"You can't love animal's if you're not a vegetarian"

[RoBi3.0]

In short, again, no point being all "houlier-than-thou" over food, there are still more serious problems than whether you eat plants or not. And as a sidenote, if everyone started being vegetarian now? Well, i hope you guys like worldwide famine, because 7 Billion People eating nothing but grown food? Yeah we dont have the space to even make as much food as we'd need.

Thank you for this point, most people seem to forget how little land there is that is available for growing crops when most of it has unsuitable soil, is too rocky, is already in use for various reasons like our living space, protected natural habitats and parks, is desert or tundra, or is being used by animals. The most likely choice to help spread crop land would be to push the animals out seeing as how most other suitable places are protected by the government or used for pointless reasons (looking at racetracks and sports stadiums).
But, maybe in all likelihood we can develop something along the lines of skyscrapers re-purposed to grow indoor crops like greenhouse towers, and even though these would take us less space that widespread growing fields, it would still take several cities worth of greenhouse towers to feed everyone.

I am not sure about this, because I only saw it in a mention earlier in the thread, but wouldn't it take a larger amount of crops to actually feed the animals from birth to slaughtering age than the animal would actually be worth as food? Let me know if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that you generally can't get more out of most organisms than you put in to keep them alive.

Well, that may be true, but it all depends on what they're being fed, a lot of the livestock around my area is fed with grass. A lot of crops require good soil and a lot of areas lack adequate soil to raise crops whereas grass grows almost everywhere. It we could convert the tough soil into something usable then maybe we could switch over but even then, I'm not going to be the one to tell people who enjoy eating meat that they can't because somebody says they find it morally wrong.
And another point, we do overproduce food on both the plant and meat side but even then, most countries are not willing to send excess supplies to regions that lack the means to produce sufficient amounts of food to feed their citizens - mostly in poor areas across Africa that are still tribal or are under the rule of warlords. Is it because the countries wouldn't get money from donating food? Or is it because once we let go of it it goes right into the hands of the powerful or wealthy?
Frankly, we need to solve problems like this before we go around deciding what's morally right to eat; heck a lot of people in the US can't even get sufficient amounts of food for lack of funds.

I few points I would like to add the typical industrial raised beef cow is feed corn and grains because those food sources make cows nice and fat and more fat specifically inter-muscular fat makes cow more appealing to eat. Also when cows are feed grass and allowed to openly graze the land needed to support them increases.

Second, there are technical means to improve soil quality it just is not financially prudent to do improve soil quality everywhere, at this point is time.

Last, I agree with you on your point that we do currently over produce food, and that the surplus does not go where it is needed. It is a sad fact of our current society that we have the means to makes sure no one goes hungry. We just have not made it a priority.

I do want to point out that when left to their own traditional devices tribal cultures are more then capable of supporting their own subsistence needs. It is when people from larger scale cultures start trying to "fix" what they see as broken that traditional tribal means of self sufficiency starts to unravel. This is of course a topic to big for this thread though. I just wanted to put my two cents in.

Well, thank you for your input and while I would disagree with you on the point that there are plenty of things wrong with the third-world cultures, we do need to take the time to introduce them to modern views and practices. Sometimes, we have to do something before they'll do it themselves like for example, I read an article about places in India where they practice child marriage and treat women and girls like personal property.

I guess you could argue that child marriage and treating women like property are things that you should "fix" and it would be hard to disagree. My main point was in regard subsistence patterns. For example the Massia of Sub-Saharan African at first glance look like the a living is very poor conditions they are in fact doing just fine. They have stubbornly fought off the surrounding Commercial scale cultures in favor of their own. Even though authorities in the area at one point trying to get them to grow commercial crops and stop obsessing about their cows.

Furthermore (child marriage and treating women like property aside) I would caution against snap judgements to fix practices of tribal cultures that seem offish or barbaric to your culture, because while a tribal culture operates on a smaller scale then a modern cultures they are no less intricate "Fixing" one thing may cause a butterfly effect that drastically change things for the worst. Especially if you have not taken the time to study how the change could impact the culture.

