine until I hit 30s.
|
| I started having serious stomach issues that doctors blamed on
| "stress" or the misteries of the gut. Over two years I dropped
| huel, gradually went back to meat, dairy and vegetables and
| grains.
|
| I still had painful, bloody and explosive episodes.
|
| I started eating a carnivore diet and all the symptoms
| disappeared in a week. I also lost 7kg.
|
| This made me revaluate everything I believed in nutrition. I
| realised that the reasons for introducing a vegetarian diet as
| part of USDA was pretty much baseless and that USDA backpedaled
| on fat consumption being bad.
|
| At this point I frankly doubt much of the research on nutrition
| and I'm not sure if I buy the reasons to avoid meat.
|
| Is there really a link between meat and cancer and cardio
| diseases or are you just trying to sell me some preprocessed
| vegan crap?
| Cederfjard wrote:
| The thing is that you can't look at evolution and sexual
| selection from the perspective of "this particular thing makes
| the most sense or seems to be the optimum, and so of course
| nature has made things such".
|
| An urge can be very strong and provide just a little benefit,
| and still remain. It can be weak and enormously beneficial, and
| still just be prevalent in a small part of the population. It
| can even be not beneficial at all, and just be a remnant from
| when it was, or even a byproduct of something else.
|
| So you can't discount biology, especially when looking at the
| wider population, just because you think that for whatever
| reason whatever the thing that caused the evolutional pressure
| for the behavior you're observing isn't valid anymore. And even
| if that's true, you're probably lagging a few hundred, thousand
| or tens of thousands of years behind.
| cassianoleal wrote:
| > it's quite clear that humans can happily survive whether they
| eat animal products or not
|
| Perhaps, but survival is not the only point of eating and
| shouldn't be the ultimate measure of your success as a human
| being. A balanced meat-free diet is not easy. You need to be
| very aware of the compromises you're making and compensate for
| them either through much more thought put into your food
| choices or supplementation. The BBC published an interesting
| article a while ago on the topic [0].
|
| > Whether somebody is vegan or not in the modern world is much
| more to do with the social situation that they find themselves
| in, along with the availability of vegan foods that appeal to
| their tastes than anything to do with chimpanzees.
|
| This seems to be a case of science and culture working around
| biology. It doesn't really contradict the biological argument.
|
| [0] https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200127-how-a-vegan-
| diet...
| captainbland wrote:
| The point from the article that I'm really concerned with is:
|
| > It is well to keep this biological fact in mind when
| considering outlandish claims about the imminent victory of
| veganism.
|
| And while 'victory' is loosely defined, appears to come from
| the idea that:
|
| > much of the world is trending towards plant-based eating
|
| My point is exactly that if the "work around" (as you put it)
| works then the argument that biological history will
| necessarily prevent veganism from becoming more popular no
| longer really holds, precisely because we can "work around"
| it.
|
| I don't really take issue with the idea that biology has to
| one degree or another helped to shape dietary habits today,
| just that the historical trend may not hold in the future in
| the face of social (which I take to include scientific)
| change.
| wszfahwbwbaha wrote:
| it's really not that hard that's just meat propaganda. Been
| vegan 10 years and still somehow manage to boulder at a high
| level without even thinking about my diet
| sinsterizme wrote:
| That's great for you, but it's quite common for vegans to
| suffer from b12 deficiency. And that's just a commonly
| tested one but meat also contains iron, taurine, creatine,
| and a lot more that is hard to get from non meat sources.
| Personally I went low meat (not even close to vegan) and
| suffered. My b12 was low normal, yet I definitely felt the
| effects.
| drooby wrote:
| Just want to add that I eat mostly vegetarian/vegan and
| bouldering at v4 level. Also very easily gaining muscle
| and not thinking too much about my diet. Just paid for
| every possible blood test that my doctor could provide
| and everything was in healthy ranges. Truth is... taking
| a b12 vitamin a few times per week and having some vegan
| protein shakes a few times per week is super easy. Truth
| is... there a lot of vegans that just don't have super
| basic knowledge about the diet. But it's actually super
| easy to figure it out if you put in maybe 1-2 days of
| research.
|
| Also, something like one third of all Americans have low-
| normal b12 levels. A lot more people should be
| supplementing in general.
| Maursault wrote:
| > But it's actually super easy to figure it out if you
| put in maybe 1-2 days of research.
|
| Vegans always say this. It is not true, or it is only
| half true, because you may gain the knowledge but very
| often still not have any options. I am vegetarian (cheese
| is my protein source because though I love the bean, it
| is a bitch to prepare). I am terrible at vegetarianism,
| but it isn't my fault. Nearly everything available has
| some animal byproduct in it, and nearly everything
| available is also not all that healthy, filled with sugar
| and salt. It takes something like a detective's mind and
| drive to sift through a grocery store and find things
| that are actually good for you unless you prepare every
| meal from its most basic constituents. On the road? Good
| luck finding vegan or vegetarian meals. I honestly find
| it offensive that everything everywhere is based on the
| meat eater's diet with either one single or no decent
| alternative menu item, which is just as likely to be mac
| and cheese.
|
| It is terribly annoying and difficult to eat healthy and
| vegetarian, let alone vegan, especially in the South and
| in the sticks. It takes virtuous dedication and extreme
| vigilance, while carnivores need take no effort
| whatsoever. I don't understand why there isn't a
| vegan/vegetarian national chain restaurant, and one
| without bazaar menu items no one's ever heard of. Veggie
| fast food is a great idea, would draw crowds, but it
| simply does not exist. Why isn't half the frozen section
| filled with vegetarian and healthy TV dinners? Why isn't
| the free market pouncing on providing healthy, simply
| healthy, food? Basic, square, vegetarian food is all I am
| after, and not finding it means I am pretty much starving
| myself and settling for meals that really aren't all that
| nutritious.
| therealdrag0 wrote:
| What vegan shake you have?
| drooby wrote:
| Currently using Orgain Peanut Butter and Vega Chocolate.
| The Vega one has some extra minerals and vitamins which
| is nice. Both are super delicious.
|
| Tip... add a splash of vegan creamer to the shake before
| mixing. I like to add Trader Joe's brown sugar oat
| creamer and it makes it heavenly.
| therealdrag0 wrote:
| Cool. Gotchya. I'm not vegan but I drink Huel vanilla for
| breakfast which is vegan.
| someNameIG wrote:
| TheDong wrote:
| > Yet even in those rich countries in which the consumption of
| meat has reached new heights [...] it has led to no demonstrable
| ill effects on health
|
| The article doesn't mention environmental pressures: as we
| grapple with climate change, we'll necessarily have to reduce CO2
| emissions, and meat is a huge contributor to global CO2
| emissions. The health consequences of meat are hard to argue with
| certainty, we really have only a rudimentary understanding of
| health science.
|
| We have a far better understanding of global warming, and we can
| say with certainty that eating less meat will reduce global CO2
| emission. Whether that means the price of meat goes up over time
| (i.e. due to a carbon tax), or laws curb it, that's a factor
| which may overwhelm the article's thesis that "more global wealth
| = more meat eaten"
| lumost wrote:
| Are there any references covering how much CO2 is generated by
| a realistic vegan/vegetarian diet?
|
| It would be easy to identify a theoretically low CO2 diet of
| rice and beans which does not require refrigeration, can be
| dehydrated for transport, grown easily and dense in calories.
| However this _is not_ the diet that I generally see vegetarians
| /vegans eating - or the diet I go for when I eat vegetarian.
|
| I'm suspicious that we look at extremely high quality
| vegetarian foods when we want to claim health benefits, and
| then low quality foods when we want to claim environmental
| efficiency.
| dan-robertson wrote:
| I think the claim is more that raising cattle leads to higher
| methane levels and methane is a much more potent greenhouse gas
| than CO2. There are other environmental or social issues with
| raising animals for meat however (eg inefficient land use,
| animal welfare, deforestation, zoonotic diseases, etc).
