I recommend the book The Proof is in the Plants for a seemingly unbiased review of the literature.
Dude cites study after study pretty much all with the same conclusion: Eating animal products is bad for your health.
40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
111–120 of 360 posts
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly. The current world population is 8.3 billion and is expected to peak at 10.3 billion in 2080 and then begin declining. Now, there are a number of other reasons we might have food shortages, but population per se I don't think is a significant factor.
Even if food shortages aren't an issue, reducing the amount of land dedicated to food production is a win for ecosystems. Not saying people have to go vegetarian, but reducing meat consumption or using more efficiently produced meats (in terms of land use) would overall make the world a nicer and more interesting place. And, really, with the whole neu5gc thing, it might be that humans would be better off focusing on…
Yes, we could concreting this land and build housings and streets.
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#113Cows eat grass. Humans use more calories digesting grass than they gain from eating grass, so cows are infinitely more efficient than humans at gaining calories from grass. And there are places in the world where growing human food would destroy the land. Semi-deserts like Texas and Montana. Grazing cattle there is a good idea. Bison would be even better because the native prairie there is adapted to bison, but cattl…
I think a vast majority of the beef we eat is grainfed unless you're buying the super hip, small-scale, expensive stuff
In my neck of the woods, the vast majority of the beef we eat is grass fed for most of their lives, but then grain finished. They only eat grain for the last month (out of 8 or so), but they put on most of their weight in that last month.
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#114> "needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal" The calories cows eat are ... useless to humans. We cannot digest cullulose (grass) and most of the rest of the things we feed to cows. Anyone throwing this number around has an agenda, and is not objective
90% of the feed they get is not for human consumption. But the rest that feed is for human consumption. And that human-edible feed makes up 75% of all US cropland. Most of our crops are grown just to feed cows. Meaning the majority of the grain we produce is going to grow a steak, when it could be used to feed many more humans than a steak will.
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is no reason to obliterate food, you should give it away to those in need.
Ok drive to Michigan and haul away 3 tons of cherries.
Are Michigan tart cherry farmers allowed to sell direct to customers without additional licensing requirements and food inspections?
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s hard for the market to decide on its own when the environmental damage of meat production is left as an unpriced externality and when government subsidies are handed out like candy.
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Is the deforestation of the Amazon overblown? What about the draining of American aquifers?
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#117Cows eat grass. Humans use more calories digesting grass than they gain from eating grass, so cows are infinitely more efficient than humans at gaining calories from grass. And there are places in the world where growing human food would destroy the land. Semi-deserts like Texas and Montana. Grazing cattle there is a good idea. Bison would be even better because the native prairie there is adapted to bison, but cattl…
I think a vast majority of the beef we eat is grainfed unless you're buying the super hip, small-scale, expensive stuff
The vast majority is beef is finished on grain, but start on grass.
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a nice bit of trivia but it doesn't really affect the comment you're replying to. It's still food, full of flavor and calories, and able to be used by a home cook (by making a pie).
If you researched this regulation even a little, you'd see the crops are rarely destroyed. They are far more often exported, diverted to secondary markets, donated, or carried-over into next-season's stock. It's interesting to me how people are quick to comment about things they know nothing about... > It's still food, full of flavor and calories Tart cherries have about 1-2 calories per cherry, and do not taste good…
> If you researched this regulation even a little
Yeah yeah yeah I saw that in your other comment.
That's a completely different argument.
The argument you made in this comment is still a bad one.
It's interesting to me how people are quick to move the goalposts...
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#119> If excess beef consumption were reduced to healthy quantities, as defined by the EAT-Lancet healthy reference diet, and substituted with chicken in forty-eight higher-income countries, the lost calories avoided would be enough to meet the caloric needs of 850 million people. It's really impressive how efficient chickens are compared to beef. Obviously thinks like legumes are way more efficient, but we've really bre…
Legumes and soy in particular is a pretty common allergy... it's nearly impossible to get sufficient protein without meat if you have a legume allergy.
The impact of non-natural feeds on the overall nutrition profile for chickens and pork are larger than with ruminant animals. Chickens have been bred and changed a lot through environmental manipulation to grow much faster than in nature.
There are a few breeds of cows that are producing more muscle mass than most, they've gotten quite a bit larger through breeding as well, though the difference in time to maturation doesn't come close to what we've done with chickens... I'm not sure it's for the better though.
Re: 40% of lost calories globally are from beef, needing 33 cal of feed per 1 cal
#120Not trying to be overly flippant... who cares? The paper opens with "to feed a growing population" without asking is that what we need? want? where we are actually heading to? Is feeding the world a real problem? I've yet to see compelling evidence that it really is except as a secondary effect of logistics, energy supply, and war. edit: I understand the environmental impacts. I think we should solve our energy probl…
> Is feeding the world a real problem? Yes. > I've yet to see compelling evidence that it really is except as a secondary effect of logistics, energy supply, and war. I don't know how to respond to this. It's like saying you don't think breathing underwater is difficult, except for the secondary effects of water. War is a problem. Energy supply is a problem. Logistics is a problem. All these problems lead to starvati…
Feeding the world is a problem of economics and politics, not the ecological problems of growing food.
There is huge capacity for food production in the world, and no reason anyone should go hungry
Keeping people hungry is deliberate economic policy.
In New Zealand where I live we make enough food for millions more than live here, yet many face food insecurity.
As I say, it is deliberate, calculated, government policy to keep people on the edge of hunger.
It keeps wages low - our idiot business people think every dollar paid in wages is a dollar of profit lost
Idiotic and cruel, and widespread