This isn't an Anthropology thread so I suppose I will pipe down now.

 

[John the Gamer]

snip

Please, just stop with this argument. I see it far to often, and it is just absurd. If you can't tell the difference between a thinking, conscious creature and a plant, I don't really know what to say

Oh, I can tell the difference, it's just the idea of 'killing certain living beings for food is OK, but the ones who can look me in the eye are off-limits' doesn't go well with me. How do we know plants don't feel or think? There might come a day when we find out they can. And then what?

There are plants who respond to touch, doesn't that mean they feel? Sure it might not be emotions or sentience, but where do you draw the line?

I mean, I'm still going to enjoy my salad after I'm done butchering this lettuce, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm eating a dead being for the sake of my own survival.

 

[A-D.]

Yes, I am familiar with the concept of over uses of fields. I am also familiar with the concepts of crop rotation and fertilizer. In South eastern Ohio where I lived for several years a common crop rotation would be to grow corn for a year the grow soy beans for a year or two. This coupled with fertilizer makes it so you are capable of growing a crop every year. This is just one example. Furthermore your argument would have more weight if we where raising livestock in the desert but we are not. We are raising livestock on land that could be used for crops. Nor are we rotating crops through land used to raise Livestock, meaning crops are not grow for x year then cattle raised on the same land for x years. Land dedicated to industrial scale meat production is dedicated and used solely for industrial scale meat production. We are also feeding cows [and other livestock] crops grown on land that could be used to make people food. I am also aware of the fact that the U.S. pays farmers to not grow certain crops in order to stabilize related economic markets. Therefor our maximum production out put is greater then what we actually produce.

Also you go on a rant about GMOs but fail to provided a point for the rant. So I am not sure what you are trying to prove with that information.

I am not saying that a global switch would be easy nor am I suggesting that it would not present any major problems. Nor do I think it should happen. I like to eat meat and don't want to stop. As you said people should be able to choose.I was simply disagreeing with you insinuation that it was impossible, and that the consumption of meat was preventing famine.

I never said it was impossible, i pointed out that it was unlikely, or at least that it cant be done without serious problems and if we simply went with the thought of "Oh, it will work out" we will probably screw it up and the result of that wouldnt be pretty.

But yes you do see the Point i was making, without crop and field rotation, the soil would be made unusable after a while, im not a expert there, so im not sure how fast that happens or how slow, i do know that it would happen eventually however. And the problem is that as i said if 7 Billion people wanted a vegetarian diet, we dont have enough fields to allow for crop or field rotation, all fields we currently have would be "producing" all year round as it were, hence we'd need more farmland to allow for the rotation again and that again would lead to other problems probably.

And yes i ignored the point about how Animals use fields because that doesnt matter whether we use it for crops or animals at this point, as even if the initial yield of food would be higher it wouldnt prevent the underlying problem. Also where would you put all the animals? In fact how would Cows, pigs and the like survive if they werent..well being eaten by us? We probably wouldnt really care about them if it wasnt for that we can eat them and that they taste good.

The problem I'm having with what you are saying is, since this thread became active again after almost a year without posts, no one has behaved the way you describe. As far as this conversation goes, you're writing preemptively.

I have never said no one anywhere should ever eat any meat and the entire world should switch to an all plant diet.

I wrote earlier:

As I have written over and over, I agree that an ideal diet for omnivores includes a small amount of meat. Vegan and Vegetarians would rather not take part in an industry and culture they are deeply opposed to--instead supplementing and finding other sources of protein rather than contribute to the mass factory farming of livestock.

As for you remarks about Vegans and Vegetarians being like religious fanatics... I disagree:

You have to keep in mind, vegans and vegetarians would probably not be the religious people in that comparison. They may appear to have a similar fervor at times, but they share more in common with the smaller, less socially accepted, group--the atheists or agnostics. And if you engage in a conversation with them, they will almost undoubtedly try to talk you over to their side--but more likely with facts and logic than a holy book and statements about faith.