|
| I don't buy your argument because I think people are just not
| going to significantly change their behaviours because they are
| scared by some predicted global warming apocalypse, and carbon
| taxes seem unlikely to be supported in democracies for the same
| reason. It seems to me that the only way we will significantly
| curb CO2 emissions is by the environmentally better option
| being cheaper than keeping the worse option, possibly with some
| subsidies to help. It seems this is happening with electricity
| generation now in the US, which is good.
|
| Personally, I find environmental arguments to be stronger but I
| expect any declining meat consumption to be driven by animal
| welfare concerns, cultural changes, availability of
| alternatives, and possibly vegetarian/vegan food becoming
| cheaper or meat becoming more expensive (though that feels a
| bit unlikely currently).
| ravenstine wrote:
| There is not one shed of science that can suggest with any
| amount of confidence that eliminating livestock will make a
| difference with global warming meaningful enough to justify not
| being able to eat the food that we developed to subsist on.
|
| I don't think anyone is suggesting that meat production at
| present doesn't add something to the system, but CO2 and
| methane emitted by the process isn't exactly new. Whether it's
| corn or grass that's being fed on, the carbon being belched out
| by cows comes from the carbon the plants captured from the
| atmosphere before being eaten. While inevitably some carbon is
| going to be consumed from the ground, it is minuscule compared
| to all the other minerals that the plants need to consume. Why
| would they need to get carbon from the ground when
| photosynthesis already necessitates using atmospheric carbon?
| And yes, methane eventually degrades into carbon over around a
| decade or so.
|
| Also, there were far more large grass eating ruminants on
| planes like the North American continent, before humans killed
| the vast majority of them, than there are cows being raised as
| livestock now. We don't even have more cows being raised than a
| decade ago. So trying to reduce meat consumption is not only
| fighting against the atmosphere's own carbon cycle, but the
| same cycle that was occurring in nature at a greater abundance
| before man showed up.
|
| We're better off just not releasing carbon that's trapped in
| the earth's crust, which is what we're doing when we're burning
| fossil fuels, because that wouldn't really be happening at such
| a rapid rate in nature. But no one wants to talk about that. We
| have nuclear, but the hand waving never stops. I don't really
| know what to tell people who think that we need to stop eating
| meat because of global warming when they refuse to advocate for
| nuclear energy.
| roboticmind wrote:
| > There is not one shed of science that can suggest with any
| amount of confidence that eliminating livestock will make a
| difference with global warming meaningful enough to justify
| not being able to eat the food that we developed to subsist
| on.
|
| As long as that gas continues to go into the atmosphere, it's
| going to keep causing problems for climate change. It
| accounts for 14.5% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions[1]
| and a phase out presents a massive opportunity to sequester
| carbon.
|
| > We show that, even in the absence of any other emission
| reductions, persistent drops in atmospheric methane and
| nitrous oxide levels, and slower carbon dioxide accumulation,
| following a phaseout of livestock production would, through
| the end of the century, have the same cumulative effect on
| the warming potential of the atmosphere as a 25 gigaton per
| year reduction in anthropogenic CO2 emissions, providing half
| of the net emission reductions necessary to limit warming to
| 2degC. The magnitude and rapidity of these potential effects
| should place the reduction or elimination of animal
| agriculture at the forefront of strategies for averting
| disastrous climate change.
|
| https://journals.plos.org/climate/article?id=10.1371/journal.
| ..
|
| [1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/sep/07/20-me
| at-...
| Rury wrote:
| Again cows don't emit completely new gas into the
| atmosphere; all gas they emit originally came from the
| atmosphere. So their emissions are not in anyway a problem,
| as it's really just recycled atmosphere.
|
| You'd might argue that they change the composition (eg
| changing it to methane gas), but methane also breaks down
| in the stratosphere. Sure it takes like 100+ years to
| happen, but it's temporary. You can set a population of
| cows, and keep it steady, and the amount of methane and
| other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere attributed to the
| cows won't change after some period of time. Now, growing
| the population of cows will grow this temporary store of
| gas, but cows bodies also are carbon sinks themselves which
| offsets it somewhat. And likewise, as you cite, reducing
| the population of cows and livestock would decrease their
| temporary contribution of gas. But this temporary store of
| methane isn't the root of our problems.
|
| The real problem, is taking carbon from underground, and
| burning it. For nature to naturally reverse this process,
| takes _millions of years_. The _only_ real solution is to
| stop burning fossil fuels, and /or to reverse the natural
| process faster somehow (like by repeatedly burying trees
| and growing new ones).
| FooBarWidget wrote:
| > Whether it's corn or grass that's being fed on, the carbon
| being belched out by cows comes from the carbon the plants
| captured from the atmosphere before being eaten.
|
| I think the main problem is that said plants are grown using
| fossil fuel-derived fertilizers.
|
| Why they don't use cow dungs to fertilize said plants, I
| don't know. Maybe a farming specialist can enlighten me why
| chemical fertilizers are so much more abundanly used than
| animal waste fertilizers.
|
| Another problem is local buildup of carbon or nitrogen. The
| Netherlands suffers from a nitrogen crisis: an EU court has
| ruled that the Netherlands' nitrogen emissions are higher
| than allowed by treaties, and so we must cut emissions.
| Emissions are caused for a large part by farming activities.
| These emissions are a problem because the nitrogen in farm
| waste products originate from a non-local source. So the
| nitrogen builds up locally and harms nature.
|
| The Dutch government ordered farmers to cut back on their
| stock. Now farmers are protesting, blocking roads and setting
| hay balls on fire.
| tootie wrote:
| I'm not sure how you can say there's no science to back this
| up. Livestock are accounted for as contributing nearly 15% of
| greenhouse gas emissions. And since so much pasture is
| cleared by razing old growth forest the cost may be even
| higher. And aside from their primary contribution, livestock
| place a lot of strain on water resources which are dwindling
| due to climate change. I'm not anyone has bothered computing
| the result of a world without livestock because it's so
| improbable but it would certainly be very significant.
| danielbln wrote:
| We are omnivores, we can subsist on many things, meat being
| one of them. If you enjoy meat that's one thing, but the "we
| evolved to eat meat, now give me my steak" mindset is a
| strange one.
| ravenstine wrote:
| If you put eat in front of a cow, they'll eat it if they're
| even modestly hungry. Does that mean that they evolved to
| eat meat? Of course not.
|
| Mad cow disease wouldn't be a thing if this wasn't true.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bovine_spongiform_encephalopa
| t...
|
| https://farmhouseguide.com/do-cows-eat-meat/
|
| > If you enjoy meat that's one thing, but the "we evolved
| to eat meat, now give me my steak" mindset is a strange
| one.
|
| It's only strange to for those who are unaware of the
| evidence.
|
| On the other side of the coin from cows, just because we
| can eat plants, pass undigested cellulose in our stool, and
| survive does not mean that we either developed to eat
| plants, need plants, or operate _optimally_ on plants.
|
| The fact that our ancestors ate mostly meat is not
| controversial and is even backed up by stable isotope
| testing. The fact that we lack aspects of an herbivorous
| digestive system is not controversial. Go look for what's
| called a cecum. By name, we humans have a "cecum" but in
| name only since that word means "dead end". Our cecum looks
| nothing like that of any animal that is herbivorous or
| obligatively omnivorous. That's just one example. At a
| higher level, we suck at digesting cellulose, and most
| available plants before agriculture were very fibrous and
| lacked the flesh of fruits and vegetables you find at a
| grocery store.
|
| Moreover, meat contains everything we need to survive and
| function properly to the exclusion of any plant material at
| all. If you're wondering about things like Vitamin C, well,
| I don't really want to spend all day going into such
| specifics, but long story short there's no need for an
| abundance of Vitamin C on a diet primarily composed of meat
| and lacking carbohydrates.
|
| So no, it's not just about making excuses to eat tasty
| meat. You might find that eating meat and not confounding
| such a diet with carbohydrates and plant material has real
| benefits.
