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If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

theguardian.com

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Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#51

Post by dsfyu404ed »

munin wrote: post #42
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People have meat for almost every meal I'm gonna call BS on this unless you provide a citation. Many people (in the west) eat a breakfast (cereal, pancakes, waffles, bagel, toast) or lunch (PB&J sandwich, salad) that contains no meat every day or every workday. Then you have to account for all the meals where there is no meat (pizza, mac and cheese). You'd need to have a substantial fraction of the population eatin…

bacon with your waffles? hot dog for lunch? meat lovers pizza for dinner?

Most people don't eat a breakfast with multiple things most days, just a quick meal before work (or they shove a bagel in their face while driving). Most people eat food that requires basically no prep work for lunch most days. Eating out (with the exception of coffee and donuts in certain industries) is not a regular occurrence for most people because it's not justifiable at their income level.

I'm not denying that one can have meat at every meal if they so desire. I'm saying that as a matter of convenience many do not.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#52

Post by eaenki »

Djvacto wrote: post #29

This article reads more like an ad for their farm, which granted as far as farms that produce meat from livestock goes, seems really nice. But their approach is not gonna work at scale, because you cannot have enough farms that operate this way to supply meat to a whole population. They also only compare their approach to what is basically the strip mining approach to crop growth. They don't look at things like crop…

I'm calling quit on HN after seeing such an article on the first page.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#53

Post by naasking »

cageface wrote: post #26

More humane and sustainable forms of animal agriculture would certainly be a step in the right direction from the horrors of the concentrated feeding operations that supply most of the world's meat supply right now. But those techniques were developed for a reason. There's no way to meet the current and rapidly growing demand for meat without completely setting aside the welfare of the animals and the environment. Th…

> The real solution is to reduce the global population

Why is that the "real solution"? We're close to factory-scale lab-grown meat, which seems like a perfectly viable alternative too.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#54

Post by Djvacto »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #39
tdb7893 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing to note is that being vegan is very difficult and most people aren't going to be vegan. One thing everyone can do is to cut their meat intake. People have meat for almost every meal and it's pretty simple to cut back and you still get some health and environmental benefits.

> People have meat for almost every meal I'm gonna call BS on this unless you provide a citation. Many people (in the west) eat a breakfast (cereal, pancakes, waffles, bagel, toast) or lunch (PB&J sandwich, salad) that contains no meat every day or every workday. Then you have to account for all the meals where there is no meat (pizza, mac and cheese). You'd need to have a substantial fraction of the population eatin…

For the record, veganism also excludes dairy products, and we still have a pretty significant impact from things like dairy producing cows (not to mention they are treated just as poorly in factory conditions). And especially in restaurants, meat is very often consumed as a part of the things you mentioned. At least half (sometimes more) of pizza options have meat, mac and cheese when eaten as an entree and not a side almost always has bacon, chicken, etc. People take turkey or ham sandwiches for lunch just as often as PB&J. Burgers, breakfast sandwiches, etc. And look at fast food, how many places do you know where you (or other non-vegans) would actually regularly get meatless options?

The only fast food place we ever eat at is Taco Bell because you can customize everything to have beans instead of beef. We can't really eat at Chick-Fil-A, Wendy's, etc anymore.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#55

Post by naasking »

yread wrote: post #46
tdb7893 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing to note is that being vegan is very difficult and most people aren't going to be vegan. One thing everyone can do is to cut their meat intake. People have meat for almost every meal and it's pretty simple to cut back and you still get some health and environmental benefits.

It's also healthy to cut back on (red) meat consumption. NHS recommends 70g/day. One proper steak means no meat for the rest of the week. https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/meat-nutrition/#how-mu...

Actually, later studies found that red meat isn't the issue per se, it's processed red meat that is the real culprit.

So basically, raw ingredients of any kind are good to eat, processed food is not so good for you.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#56

Post by dsfyu404ed »

ianai wrote: post #50
munin wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

bacon with your waffles? hot dog for lunch? meat lovers pizza for dinner?

Many many many foods have eggs or dairy products in them that simply don’t need them. The bread for that pbj could very well have milk, eggs in it. Butter on toast is a dairy product. Eggs are a common ingredient in veggie burgers!

Dairy and small amounts of egg (usually added for it's chemical/material properties) in baked goods don't count as meat for discussions about food sustainability because they don't require raising animals for slaughter. A dairy cow can produce many gallons of milk and a chicken can lay many eggs over its lifetime. They're a drop in the bucket compared to the environmental impact of meat raised for direct consumption.

That's like complaining about oil products used to patch roads in a discussion about the environmental impact of oil.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#57

Post by munin »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #51
munin wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

bacon with your waffles? hot dog for lunch? meat lovers pizza for dinner?

Most people don't eat a breakfast with multiple things most days, just a quick meal before work (or they shove a bagel in their face while driving). Most people eat food that requires basically no prep work for lunch most days. Eating out (with the exception of coffee and donuts in certain industries) is not a regular occurrence for most people because it's not justifiable at their income level. I'm not denying that…

The McDonalds drive through doesn't require any prep work and is super cheap. I see tons of people load up on Egg McMuffins with sausage at 6-7am on their way to work.

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#58

Post by Djvacto »

eaenki wrote: post #52
Djvacto wrote: post #29

This article reads more like an ad for their farm, which granted as far as farms that produce meat from livestock goes, seems really nice. But their approach is not gonna work at scale, because you cannot have enough farms that operate this way to supply meat to a whole population. They also only compare their approach to what is basically the strip mining approach to crop growth. They don't look at things like crop…

I'm calling quit on HN after seeing such an article on the first page.

I personally like having spots of news that aren't strictly technical mixed in, but I understand that some people prefer to see that elsewhere. For me, I like seeing what I consider one of the better communities I frequent on the internet discussing all sorts of things (if I could get you guys to write comments on everything I ever read, the internet would be my favorite place).

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#59

Post by toasterlovin »

A point that seems to be lost on most people who advocate for a plant based diet is that not all plants have the same environmental impact. Among plants as a class, there is a 60x range in the amount of calories provided per unit of resources required. So it matters a lot which plants you replace meat consumption with.

Generally speaking, beans, grains, and plant oils provide a lot of calories per input, whereas leafy greens and berries provide less calories per input than meat. So, if you replace your meat consumption with a bunch of kale salads and berry smoothies, your diet probably has a similar environmental impact to a diet that includes meat. But if you replace your meat consumption with beans, rice, olive oil, etc. then you're probably reducing the environmental impact of your diet.

I wrote a blog post about this:

http://www.richardjones.org/why-kale-is-actually-terrible-fo...

Re: If you want to save the world, veganism isn’t the answer

#60

Post by gadders »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #2

probably not a popular opinion but I think the best way to reduce your carbon foot print is not to have children

People are a resource, not a cost. Norman Borlaug saved one billion lives through improving agriculture. How many people like that would remain unborn?
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