Oh, so this was a Necro-thread? I hadnt even noticed, and im being honest there, i didnt. I blame the Necroposter for all Problems then! Okay kidding, i didnt realize it but the point stands whether this was a year ago or a day ago doesnt matter, it is fact that some people HAVE used the same logical reasoning that i would ascribe to fanatics, religious or not. Im not saying Vegetarians or Vegans are all crazy folks or the like, but some of the Comments portray a similar logic that..well the crazies use. The Idea that..their belief in eating just plants is somehow morally superior, which is if i may use that example kind of alike to feeling morally superior and talking down to people just because you believe in god and the other guy doesnt, or believes in a different god.

Im not trying to put them on the same level, but the arguements as they were chosen seem to go by that train of thought. Which is why i pointed out repeatedly that you arent any better for eating plants, just as someone who eats meat isnt any better.

 

[RoBi3.0]

Yes, I am familiar with the concept of over uses of fields. I am also familiar with the concepts of crop rotation and fertilizer. In South eastern Ohio where I lived for several years a common crop rotation would be to grow corn for a year the grow soy beans for a year or two. This coupled with fertilizer makes it so you are capable of growing a crop every year. This is just one example. Furthermore your argument would have more weight if we where raising livestock in the desert but we are not. We are raising livestock on land that could be used for crops. Nor are we rotating crops through land used to raise Livestock, meaning crops are not grow for x year then cattle raised on the same land for x years. Land dedicated to industrial scale meat production is dedicated and used solely for industrial scale meat production. We are also feeding cows [and other livestock] crops grown on land that could be used to make people food. I am also aware of the fact that the U.S. pays farmers to not grow certain crops in order to stabilize related economic markets. Therefor our maximum production out put is greater then what we actually produce.

Also you go on a rant about GMOs but fail to provided a point for the rant. So I am not sure what you are trying to prove with that information.

I am not saying that a global switch would be easy nor am I suggesting that it would not present any major problems. Nor do I think it should happen. I like to eat meat and don't want to stop. As you said people should be able to choose.I was simply disagreeing with you insinuation that it was impossible, and that the consumption of meat was preventing famine.

I never said it was impossible, i pointed out that it was unlikely, or at least that it cant be done without serious problems and if we simply went with the thought of "Oh, it will work out" we will probably screw it up and the result of that wouldnt be pretty.

But yes you do see the Point i was making, without crop and field rotation, the soil would be made unusable after a while, im not a expert there, so im not sure how fast that happens or how slow, i do know that it would happen eventually however. And the problem is that as i said if 7 Billion people wanted a vegetarian diet, we dont have enough fields to allow for crop or field rotation, all fields we currently have would be "producing" all year round as it were, hence we'd need more farmland to allow for the rotation again and that again would lead to other problems probably.

And yes i ignored the point about how Animals use fields because that doesnt matter whether we use it for crops or animals at this point, as even if the initial yield of food would be higher it wouldnt prevent the underlying problem. Also where would you put all the animals? In fact how would Cows, pigs and the like survive if they werent..well being eaten by us? We probably wouldnt really care about them if it wasnt for that we can eat them and that they taste good.

Yes, I saw your point and told you that you were flat out wrong. Crop rotation and fertilizer prolong the life of a field indefinitely. It is very clear that you are not a expert. You do realize if a field were to actually become "used up" to the point that you could never ever ever grow anything on it there would be a hell of a lot a barren waste land in the United Stated due to our commercial scale farming operations. Humans have been using some forms of agriculture for the last 3,000 years that is a lot of time to you know use up a lot of land some land. seriously drive through the country during late summer what you will find is a epic amount of farm land being used to grow food. What you wont find is barren waste lands.