|
| EDIT: To further address your point about our supposed
| omnivorism, we are only as omnivorous as we have to
| _scavenge_. As I already mentioned, the kinds of edible
| plants available to most humans before agriculture were not
| very digestible or energy dense at all, meaning that to eat
| plants required a significant energy investment given that
| we didn 't always cook our vegetables. Not only was eating
| plants not nearly as energy efficient as allowing larger
| animals to digest those plants first, but most plants in
| nature arguably aren't that tasty.
|
| I'm a forager and have been doing so for well over a decade
| (long before it was cool), and I have to be honest in that
| most wild plants don't compare to meat in terms of taste
| and satiety. The plants that are tasty are usually only
| around for a short period of the year.
| danielbln wrote:
| There are a few points to unpack here.
|
| 1. Cows are herbivores. They will eat meat in certain
| situations if you put it in front of them, but it's not
| good for them. We are not herbivores, we are specifically
| omnivores.
|
| 2. Our ancestors were hunter gatherers, and their diet
| was by no means mostly meat. In fact, it was only meat
| when available, which was every few days to weeks.
|
| 3. There is evidence that humans are omnivores from both
| an anatomical and physiological perspective. For example,
| our teeth are suited for both grinding plant matter and
| tearing meat, and our intestines are relatively long,
| which is necessary for digesting plant-based food.
|
| 4. Humans can not digest cellulose, this is true.
| However, heating plant matter breaks down cellulose, so
| at the very least, ever since we started using fire on
| food, cellulose is not an issue. Technically, you could
| even heat grass and eat it, but it wouldn't be very tasty
| or nutritious.
|
| 5. While a diet purely on meat is possible, it's not the
| best thing for your health. A diet that is high in fat
| and protein and low in carbohydrates can lead to health
| problems over time, such as heart disease, stroke, and
| cancer.
|
| 6. Meat is calorically dense, so for hunter gatherers it
| made a lot of sense to seek this type of food out. In a
| modern world, this isn't really an issue, we have an
| absolute overabundance of all types of foodstuff.
| pravus wrote:
| > We are omnivores, we can subsist on many things, meat
| being one of them.
|
| True, but I personally find it interesting that we have the
| smallest cecum and shortest digestive tract of the apes.
| Both of these are more indicative of a carnivorous diet
| than a herbivorous one.
| danielbln wrote:
| There is no agreed upon definition of "cecum." The cecum
| is a pouch-like structure in the lower intestine where
| the large intestine begins. It is thought to aid in the
| digestion of plant material, but its exact function is
| not fully understood. Humans do have a relatively small
| cecum compared to other apes, but it is not clear if this
| is due to our diet or our evolutionary history.
|
| There are several possible explanations for why humans
| might have a relatively small cecum. One possibility is
| that our diet does not require a large cecum to aid in
| digestion. Another possibility is that the cecum has
| shrunk over the course of human evolution as we have
| adapted to a diet that is less reliant on plant material.
| Finally, it is also possible that the small size of the
| human cecum is simply a result of our anatomy and is not
| related to diet or evolution.
| [deleted]
| pawsforthought wrote:
| Besides fossil fuel derived fertilizers used for feed, as
| sibling commenters have mentioned, you're neglecting the
| impact animal agriculture has on forests.
|
| 2.1 million hectares (5.2 million acres) of tropical forest
| is destroyed every year to make way for beef herds [1].
| That's 41% of all tropical deforestation (which is where 95%
| of the deforestation occurs).
|
| This is a disaster both in terms of the vast stores of carbon
| being released, and the destruction of habitat in the world's
| most precious and biodiverse ecosystems.
|
| [1]: https://ourworldindata.org/what-are-drivers-
| deforestation
| ravenstine wrote:
| As if said impacts are not shared by plant agriculture?
| Where do you think your vegetables come from? They need
| vast amount of space to grow, they need to kill animals
| that would otherwise inhabit the space, they need to spray
| large quantities of pesticide from above, fertilizer is
| necessary and fossil fuels are burned in that process, and
| fossil fuels need to transport the crops.
|
| > 2.1 million hectares (5.2 million acres) of tropical
| forest is destroyed every year to make way for beef herds
| [1]. That's 41% of all tropical deforestation (which is
| where 95% of the deforestation occurs).
|
| What are the economic incentives to destroy tropical
| forest? Meat is by no means the only thing that land can be
| used for, first of all, but there is no requirement that
| cows be raised on land that was previously tropical forest.
| Go check out the Great Plains where most of the United
| States' cows are raised, because you won't find a tropical
| forest, deforested or not, for thousands of miles. And yet,
| somehow, meat continues to be produced.
|
| No, I don't want forests to be destroyed, but it's a
| separate issue. Forests have been destroyed for countless
| reasons that have nothing to do with meat. Deforestation
| sucks, but that really isn't a the best reason to conclude
| that there's a problem with eating meat when deforestation
| isn't an issue. That is unless you have a problem with the
| non-forested land that cattle farms occupy, and most people
| don't because tropical forests are more interesting.
|
| As I have mentioned elsewhere in this thread, if we clean
| up where we get our energy, these arguments mostly
| disappear because, regardless of the end product, fossil
| fuels are currently still being burned. Doesn't matter if
| you're eating beef or soy.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| One thing we're ignoring here is all the fertilizer used to
| grow animal feed, which is generated from fossil fuels. So
| it's not quite all fresh carbon.
| kvgr wrote:
| It is not, it is only recycling plants into methane that
| changed to co2 and that is then captured by plants again. Ffs
| greatpostman wrote:
| Dude India and China are the biggest contributors. I'll take
| these comments seriously when people start pointing at real
| root causes
| nicbou wrote:
| The most populous countries which are also the world's
| factory? Yes.
|
| But if you look at emissions per capita, it's not China we
| should look at. It's a country that outsources most of its
| manufacturing and still manages to top the chart.
|
| I feel like people say "but China" to avoid taking any
| responsibility.
| josephcsible wrote:
| It would only make sense to look at emissions per capita if
| emissions were driven by individuals rather than by
| industry.
| naruvimama wrote:
| tomp wrote:
| Meat contributes literally _zero_ to global CO2 emissions.
| After all, it 's recycled grass.
|
| Maybe meat faming _methods_ contribute CO2 emissions, but that
| 's a reason to stop _those farming methods_ , not stop _eating
| meat_.
|
| Similar to people who hate aircon, people who argue that we
| should stop eating meat simply reveal themselves as regressives
| (hating advanced human civilisation, wanting a decrease in
| energy usage of humanity, which necessarily implies regression
| and mass death).
|
| (Some people argue that beef contribute methane emissions,
| which is true however methane is a cycle and contributes
| nothing to the _long-term_ anthropogenic carbon emissions, the
| entirety of which is coming from fossil fuels; yet still, the
| correct response is improving agricultural practices, not
| banning meat.)
|
| Btw I fully support a carbon tax, as long as it's non-
| discriminatory (i.e. taxes _all_ fossil fuel usage equally, not
| meat and /or other "sinful" activities more).
| roboticmind wrote:
| If you keep emitting that methane, then it continues to
| persist and leads to problems with climate change.
| Unfortunately this can only reduced a bit with changes to
| farming practices in the meat industry
|
| > people that argue that we should stop eating meat simply
| reveal themselves as regressives (hating advanced human
| civilisation, wanting a decrease in energy usage of humanity,
| which necessarily implies regression and mass death).
|
| How does saying the meat industry is a problem "hating human
| civilization"? It certainly does not mean regression and mass
| death as it would decrease the amount of land, cropland, and
| resources to grow food since we wouldn't need to grow so much
| feed nor clear so much land for pastures
|
| "If we would shift towards a more plant-based diet we don't
| only need less agricultural land overall, we also need less
| cropland"
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets
| [deleted]
| chasil wrote:
| I haven't read the article yet (and I will), but it would be
| a great gift to the future of humanity if we could develop
| sustenance that was devoid of suffering and murder.
|
| I am no partisan for the cause (and will order anything from
| a menu that strikes my fancy), but there is a certain mark of
| savagery in what and who we eat that (I feel) it is our
| destiny to overcome.
