Omnivorous, the reason our species is a success

[Heinz]

Vegans...a luxury for the righteous?

look at your teeth.

[Thomas Micklewright]

Interesting, the old look at your teeth argument.

I suppose you have tried biting through the hide of a cow, or crushing bones with them?

Nope. Our teeth arent meant for hunting or killing animals. Yes we have eaten flesh in the past, and it has helped us to get where we are. However, for the human population to continue living on this earth (reachin 9 billion by 2050) it is a simple fact we will need to reduce our consumption of animal products.

Vegans use 1/4 of the land, water and oil compared to omnivores. Lets all get righteous and maybe our grandkids will have an earth to live on aswell?

[Heinz]

Insects 20 times the landmass humans weigh...edible.

[ibilly99]

Who says we are a success - if the runaway success of homo sapiens in dominating our world results in the destruction of the planet then we can be ultimately seen to be a cancerous growth where evolutionary forces ran away with themselves.

[Heinz]

Perhaps,

But let us not forget the planet will be fine, we might not. Fertility/lifespan can be questioned...different topic.

[Heinz]

ibilly,

The fact you can type a reply really does proves that we are the dominant, successful species. Let me know when you're budgie (or any other animal) does the same.

[Thomas Micklewright]

Can you explain your comment re. Insects I'm confused?

We are greedy parasites that will probably end up wiping ourselves out.

Anyway, just because we are dominant doesn't mean we need to cause death and destruction does it?

[Heinz]

Your survival/nourishment depends on the demise of what you eat.

[Saffron]

A few years ago when the number of clinically obese people offically surpassed the number of starving people, I suggested that we simple feed the fat people to the starving people...

[RobP]

I have always assumed that is was the preperation of the human diet rather than it's contents that gave homo sapiens an advantage.

Fire opened up a whole new protein group of grains and pulses into our daily feast, meat was readily available to our ancestors in its raw form prior to that and that didn't seem to give us an evolutionary leg up.

Just had a look at my teeth. Nothing like a tiger or shark (carnivore), a lot more like a gorilla's (primarily vegan).

:))

[Thomas Micklewright]

Thanks beef, didn't expect that from your name!

[Heinz]

beef Wrote:

-----------------------------------------------------

> Just had a look at my teeth. Nothing like a tiger

> or shark (carnivore), a lot more like a gorilla's

> (primarily vegan).

> :))

I thought incisives were designed to cut and tear flesh...am I wrong? and if I am why don't cows have them?

by the way gorillas do eat meat, not often but they do.

[RobP]

Hi Heinz,

Sorry, cattle do have 6 incisors, as do other herbivorous animals such as horses. The incisors are used to shear/tear through plant and fibrous material, and therefore can also be used to tear through flesh. Your canines are used to hold the food in place (therefore they are pointy) and molars grind it down.

A meagre 3% of a gorilla's daily intake is made of insects and catterpillars, a daily hazzard when you are chomping your way through 18 kg of veg a day. As they have an organic diet they don't have the pesticides to keep the critters away. I'd say a 97% herbivorous diet was pretty much vegan to me (especially as they shun dairy).

Back to my original supposition; I don't think it is what we eat that has led to our species advancement, but how we eat. Cooking has given us the ability to extract greater energy from our food, preservation through salt and pickling has given our food a greater longevity (and helped prevent the seasonal plenty/famine), and of course farming has given us a plentiful harvest that we can share as a group.

[binary_star]

Having pubescent females at age 10 or 11 has probably led to "success" as a species as well but I don't think that's a strong enough argument to encourage hebephilia.

[Heinz]

Sorry, meant canines.

[RosieH]

beef, you could also say our teeth are more like a chimp's (closer relation than a gorilla) - omnivorous little cannibals

edited because I cannae spell

[Heinz]

Maybe not the only reason...

[DJKillaQueen]

Having just watched five episodes of Channel 4's 'Catastrophe', none of it really matters, as sooner or later some massive natural disaster will render us all extinct.

[RobP]

Hi Rosie,

Chimps are mainly herbivores and will choose fruit above all other foods, gorilla and chimpanzee teeth are very similar, though in both cases their canine teeth are more pronounced than ours. I don't believe teeth really have helped out in our evolutionary progress

Cattle also have canine teeth Heinz.

Binary star, gorillas also have a similar age for puberty among females, and in parts of Africa a similar life expectancy (barely 32 in Swaziland according to the CIA World Factbook, which is shocking). So I don't really see how this helped.

And DJKQ, is this the CATASTROPHE you were alluding to?

[Frankito]

:))

Saffron Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> A few years ago when the number of clinically

> obese people offically surpassed the number of

> starving people, I suggested that we simple feed

> the fat people to the starving people...

[mockney piers]

DJ, it's true we are overdue a mass extinction event by some millions of years, but the timescales of we're due one soon are pretty huge, I wouldn't hit despair or start building that deep bunker just yet.

You might want to think about signing up your great grand kids for the first near light speed deep space exploration vessels though!

[RosieH]

beef, I don't really think this has any bearing on the argument, but chimps do eat meat. "mainly herbivores" means omnivores, right?

They are predators of certain other mammals, in particular the red colobus monkey, and have been known to eat other chimps after a battle. Meat has been shown to be important in denoting status within the group, and apparently in getting them sex (I'm going to make no comparisons to the attractiveness of a man who eats a bloody steak and one who eats sodding lentils).

Like I say, has no bearing on this particular argument - but claiming they're "mainly herbivores" when some of them eat up to a ton of meat annually is a little disingenuous.

[maxxi]

Not to mention all that tea they used to get through.

[RosieH]

was it 'erbal tea maxxi?

[maxxi]

I believe it was their favourite Post Gestive TIPple...

La Premier Th? Anglais no?

Or has television been lying to me again? Now I'll never get that piano shifted.