Frankly your limited land hypothesis spells doom for humans regardless of the size of our population because eventually all the land would be over planted and therefor be unable to grow anything are again, meaning the plants you grow for food to feed us and our livestock would cease to exist and we would all starve.

Thanks for proving you are not an expert.

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

snip

Please, just stop with this argument. I see it far to often, and it is just absurd. If you can't tell the difference between a thinking, conscious creature and a plant, I don't really know what to say

Oh, I can tell the difference, it's just the idea of 'killing certain living beings for food is OK, but the ones who can look me in the eye are off-limits' doesn't go well with me. How do we know plants don't feel or think? There might come a day when we find out they can. And then what?

There are plants who respond to touch, doesn't that mean they feel? Sure it might not be emotions or sentience, but where do you draw the line?

I mean, I'm still going to enjoy my salad after I'm done butchering this lettuce, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm eating a dead being for the sake of my own survival.

Brains. That's a pretty good gauge of what is thinking. Responding to touch is different from thinking. Bacteria responds to it's environment, but the responses are completely reflexive and chemical. It's never being about "living beings" a term that people give way too much significance.

 

[Chris OBrien]

snip

Please, just stop with this argument. I see it far to often, and it is just absurd. If you can't tell the difference between a thinking, conscious creature and a plant, I don't really know what to say

Oh, I can tell the difference, it's just the idea of 'killing certain living beings for food is OK, but the ones who can look me in the eye are off-limits' doesn't go well with me. How do we know plants don't feel or think? There might come a day when we find out they can. And then what?

There are plants who respond to touch, doesn't that mean they feel? Sure it might not be emotions or sentience, but where do you draw the line?

I mean, I'm still going to enjoy my salad after I'm done butchering this lettuce, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm eating a dead being for the sake of my own survival.

Brains. That's a pretty good gauge of what is thinking. Responding to touch is different from thinking. Bacteria responds to it's environment, but the responses are completely reflexive and chemical. It's never being about "living beings" a term that people give way too much significance.

Brains, or at the very least, a central nervous system.

Does it actively struggle against its environment to survive? If you put something it considers food in front of it, will it eat the food? Does it reproduce in a way similar to human beings, at least on a basic level?

He had it, the word that is really important to vegans and vegetarians is sentience. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentience)That is where you draw the line. Does it have the ability to suffer?

It goes without saying that there are many things we do not know, but all you can do is behave based on available data. The available data of basic biology reveals that plants cannot think and feel and cannot suffer. They are alive, but not sentient. Animals, on the other hand, are sentient.

 

[Chris OBrien]

Yes, I am familiar with the concept of over uses of fields. I am also familiar with the concepts of crop rotation and fertilizer. In South eastern Ohio where I lived for several years a common crop rotation would be to grow corn for a year the grow soy beans for a year or two. This coupled with fertilizer makes it so you are capable of growing a crop every year. This is just one example. Furthermore your argument would have more weight if we where raising livestock in the desert but we are not. We are raising livestock on land that could be used for crops. Nor are we rotating crops through land used to raise Livestock, meaning crops are not grow for x year then cattle raised on the same land for x years. Land dedicated to industrial scale meat production is dedicated and used solely for industrial scale meat production. We are also feeding cows [and other livestock] crops grown on land that could be used to make people food. I am also aware of the fact that the U.S. pays farmers to not grow certain crops in order to stabilize related economic markets. Therefor our maximum production out put is greater then what we actually produce.

Also you go on a rant about GMOs but fail to provided a point for the rant. So I am not sure what you are trying to prove with that information.

I am not saying that a global switch would be easy nor am I suggesting that it would not present any major problems. Nor do I think it should happen. I like to eat meat and don't want to stop. As you said people should be able to choose.I was simply disagreeing with you insinuation that it was impossible, and that the consumption of meat was preventing famine.

I never said it was impossible, i pointed out that it was unlikely, or at least that it cant be done without serious problems and if we simply went with the thought of "Oh, it will work out" we will probably screw it up and the result of that wouldnt be pretty.