|
| For us to solve as many problems as we can now will give our
| progeny more focus on what they are tasked to do, and they
| will thank us for it.
| tomp wrote:
| Every coin has two sides.
|
| Vegans are implicitly promoting genocide of cows, chicken
| and pigs. There's no chance these animals can survive in
| nature, they're so numerous exclusively because they're
| bred by humans for food. Is one-time genocide better or
| worse than continuous perpetual murder? This essay argues
| that it's worse.
|
| https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/12/11/acc-is-eating-meat-
| a-n...
| quantumwannabe wrote:
| Additionally, the _only_ way to lower emissions from
| animals is to genocide them. It 's not just that they are
| likely to die if left to their own devices, leaving them
| to roam freely in nature results in them emitting the
| exact same amount of carbon as when they were farmed for
| meat (which is net zero, but that's besides the point).
| tpush wrote:
| > Vegans are implicitly promoting genocide of cows,
| chicken and pigs.
|
| Nonsense.
|
| > Is one-time genocide better or worse than continuous
| perpetual murder?
|
| 1) False dichotomy, nobody is asking for "genocide".
|
| 2) Even if, the answer is absolutely yes.
|
| What a disingenuous and ridiculous stance.
| nicoburns wrote:
| > that's a reason to stop those farming methods, not stop
| eating meat.
|
| Presumably it would also be a reason to stop eating meat
| grown using those farming methods. Which would be the
| majority of meat consumed as it stands.
| overcast wrote:
| Yeh sure, matter is neither created nor destroyed. The
| problem here is that massive amounts of carbon sequestered
| over millions of years, is being released, just to create the
| feed for these livestock. This isn't like a small group of
| cattle, grazing on natural prairies.
| josephcsible wrote:
| Sure, let's stop making fertilizer out of fossil fuels.
| That doesn't require us to stop eating meat.
| teaearlgraycold wrote:
| The only carbon tax that makes sense would be one that
| targets fossil fuel production. Extracting oil from the
| ground? Hella taxed. Extracting natural gas? Super taxed.
|
| If people can find a good way to create fossil fuels from
| atmospheric CO2 then they shouldn't have any fossil fuel
| punishments in their way.
| megaman821 wrote:
| Meat contributes zero new CO2 IF the crops they are eating
| weren't grown with fertilizer ultimately made from natural
| gas. Do you know a country where this is true?
| tpush wrote:
| > Meat contributes literally zero to global CO2 emissions.
| After all, it's recycled grass.
|
| Do you genuinely not understand that these animals are bred
| _for humans consumption_? They wouldn 't exist otherwise.
|
| If you can nurture a human with X amount of plant food, but
| instead use X+Y amount of plant food (and extra water,
| fertilizer, fossils fuels etc.) to raise cattle to nurture
| the same amount of humans, _you 've absolutely increased
| carbon emissions_ as compared to the first option.
|
| I sincerely do not get how one can miss this point??
| josephcsible wrote:
| > If you can nurture a human with X amount of plant food,
| but instead use X+Y amount of plant food (and extra water,
| fertilizer, fossils fuels etc.) to raise cattle to nurture
| the same amount of humans
|
| The key points you're missing are that the plants that cows
| eat aren't suitable for human consumption, and the land
| that said plants grow on isn't suitable for growing any
| plants that are suitable for human consumption.
| tpush wrote:
| The vast majority of cow's feed is grain & soy, both of
| which humans can eat directly. Current levels of meat
| consumption both in value and cost wouldn't even be
| remotely sustainable if everyone only ate pasture raised,
| grass fed cows.
|
| Not to mention that existing biotopes are being destroyed
| in order to create more pasture; it's very much a self-
| made problem.
| simonsarris wrote:
| > Do you genuinely not understand that these animals are
| bred for humans consumption? They wouldn't exist otherwise.
|
| In the United States we actually destroyed an equivalent
| biomass of Bison and replaced them with cattle. Though
| perhaps you celebrate the Bison eradication, too.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| Of course the long term answer is to _stop having so many
| damn babies!_
| josephcsible wrote:
| People in the developed world are having too _few_
| babies.
| tomp wrote:
| Water is a cycle and isn't actually consumed. Fertilizer
| requires energy, as does transport.
|
| If we make plant agriculture "sustainable" (i.e.
| independent of fossil fuels) then we will also make meat
| agriculture sustainable.
| legulere wrote:
| I agree that there's potential for sustainable husbandry in
| grasslands you cannot use otherwise. But it's very small and
| could not sustain today's mean consumption at all. Meat
| production relies heavily on farmed feed, with very low
| efficiency (25kg of feed for 1kg of beef). For growing that
| feed you need a lot of farmland which is a driving factor for
| the destruction of carbon sinks like the rain forest. Here in
| Europe for instance we are not able to produce enough feed
| for our animals, so we heavily import from the Americas.
|
| Also your argument against methane emissions is not very well
| thought through. You could argue the same against any CO2
| emissions, by arguing that at some point they will be stored
| by CCS again.
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/feed-required-to-
| produce-...
| Ma8ee wrote:
| I can directly influence what I buy in the supermarket. I
| have very little influence on what methods a farmer on the
| other side of earth uses, whether he lets his cows graze on
| land that used to be rain forest, or just uses many times
| more fuel to produce the crop needed to feed his pigs than
| would be required to produce the same amount of calories as
| vegan food. So for now, I'm very selective in any meat I buy,
| and most often abstain.
|
| And methane stays in the atmosphere only a decade or so, so
| _the day we stop release huge amount of it_ the effect will
| disappear much faster. But as long as we continue to let
| methane out in the atmosphere, it will have disproportionate
| effect on the climate disaster. _Which happens right now!_
| Not in some unspecified remote future.
| auganov wrote:
| When people go to a grocery store does it really make sense to
| think about evolution and natural selection? Every part of the
| modern food shopping experience has been designed by humans. Even
| the food itself. It's strange to consider a chimp's hunting
| instinct somehow relates to, say, a human's evaluation of what's
| a good deal in dollar terms.
|
| _Evolution and Me: Darwinian Theory has Become an All-Purpose
| Obstacle to Thought Rather than an Enabler of Scientific
| Advance._ by George Gilder
|
| https://www.discovery.org/a/3631/
|
| "These evolutionary sex wars were mostly unresolvable because, at
| its root, Darwinian theory is tautological. What survives is fit;
| what is fit survives. While such tautologies ensure the
| consistency of any arguments based on them, they could contribute
| little to an analysis of what patterns of behavior and what
| ideals and aspirations were conducive to a good and productive
| society. Almost by definition, Darwinism is a materialist theory
| that banishes aspirations and ideals from the picture."
| allturtles wrote:
| If Darwinian theory is tautological, why was it so
| controversial? Indeed Darwin knew it would be, and so kept it
| secret for decades after conceiving it. Why does it continue to
| be controversial to this day in some places, such as the U.S.,
| to the degree that organizations like the one you cited (the
| Discovery Institute) are dedicated to dismantling it?
|
| The core of Darwinian theory is not "what survives is fit; what
| is fits survives." The core of it is: 1) Life can multiply
| extremely rapidly, outstripping the available resources to live
| on, meaning that only some offspring can survive (this comes
| from Malthus) 2) There is random variation in the
| characteristics of offspring, some of which will prove more
| successful at survival and reproduction than others. 3) The
| action of (1) and (2), starting from some unknown point of
| origin of life, can explain all the variation in types of life
| that we see around us today, from fungi to humans.
|
| None of these are tautologies.
| ajdegol wrote:
| I don't agree it's tautological. His theory had predictive
| power.
| [deleted]
| SnowHill9902 wrote:
| That's because Darwin's is an observation of self-replicating
| systems in general and not an abstract idea or new concept.
| It's tautological that the most successful self-replicating
| systems are the ones most successful at self-replicating.
