66 comments on Will conservation efforts have an effect?
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66 comments on Will conservation efforts have an effect?
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Trying to re-imagine our economy is a job for anthropologists or perhaps science fiction writers, I think. It has more in common with the classic "utopia" novel than with current economic theory.
Jared Diamond's Collapse doesn't just talk about societies that failed, but also those that succeeded. And it's fascinating. What it takes to become a successful sustainable society is often brutal by our standards. Population control is critical; zero population is the ideal. This is achieved not only via abortion and birth control, but by encouraging infanticide, warfare, and suicide. One of the societies studied in the book has a hard population cap; the king sends away people each year, to keep under the cap.
One incident that stuck in my mind was the way one society dealt with the pig problem. Pigs are often a problem. They aren't very sustainable. They are tempting, because they turn plant matter into meat more efficiently than just about any other critter. But meat production really isn't efficient, even at best, and pigs do not provide milk or eggs or wool or transportation, as other animals do. And they eat only food people can eat. So societies declare them unclean, as in the Middle East, or put taboos on them that allow only certain people to eat them (as in ancient Hawaii).
One society Diamond studied went a step further. They decided to exterminate every pig on the island. The pigs were getting into the gardens and eating food people needed, and only the elite ever got to eat pork. So they decided to eliminate every pig on the island, and did. (Must have been a heck of a barbecue!)
I just can't see us ever agreeing to anything like that. We believe that if you can afford it, you can have it, regardless of the cost to society. I don't think we have it in us to make the hard choices. At least, not yet.
3 vegetarians can be fed by one acre,
7 vegans can eat from one acre
consider how much oil goes into agriculture, pesticides, ferilizers, transportation of grain and cereals to feed the animals, transporting the animals.
refigeration of meats.
cooking meats.
I really envy americans you have a far greater ratio of arable land per person than any of us europeans.
it takes many kilos of cereal to create one kilo of meat.
and meat isnt very good for you, the health implications also make for a less sustainable society.
go on
go vegan
for life
http://www.alternet.org/story/12162
http://www.beyondveg.com/cordain-l/grains-leg/grains-legumes-1a.shtml
http://www.tbkfitness.org/TBKdiet.html
http://www.mercola.com/article/insulin.htm
http://www.beyondveg.com/cordain-l/grains-leg/grains-legumes-1a
Consequently, the human genome is most ideally adapted to those foods which were available to pre-agricultural man, namely lean muscle meats, limited fatty organ meats, and wild fruits and vegetables--but, significantly, not grains, legumes, dairy products, or the very high-fat carcasses of modern domesticated animals
meat and dairy products have been consitently linked to heart attack and cancer (also partly due to steroids, hormones and I suspect antibiotics that industrialised animals are fed) as outlined in your second link
http://www.tbkfitness.org/TBKdiet.html
Most of us today follow a diet containing a large amount of food which is not readily available in nature, and that must be highly processed to become edible. Our bodies were not made to handle such foods, and thus we suffer by dying of heart attacks, strokes, cancer, and complications from diabetes and osteoporosis.
http://www.mercola.com/article/insulin.htm
reads very much like the atkins diet and he is trying to sell his book.
however i agree cereals and legumes should not be the basis of a diet, you would definetly get malnutrition.
I advocate a BALANCED vegan diet for optimum health and using less resources
nuts, seeds, berries, fruits, vegetables and some legumes, root vegatables and rice if you can get it
a potato based diet is not good, but that is not to say potatos are bad for you.
as an aside britains oldest man was vegan lived till 111, cycled to work till he was 100 and retired at 104.
if you would like to know more about the free organic food that is available to you then go to
www.pfaf.org
they have a database of 7000 plants that are edible
happy foraging.
But then mabye millions of people dieing from a pandemic is just what we need to save resources so we can carry on eating meat??
and drive suvs.
sorry thats a totally unfounded conspiracy theory I composed after watching "twelve monkeys" recently...
its not serious :)
And then bashing grains? You sound like a raw fooder, lol!
If grain-based diets caused chronic disease then the incidence of western ilnesses like heart disease/cancer should be HUGE in the poor populations of the world that base their diets on grains. Instead, these diseases are nearly unheard of in these populations, which make up a major part of world population - clearly a glaring contradiction.
The book noted below is yet another elucidation of the unhealthiness of meat. Even tiny amounts (by western standards) showed negative consequences. 5000 people in the US drop dead every day from artery diseases clogged and ruptured by what, rice and vegetables? The head of The Framingham Heart Study, the grand prix of heart studies,
says they have never seen a case of heart disease from a person with a cholesterol lower than 150. Guess what level cholesterol drops to when you stop eating meat and dairy? under 150.
The China Study : The Most Comprehensive Study of Nutrition Ever Conducted and the Startling Implications for Diet, Weight Loss and Long-Term Health -- by T. Colin Campbell,
It's important to keep an open mind, but not so open your brain falls out. (Carl Sagan?) In my unpopular opinion, if you believe meat is healthy then your brain is flopping around on the ground, waiting to be picked up.
Hmmm. Didn't Lenin (Trotsky? Stalin?) define a liberal as someone whose mind is so open that his brains fall out?
In most "traditional" cultures meat was considered a flavoring.
Best to limit all highly refined substances in one's diet, be they pastas or pepperonis.