But yes you do see the Point i was making, without crop and field rotation, the soil would be made unusable after a while, im not a expert there, so im not sure how fast that happens or how slow, i do know that it would happen eventually however. And the problem is that as i said if 7 Billion people wanted a vegetarian diet, we dont have enough fields to allow for crop or field rotation, all fields we currently have would be "producing" all year round as it were, hence we'd need more farmland to allow for the rotation again and that again would lead to other problems probably.

And yes i ignored the point about how Animals use fields because that doesnt matter whether we use it for crops or animals at this point, as even if the initial yield of food would be higher it wouldnt prevent the underlying problem. Also where would you put all the animals? In fact how would Cows, pigs and the like survive if they werent..well being eaten by us? We probably wouldnt really care about them if it wasnt for that we can eat them and that they taste good.

The problem I'm having with what you are saying is, since this thread became active again after almost a year without posts, no one has behaved the way you describe. As far as this conversation goes, you're writing preemptively.

I have never said no one anywhere should ever eat any meat and the entire world should switch to an all plant diet.

I wrote earlier:

As I have written over and over, I agree that an ideal diet for omnivores includes a small amount of meat. Vegan and Vegetarians would rather not take part in an industry and culture they are deeply opposed to--instead supplementing and finding other sources of protein rather than contribute to the mass factory farming of livestock.

As for you remarks about Vegans and Vegetarians being like religious fanatics... I disagree:

You have to keep in mind, vegans and vegetarians would probably not be the religious people in that comparison. They may appear to have a similar fervor at times, but they share more in common with the smaller, less socially accepted, group--the atheists or agnostics. And if you engage in a conversation with them, they will almost undoubtedly try to talk you over to their side--but more likely with facts and logic than a holy book and statements about faith.

Oh, so this was a Necro-thread? I hadnt even noticed, and im being honest there, i didnt. I blame the Necroposter for all Problems then! Okay kidding, i didnt realize it but the point stands whether this was a year ago or a day ago doesnt matter, it is fact that some people HAVE used the same logical reasoning that i would ascribe to fanatics, religious or not. Im not saying Vegetarians or Vegans are all crazy folks or the like, but some of the Comments portray a similar logic that..well the crazies use. The Idea that..their belief in eating just plants is somehow morally superior, which is if i may use that example kind of alike to feeling morally superior and talking down to people just because you believe in god and the other guy doesnt, or believes in a different god.

Im not trying to put them on the same level, but the arguements as they were chosen seem to go by that train of thought. Which is why i pointed out repeatedly that you arent any better for eating plants, just as someone who eats meat isnt any better.

I have a couple questions for you then, because unless you frame your value system for me, your comments make you seem like a moral relativist.

What do you value? If someone made what they thought were personal choices that negatively affected the world and it conflicted with your value system, would you not feel morally superior? Would you not try to inform said person of the effects of their behaviors and try to better the world by bettering them?

See, to vegans and vegetarians who care about the treatment of animals, their diet is morally superior. However, the difference you seem to be ignoring is that their sense of moral superiority is based on verifiable evidence regarding the meat farming industry and the treatment of animals as well as the health benefits of a diet that minimizes meat consumption, not on interpretations and opinions about thousands of years old texts that are regarded as holy books. They've been edified, not indoctrinated. Shouldn't it be every individual's goal to be as morally advanced as possible? If not, then why not?

I'm not arguing that makes it right to treat anyone poorly or talk down to others, I'm arguing that all things are not equal. If some behaviors are morally superior to others, then all behaviors can be assigned greater or lesser value. (Note: "behaviors," not "people.")

To your above comments about farmed animals--we care about plenty of animals that are not grown for food. The goal is not merely the continued survival of any given species, it's the ethical treatment of all animals. You don't "put all the animals" anywhere. You stop breeding as many. You ween yourself as a society slowly off of meat.