| Fitness is by definition being successful at dealing with the
| environment in regards to self-replication. Darwin's in the
| general sense is in my opinion not a theory but a fundamental
| observation of what is. The only theory is that there's a
| continuous lineage of living systems that evolved one into one
| other. But that's more of a teleological issue and can be
| understood as a theory subject to rejection.
| zmgsabst wrote:
| Darwin's theory is that the diversity of life, the nested
| hierarchy of traits noted by taxonomists before him, can be
| explained by that fact about replicating systems -- and
| doesn't require more than that and mutation.
|
| Darwin explained an open question ("why do taxonomies look
| like this?") by relating it to fitness and to trait changes
| via artificial selection (eg, breeding horses and dogs).
| That's why it's about how finches developed traits in nature
| -- because repeated fitness selection in nature _like farmers
| breeding lineages_ could account for differences in animals.
|
| That the "fit survive" isn't the theory -- just a fact about
| the world.
| leereeves wrote:
| > That the "fit survive" isn't the theory -- just a fact
| about the world.
|
| In Darwin's time the idea that "the fit survive" was very
| much a theory.
|
| A competing idea that we might call "the just survive" was
| the basis of trial by ordeal and trial by combat, of
| prayers for healing and rescue, and of holy wars. Many
| people still believe that God chooses who survives, and
| thus do not accept survival of the fittest.
| SnowHill9902 wrote:
| "Survival of the fittest" is a statistical observation of
| a population ensemble. You can be otherwise fit and eager
| to replicate and be hit by a truck. Or you can be sick
| and almost infertile but got someone pregnant. So Darwin
| doesn't explain the human condition and why the just
| might fall due to sickness or the wicked become rich and
| prolific. That only Heaven knows.
| bluefirebrand wrote:
| > So Darwin doesn't explain the human condition and why
| the just might fall due to sickness or the wicked become
| rich and prolific
|
| You're changing the measure. Just-ness is not a measure
| of Fit-ness. Nor is Wicked-ness a measure of Unfit-ness.
| SnowHill9902 wrote:
| I'm saying that "survival of the fittest" and the
| existence of God can coexist.
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| there's no way this function from wealth to amount of meat is
| differentiable
| dan-robertson wrote:
| I thought the article did a reasonably good job of addressing
| most of the confounding factors I thought of. My first guess was
| that this would be like population growth which is low when
| countries are poor (due to high infant mortality or things that
| correlate with being poor like civil wars), high as countries are
| getting richer (combining high fertility with lower infant
| mortality), and lower in developed countries (apart from
| immigration; fertility may be below replacement rate). But then
| we see the US continuing to eat more meat per capita into recent
| times. My other guess would then be that the US is consuming more
| food per capita (obesity and suchlike) but this doesn't really
| line up with the relatively poorer Spain eating similar amounts
| of meat.
|
| It may still be possible that the peak was recent (the data given
| isn't so fine-grained) and so we don't see a decline from 1970
| levels or that there are other confounding factors, eg maybe
| Spain's statistics are including meat consumed by tourists.
| Tourism has increased a lot since 1970, I think, and tourists
| seem likely to eat a lot of meat.
|
| But it certainly doesn't seem that falling meat consumption is
| anywhere near as universal as falling fertility as countries
| get/remain rich.
| HFguy wrote:
| I don't understand the scope of research and topics the IEEE
| publishes. I would think it would be electrical engineering
| topics and things tangential to that.
|
| Anybody have any insight?
| jacooper wrote:
| Does anybody actually believe the world is about to turn vegan?
|
| Because you got to be really delusional to believe so.
|
| Edit: title was changed, it was "Ignore the hype that the world
| is about to turn vegan", and my comment was an answer to it.
| oifjsidjf wrote:
| The billionares are investing massively in fake lab grown food,
| so they will obviously also pour billions into marketing and
| pushing fake "lab grown food is good for you" studies just like
| the tobacco industry did.
| jacooper wrote:
| The thing is, we all know that processed meat is bad to our
| health, and its the core of many health issues in the wealthy
| countries.
|
| So what do you call fake meat?, super duper processed food?
| And why should it be called meat in the first place if it has
| no meat in it?,
|
| It should be called manufactured meat-like... Thing.
|
| Also is it more healthy than normal meat? Or will we discover
| it has some long term side a effect that nobody noticed until
| it was too late?
| wodenokoto wrote:
| It might not be real meat, but it is real food.
| collegeburner wrote:
| theres a lot of shit thats "real food" but aint good for
| us. french fries in seed oils and a sugary coke is "real
| food" technically.
| [deleted]
| throwaway0x7E6 wrote:
| well yeah, you can make a substitute for pretty much any
| food with a starch, artificial coloring and artificial
| flavoring. it will even taste "good" if you fry it in an
| ungodly amount of oil, just like all these asian insect
| snacks that are brought up as an example of bugs being a
| perfectly good food - soaked in oil and seasonings, the
| only way to mask their disgusting taste and smell
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| Are you saying the IEEE is delusional?
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| I am kidding btw, don't answer that.
| [deleted]
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Currently developing countries are enormous carnivores.
| Veganism is mostly SWPL hipster thing from my observations.
| triyambakam wrote:
| Veganism is growing in popularity in Thailand and India, two
| countries I'm familiar with, both which have a long Hindu and
| Buddhist history of vegetarianism. Actually traditionally
| vegetarian in Thailand meant vegan because cow milk was not
| popular and eggs are seen as meat in Buddhism and Hinduism.
| throwaway0x7E6 wrote:
| our young global elites do, rather insistently.
|
| there's no sacrifice they aren't willing us to make.
| wooque wrote:
| Not surprised. Meat tastes good and bio-availability of animal
| protein is unmatched by any plant protein.
|
| Apart from minor vegan delusion in the Western nations, meat
| eating is not going away and it's not even reached its peak.
| sarsway wrote:
| Vegan delusions? Meat eating is overrated, most people have
| never even tried to stop eating meat for just a month. Most
| dairy things are pretty gross. You can easily live of a 90%
| plant based diet and eat as little as 12/kg meat a year.
| Pakdef wrote:
| > Most dairy things are pretty gross
|
| cheese?
| karol wrote:
| Fully agreed. Also I have a feeling the opposite might also be
| true - the more meat a person eats the bigger their chances to
| get good levels of energy and cognitive skills required to
| increase earning potential.
| goodpoint wrote:
| This flamebait material does not belong to ieee.org and to HN
| MrMan wrote:
| our household reduced meat and dairy by 95%, its not hard or a
| hardship.
| [deleted]
| googlryas wrote:
| The world will never go horseless. The richer one gets, the
| more horses one owns. And the whole world is getting richer.
| Therefore the world will be filled with horses soon.
| gtsop wrote:
| The world is not getting richer, some few are getting richer.
| The vast majority is going light years away from getting a
| horse
| throwaway0x7E6 wrote:
| in the West, the quality of life has been steadily
| declining for the past 50 years. in India, China and
| Southeast Asia, where two thirds of humans reside, it has
| been steadily improving. things aren't great, but much
| better than they used to be. China, for example, is facing
| a slow exodus of Western capital, because it is no longer
| cheap to manufacture things there, with median income
| approaching Eastern European levels.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the West, the quality of life has been steadily
| declining for the past 50 years_
|
| Based on what metric? Because on measures of health,
| wealth and happiness it's bee a good half century.
| throwaway0x7E6 wrote:
| the middle class is rapidly shrinking. that's the most
| damning metric
|
| the lower classes are worse off now than they were then.
| home ownership and education are unattainable, healthcare
| is unaffordable, the overall quality of life is rapidly
| declining.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _lower classes are worse off now than they were then_
|
| This is objectively untrue in terms of real incomes and
| net financial position. Life expectancy, too, has gone up
| since the 70s. Consider the quality of life of America's
| destitute in 2022 vs. 1972 and the choice is apparent.
|
| This isn't a roses and sunshine pitch. But believing the
| West is in decline (versus being caught up to) is a
| common mistake that leads to predictably bad outcomes.
| kar5pt wrote:
| Do you have evidence of this? It seems false on its face.
| https://intellectualtakeout.org/2018/09/is-the-world-
| really-...
| towaway15463 wrote:
| To each his own
| marcodiego wrote:
| Ignore the hype that there is a hype that the world is about to
| turn vegan.
| dan-robertson wrote:
| I think this submission should take the title of the article
| rather than the more clickbaity subtitle. (Maybe the article
| changed since it was linked?)
| dang wrote:
| Ok, we've done that.
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| It doesn't change the fact that the IEEE made an article
| about a nonsensical "hype".
| dang wrote:
| I think you guys need to make an argument rather than just
| shallow dimissals and name-calling like "nonsensical" (both
| of which are against the site guidelines, btw). Also,
| please don't just react to the headline. The word 'hype'
| doesn't appear in the body of the article.
|
| (Authors don't usually write the headlines at media
| publications.)
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| > Authors don't usually write the headlines at media
| publications.
|
| Well, this is just sad.
| goldenkey wrote:
| This actually came up in the Amber Heard vs Johnny Depp
| trial.
|
| "Heard was also found liable for the headline, which was
| written by a Washington Post editor."
|
| https://www.insider.com/aclu-wrote-amber-heard-
| washington-po...
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| Let's say the article is good and presenting a good
| argument.... but can I conclude from this that the IEEE
| is acting like news media and only care about traffic?
| dang wrote:
| Maybe yes. I agree the headline and especially the
| subtitle are disappointing from them.
|
| But we can't do anything about that, and we've learned a
| long time ago not to judge media articles just by their
| headlines. Nor by the general quality of the site,
| actually [1], although that point isn't so relevant here.
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false
| &so...
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| Got it, thanks for your efforts, my comments weren't
| against you btw.
| dang wrote:
| Indeed it is, but it's been that way for well over a
| century and it's a product of institutional pressures.
|
| HN is in the sweet spot of not being subject to those
| pressures (e.g. we don't have to optimize for clicks or
| ads), so we can take a different approach to headlines.
| Basically, it's the headline writer's job to sex up the
| title and our job to knock it down to size. https://hn.al
| golia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
| philipkglass wrote:
| The global trend in meat consumption is clearly upward, as the
| article says. I presume that global economic development is going
| to continue along with more meat-eating. There isn't enough land
| for everyone to consume meat like 20th century Americans if we
| stick to 20th century meat production techniques.
|
| What remains?
|
| I personally believe that cultivation of hydrogen oxidizing
| bacteria, and using them as a food chain base for animal feed,
| may constitute a second Green Revolution [1] for the 21st
| century. One early company in this space is Solar Foods [2]. Even
| though Solar Foods is promoting direct use of microbial cultured
| protein as a human food ingredient, I think that as costs go down
| and scales go up it will become common for microbial protein to
| be used in aquaculture and agriculture for feeding traditional
| food animals which will then be consumed by people.
|
| Hydrogen oxidizing bacteria can convert nitrogen, hydrogen, and
| carbon dioxide to protein and other biological macromolecules
| without relying on photosynthesis. This constitutes a potential
| revolution in food production because any source of electricity
| can be used to generate hydrogen from water via electrolysis, and
| then biomass can be grown using that hydrogen plus carbon dioxide
| and nitrogen (plus small amounts of other mineral inputs).
|
| Photosynthesis has a very low sunlight-to-food energy conversion
| ratio. A solar farm feeding hydrogen to microbial synthesis tanks
| could achieve more than an order of magnitude more food
| production per hectare than growing crops. Further, microbial
| synthesis tanks do not require weed control, insect control, or
| plowing (soil disruption). They require a minute fraction of the
| water needed to irrigate crops. They could operate on land that
| is too rocky, dry, hot, cold, or contaminated for farming. They
| could operate in windy places with little sun if powered by wind
| farms.
|
| Here's an article focusing on the use of solar power for protein
| production:
|
| "Solar-powered large scale microbial food production"
|
| https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/08/03/solar-powered-large-s...
|
| Also consider this astonishing recent research report:
|
| "Microbial Protein out of Thin Air: Fixation of Nitrogen Gas by
| an Autotrophic Hydrogen-Oxidizing Bacterial Enrichment"
|
| https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/322827781.pdf
|
| The authors use selection pressure to develop a population of
| hydrogen oxidizing bacteria that assimilate nitrogen from the
| air. It potentially renders the Haber-Bosch process [3] unneeded
| for protein production, replacing a high-pressure, high-
| temperature industrial process with a room temperature,
| atmospheric pressure biological process. That would be the
| greatest sea change in agriculture since the original invention
| of the Haber-Bosch process more than 100 years ago.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Revolution
|
| [2] https://solarfoods.com/
|
| [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process
| stefantalpalaru wrote:
| dang wrote:
| Others will describe this better, but the author of this article,
| Vaclav Smil, is a Czech-Canadian academic known for hard-nosed
| data analysis on social and environmental issues.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaclav_Smil
|
| You can like or dislike it, but please respond to the arguments
| in the article, not the baity title or the provocative topic.
| Otherwise we'll just end up with a bunch of shallow-indignant
| comments and that's not an interesting thread.
|
| Past mentions of Smil on HN:
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
| stormbrew wrote:
| This article does not read like it came from someone who was
| doing a thoughtful analysis. It lacks a concrete point and
| makes contradictory arguments.
|
| Is meat eating our evolutionary destiny or a recent trend
| driven by wealth? Is it something we are "built" to do or
| something that literally at least a fifth of the entire species
| does without?
|
| Never mind correlating health outcomes with broad trends in
| meat eating while also pointing out increasing wealth and
| pretending that's not likely to be a confounding factor in
| itself.
|
| Like, the conclusion could be right here but this article is a
| mess.
| dang wrote:
| Yes, that's why I posted my comment - one needs to consider
| this in the context of his larger body of work (edit: sorry,
| that's not really what I meant to say - see downthread). This
| isn't an internet flamethrower, or at least not just that.
|
| It's a good test for HN. Must the community have a headless
| chicken reaction to every provocation, or can we sometimes
| remain organized enough for an interesting conversation?
|
| Edit: I don't think your description of the article is fair.
| It may be right or wrong but it is far from vapid. If you've
| found fallacies in it, showing _how_ they are fallacies would
| be a better contribution to an HN thread.
|
| You've done that with your point about wealth being a
| possibly confounding factor (good), but you broke the HN
| guidelines with your first and last sentences (bad). Your
| reaction to Smil as not-a-person-who-does-any-kind-of-
| serious-analysis is a textbook case of the shallow dismissal.
| That's something the HN guidelines ask commenters to avoid:
|
| " _Please don 't post shallow dismissals, especially of other
| people's work. A good critical comment teaches us
| something._"
|
| Also: " _When disagreeing, please reply to the argument
| instead of calling names. 'That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not
| 3' can be shortened to '1 + 1 is 2, not 3._"
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| stormbrew wrote:
| Anyways, regardless of the rest of this I edited the first
| sentence to more directly state my thesis and not make
| claims about him (though I think you should consider your
| role in bringing his personality into this discussion).
| That said, I stand by everything I've said about the
| quality of this article.
| RC_ITR wrote:
| A running list of some fallacies for those interested:
|
| 1) Natural selection is the description of a process that
| happens spontaneously. Natural selection does not actively
| "form" us. Life forms itself _via_ natural selection and
| the entire _point_ is adaptability in the face of
| environmental constraints (i.e. earth's carrying capacity
| for livestock)
|
| 2) Chimpanzees may be our closest relatives, but so what?
| They're hirsute and have complex grooming rituals to remove
| parasites; we do not, among many other differences. Using
| chimps as a "natural model" of human behavior is not
| grounded in scientific thought. (EDIT: there's also the
| "closest _extant_ relative" fallacy. There were plenty of
| great apes closer to us than modern chimps, they just died
| out. If in 100 years we cause the extinction of chimps and
| bonobos [highly likely on current trajectory], then is the
| natural model for humans the Gorilla, who mostly eats
| plants and very rarely will also eat invertebrates?)
|
| 3) The author states that increasing meat consumption has
| led to no negative health effects (by only focusing on
| heart disease), but the countries with the two largest
| increases (US and China) have myriad health problems mostly
| related to rising obesity rates. Heart disease is a poor
| measure of meat-related health because a) it's highly
| correlated with smoking b) we've gotten way better at
| treating it.
|
| Overall, it's the classic "trap" for HN. A solid (usually)
| publication, a highly charged topic, and loose data
| interpretation.
| stormbrew wrote:
| Ad hominem cuts both ways. If he wants to make a good
| argument here he should do so, but there's basically
| nothing in this article to talk about _except_ how much of
| a mess it is.
|
| How often are you in a controversial post's comments
| advocating for people to read the author's other work to
| justify the poor quality of the posted article? I've been
| around a long time and I've literally never seen you do
| this before. Have you considered the possibility that
| you're the one with the wrong read here?
| dang wrote:
| I don't agree with that description of the article. I
| think both it, and Smil, deserve better than shallow
| dismissals and name-calling. He's writing about a
| particular prediction that is commonly made, and showing
| reasons to doubt whether that particular prediction is
| true. I don't see anything wrong with that, although the
| underlying topic is a hot one.
| stormbrew wrote:
| You're the one bringing his reputation into this though?
| Until you started interjecting, everything _was_ about
| the article. That it was about how poor the article is
| doesn 't make it ad hominem, it's a product of the lack
| of substance and direction of the article itself.
| Sometimes things people write aren't very good.
|
| And I said in a fair amount of detail why I can't find
| anything in this article to argue about other than its
| quality: I can't reconcile those questions to find a
| _point_ to argue with. If I argue against the evolution-
| is-destiny part then the counterargument is wealth and
| vice-versa.
|
| I really suggest you re-read this article with a more
| critical eye because I honestly can't see what you see in
| it, and I don't think you really believe "people should
| read the author's other work" is a sustainable basis for
| submission quality.
| dang wrote:
| > Until you started interjecting, everything _was_ about
| the article
|
| Until then, everything was about the headline.
|
| (And mostly still is, considering that few commenters so
| far have been talking about the specific points in the
| body.)
| triyambakam wrote:
| > one needs to consider this in the context of his larger
| body of work.
|
| That seems odd and it feels like you are defending it out
| of agreement with the author.
|
| If this is a poor article, why can't it be criticized as
| such? If Shakespeare, who for this analogy is considered a
| great respected author, wrote a lazy and uninspired play,
| one should just endure just because it's Shakespeare and
| "one needs to consider this in the context of his larger
| body of work"? That's unnecessary and fallacious.
| dang wrote:
| No, you're right - I didn't put that well. (I've been
| posting hastily trying to prevent this thread from
| devolving into a tedious flamewar and unfortunately haste
| is bad for precision!)
|
| On HN we definitely try to go by article quality (past
| explanations from a slightly different angle: https://hn.
| algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...).
|
| I guess what I meant to say was more like: don't judge
| this article (or any article) by just the headline! and
| also, if you're pattern-matching this article to garden-
| variety flamebait, it would be good to know who the
| author is, because the priors here are totally different
| than how they appear.
| lovich wrote:
| I read through the article and is it cutoff? It ends for me
| with "chorizo..." and then a reference to the print article
| this was published as.
|
| If that's the whole article what was the argument they were
| making? They showed that meat consumption went up a lot in
| poorer countries and down a little in some rich countries,
| and consistent in rich meat loving countries.
|
| If the only argument is that, no the world is not about to
| become vegan, then ok they showed evidence for that, but it
| doesn't seem like a long enough article to have much of a
| discussion over.
|
| I'm not sure this couldn't become flame bait when there's
| so little to discuss
| a1369209993 wrote:
| > one needs to consider this in the context of his larger
| body of work.
|
| No, actually, one doesn't. That's the same underlying error
| as ad hominem attacks and appeals to authority. If he has a
| point, he can actually _make_ that point, and if he doesn
| 't, a larger body of work doesn't change that.
| dang wrote:
| Yes. Sorry. I didn't put that properly and I agree with
| you.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32288733
| wasabi991011 wrote:
| My problem with this article is that there aren't many
| arguments used in the first place. It's mostly a loosely
| connected set of facts, with not much of a unifying thesis.
|
| If the thesis is "meat consumption is growing", what's the
| relevance of chimpanzee's diet or health outcomes?
|
| Those two side-points make me think the thesis is actually "it
| is normal and okay that meat consumption is growing", but if
| that is the case it is woefully underargued. I think the issues
| with comparing the diet of a different species is obvious, and
| another commenter already mentionned the correlation between
| wealth and health. But crucially the article itself doesn't
| engage at all with issues of climate change or animal rights.
|
| I don't know who Smil is. I'm just responding to this article.
| naruvimama wrote:
| [deleted]
| 2Gkashmiri wrote:
| our society has historically been poor, for centuries at end but
| only recently in the past 30 odd years, "wealth" has seen our
| doors and that has somehow changed the whole scenario.
|
| in the past, when no one had any money, cooking oil was a luxury
| and having oily food was a public display of your "considerable
| wealth so many generations grew around the notion of "oily food
| is a status symbol". fast forward it to today coming from the
| last 30 years, when everyone could now afford cooking oil, the
| idea in the minds of old people stuck around.
|
| we still find the old generation in offices and shops eat "oily
| food" because their wives at home who prepare the food still
| imagine if "someone sees non-oily food that they would think they
| are poor".
|
| i personally know people who have become obese and developed
| related diseases because of being fed "extra oily food" during
| their lunch-tiffin.
| selimthegrim wrote:
| Are haakh, lotus root, kohlrabi (sorry forgot words for the
| last two) still considered poor people food?
| im3w1l wrote:
| When people say _biology causes x_ , what's usually happening is
| biology -> a -> b -> c -> x
|
| Break any of those links, and biology will cease causing x. In
| other words, the biological causation is conditional on the
| environment.
|
| Another commenter mentioned fake-meat, and I think this indeed
| will be what breaks the chains. But I want to take it one step
| further. Not just imitation but rather superstimuli[0]. Something
| that is more meat than meat itself. If we can create superstimuli
| in so many other categories, then why not meat?
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernormal_stimulus
| invalidname wrote:
| This is rehashing obvious information and complete nonsense.
| That's why companies like beyond meat, impossible foods, etc.
| exist. It's becoming "vegan" without giving up on "meat". Yes, I
| know it isn't the same. The goal is to get it "good enough" and
| affordable. Once it's there, a lot of meat eaters will reduce
| "actual meat" intake and that's "effectively vegan".
|
| Veganism is a growing trend in most places I go. But it will
| probably not cross the chasm without fake meat. That's the story.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Fake meat is the e-cigarette of the food world.
|
| It's a tool that can be used to transition from a bad thing to
| a less bad thing or even a good thing.
|
| Maybe in the future the Beyond Meats of the world are cheaper
| and clearly better for the environment than meat, but for now
| they are good tools to prove the doubters that not every meal
| needs to have a dead animal in it.
|
| We are at the point where an average non-meat option in a
| burger is better than a bad meat burger. The alternative
| options can't beat a premium burger though - not yet.
| bobkazamakis wrote:
| >Fake meat is the e-cigarette of the food world. >It's a tool
| that can be used to transition from a bad thing to a less bad
| thing or even a good thing. It works well as a transition,
| but I don't think the end result is going to be "okay now we
| drop fake meat" -- there's nothing inherently unhealthy about
| fake meat.
| smileysteve wrote:
| There are a number of things unhealthy about fake meat; soy
| is an endocrine disruptor, some of the oils they use are
| hydrogenated.
|
| Black beans are less of an endocrine disruptor and pea
| protein even better.
| wyre wrote:
| Neither the impossible or beyond burgers use hydrogenated
| oils. The beyond burger doesn't use soy protein.
| dang wrote:
| Please don't take HN threads into flamewar on predictably
| divisive topics. It leads to predictably shallow-indignant
| threads--the opposite of the curious conversation we're trying
| for here.
|
| Smil may be a provocateur but he's a smart and informed one and
| his arguments deserve _specific_ responses, not generic
| dismissals.
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| Serious question, can you see why people are angry here?
|
| They actually like to see wisdom and well written articles
| from this kind of institutions.
|
| People are angry here for good reason.
| dang wrote:
| Absolutely, I can see why people are angry - but the
| reactive style of post that it's leading to is against the
| site guidelines
| (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html), and I
| think this is an interesting test case to make that point
| about.
| goodpoint wrote:
| Say that to the author of the flamebait article.
| dang wrote:
| I don't think that's an accurate read of Smil. See
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32288434. I haven't
| read much of him, mind you, but I don't suppose most people
| angrily dismissing his arguments have either.
|
| More generally: HN commenters need to stick to the site
| guidelines regardless of provocation. Would you guys mind
| reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html?
| They're pretty clear about cases like this:
|
| " _Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not
| less, as a topic gets more divisive._ "
|
| " _Please don 't pick the most provocative thing in an
| article or post to complain about in the thread. Find
| something interesting to respond to instead._"
| pohl wrote:
| Fresh vegetables too, though, I bet. Money gives people access,
| film at eleven.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| Meat is a status thing. In many countries meat was more expensive
| than veggies pound for pound, so rich people ate more meat.
|
| Poor people ate very plant heavy diets but that was because they
| had to.
|
| There isn't really an equivalent reversal of status at the ultra-
| rich level to dial it back down.
| dllthomas wrote:
| Status things that are comfortably within the reach of everyone
| often cease to be status things.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| There are still plenty of poor people who can't afford meat
| in every meal, even in rich countries. And even with mass
| meat consumption there is still further delineation like
| grades of meat that is plenty for rich consumers to
| differentiate themselves from (most people certainly cannot
| afford to cook Kobe/Wagyu with every meal)
| olivermarks wrote:
| 'Ignore the hype that the world is about to turn vegan'
|
| I have never heard any of this 'hype' anywhere except from
| evangelizing vegetarians.
|
| The IEEE is becoming a pretty weird organization with dystopian
| undertones these days. https://www.ieee.org/about/ieee-strategic-
| plan.html
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| "When you look at Impossible Burger or Beyond Meat, they have 21
| or 22 highly processed ingredients. So processed, that you are
| hard pressed in identifying the difference between those items,
| versus let's say, pet food." [1]
|
| [1] https://twitter.com/ghgguru & https://clear.ucdavis.edu/blog
| kcplate wrote:
| This alone makes me avoid these products like the plague. I
| honestly do not understand why if you desire and need "meat"
| enough to opt for a highly processed inferior meat analog, why
| you don't just eat the real thing.
|
| Is there really any highly processed foodstuff out there that
| is truly healthy? Doesn't really seem to be.
| turtlebits wrote:
| Not all people avoid meat for health reasons. If there's a
| market for it, so be it.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| CorrectHorseBat wrote:
| > I honestly do not understand why if you desire and need
| "meat" enough to opt for a highly processed inferior meat
| analog, why you don't just eat the real thing.
|
| Many people would like to eat meat without the environmental
| impact/killing animals. What is hard to understand about
| that?
| proc0 wrote:
| It's a loss of opportunity cost that reveals how much
| people actually care about the environment.
|
| Want to sacrifice a bit of taste and save the environment?
| Yes!
|
| Want to sacrifice the taste of meat to save the
| environment? Nah.
| kcplate wrote:
| It just has a strange irony to me. "I don't want to kill
| animals, but I am not willing to give up the taste of their
| delicious flesh"
| stormbrew wrote:
| Humans aren't robots. We can't just align every level of
| our stimulus response around a single goal. Lots of
| studies have been done on how complicated the
| relationship between conscious motivation and eating is,
| and for the most part have come down on the side of "we
| have very little control over our base desires when it
| comes to food."
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| Giving up food, a cultural and often deep identity-level
| cornerstone, is hard even when they conflict with your
| ethics. Eating fake meat because you disagree with animal
| slaughter but enjoy the taste is still consistent.
|
| Anyways I don't think these are the people who deserve
| our scrutiny. They are more consistent than those of us
| who are onboard with vegan ethics but still can't stop
| eating meat, which is me most weeks of the year
| unfortunately.
| pedrosorio wrote:
| I don't understand how this is hard to follow:
|
| "Doing X gives me pleasure, it requires doing Y which
| causes suffering to entities that are not myself. I will
| avoid doing X and instead do X' which minimizes suffering
| in the world, even if it's not as good for me"
| kcplate wrote:
| It's not hard to follow, it's just strange to me on a
| couple of levels:
|
| Approaching from a non-vegan morality perspective, but
| vegan for health, I don't understand why you would opt
| for something so highly processed instead of having
| something whole and unprocessed.
|
| From a vegan for morality sake...it's like Westworld, but
| the food equivalent.
| pedrosorio wrote:
| It is not like Westworld because the pleasure is not in
| killing / perceiving suffering in others. It's just in
| eating (which for most people raised in cities is
| completely disconnected from the animal suffering).
| kcplate wrote:
| I disagree. It's a way to enjoy an experience that is
| "outside" of your "moral code" without the moral
| consequences.
| roboticmind wrote:
| This is a false dichotomy. Plenty of people do whole foods
| plant-based diets without those. Additionally, it's also often
| replacing highly processed meats
| triyambakam wrote:
| That's why I eat beans
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Is "highly processed" always the same as "bad"?
| tomp wrote:
| Capitalism doesn't optimise for health, it optimises for
| addiction, profit, and lower costs (a.k.a. lower quality).
|
| So, yes, the more processed a food is, the more aligned it is
| to capitalistic motives, the less healthy it is.
| DeWilde wrote:
| Highly processed is almost always synonymous with the types
| of food that are considered bad for your health.
|
| From WP [0]: "he term ultra-processing refers to the
| processing of industrial ingredients derived from foods, for
| example by extruding, moulding, re-shaping, hydrogenation,
| and hydrolysis. Ultra-processed foods generally also include
| additives such as preservatives, sweeteners, sensory
| enhancers, colourants, flavours, and processing aids, but
| little or no whole food."
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-processed_food
| mjevans wrote:
| I would argue for the position of 'not always'. In my opinion
| it is much the same as GMO plants. The intent and target of
| the modification matters. A plant that is modified to
| tolerate deadly chemicals is evil; it must be handled
| carefully if consumed at all so that the chemicals it
| tolerates do not poison us. A plant which is modified to have
| a higher or higher quality (more nutrition?) yield might be
| good.
|
| Thus the highly processed foods. It depends on what the
| intent of the process is and how the results are used in the
| whole. Even if it might be less healthy I sure do love breads
| and noodles.
| jzellis wrote:
| I think within a decade most of us will be eating whatever
| calories are in front of us and glad to have them. Especially as,
| like most of the cornerstones of modern civilization, the way we
| eat now is mathematically unsustainable.
| collegeburner wrote:
| actually it's very sustainable for ppl in America. we export a
| shitton of food (and through that water), we just gotta stop.
| were one of the less dense countries and have plenty of arable
| land etc.
|
| i do feel for the rest of the world tho, they prolly gonna have
| to take a downgrade in they standard of living.
|
| source: https://www.agfoundation.org/common-
| questions/view/does-the-...
|
| were a net exporter by $ and a lot of what we import is
| expensive shit without much calories (cofee, chocolate) not
| actually calories.
| DeWilde wrote:
| Any source for this claim of unsustainability of current food
| production?
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| Current food production relies heavily on fossil fuels, so
| it's inherently unsustainable. Which is not to say that it
| can't be changed to become sustainable, I'd say the jury is
| still out on that question.
| kitkat_new wrote:
| the rainforests are burned for our food production
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-07-30 23:02 UTC)