Almost all farmed animals are domesticated at this point and that is our fault. They likely can't be reintroduced into the wild, but that does not provide any justification for continuing the gross exploitation and mistreatment of said animals for food.

 

[BNguyen]

Chris OBrien

So where would you morally stand if we did switch over to an all plant diet, and over time, the human population expanded to require say four or five times as much land to produce food as we use now and due to this, we needed to destroy animal reserve land and forests in order to get the amount of land necessary in order to feed everyone? Would you still support a plant based diet if in order to fulfill it it destroyed animal habitats and caused numerous species to go extinct?
And for this example, I'm not talking about eating animals, I'm asking how you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?

 

[Chris OBrien]

Chris OBrien

So where would you morally stand if we did switch over to an all plant diet, and over time, the human population expanded to require say four or five times as much land to produce food as we use now and due to this, we needed to destroy animal reserve land and forests in order to get the amount of land necessary in order to feed everyone? Would you still support a plant based diet if in order to fulfill it it destroyed animal habitats and caused numerous species to go extinct?
And for this example, I'm not talking about eating animals, I'm asking how you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?

You are talking about an over-population problem, not a diet problem. In your example, one (diet) does not follow the other (an over-populated planet). I and others have pointed out multiple times that it would require less farm land to grow enough plants to feed the people of the planet. In the given scenario, producing meat for human consumption would not solve the problem because you would then need to feed the increased animal population as well as the growing human population.

So, the only humane solutions to your scenario are to cap human population growth or colonize other planets with abundant natural resources. In that case, vegans and vegetarians would still support plant based diets as well as responsible human breeding, increased government funding to aero-space sciences, and the development of vertical farms (artificial land to grow crops--http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertical_farming).

All you've done is show that it requires an impossible scenario--or at least one in which the diet supported is rendered irrelevant by the very fact that the given problem would be an issue either way--to convince someone who supports plant based diets to consider saying, "well, no in that case, I'd have to rethink what I support." Perhaps the best evidence I can give you that your scenario is unrealistic is India--it has the largest population of any country in the world, yet consumes very little meat. The same was true of China, another huge population, until relatively recently when meat became more common.

Ignoring your scenario and addressing the fundamental question that you've posed--"How [would] you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?" I think that is obvious because it's exactly what vegans and vegetarians have already done. Again, most vegans and vegetarians have adopted their diets. They've identified a problem that their behavior helped perpetuate and they've altered their behavior accordingly.

 

[BNguyen]

Chris OBrien

I believe your response to my question is just as unrealistic - colonizing other planets? Within such a relatively short period of time, this would be the impossible choice and plan to pull off.
First off, only so many people could actually colonize at first in order to build a working and lasting infrastructure, and it would take an almost impossible amount of fuel in order to develop a working transportation system between the colonies and earth.
Our planet does not have infinite resources like your solutions would need, vertical farming would still require a vast amount of materials needed, a continuous stream of power (because frankly, everything that doesn't get sunlight will need UV lights and that would be very consuming. And it's obvious that a lot of places around the world are not going to follow a 'limited number of offspring' program as you would want them to, people are just built to respond negatively to any sort of control you put over them.
And, even if we were to let go of the animals we have and convert the land we used for them into crop land, we would still need to undergo crop rotation as well as fertilizing the unused land to get it back to a usable state. We take the nutrients we need to make fertilizer from areas where we don't grow crops and if we were to expand this operation to feed a population of such magnitude would be utterly ridiculous.

Given our current resources and abilities, we do not have the capability to grow enough food to support in my scenario a rapidly expanding population in a relatively short amount of time, more people would starve before we could get your plan off the ground.
And right now, places like India and China are unrealistic examples given that we are capable of feeding at least 85% of the population today.
And as you so clearly missed: THIS SCENARIO IS NOT ABOUT MEAT PRODUCTION!
I'm asking how someone who clearly doesn't understand the ramifications of the environmental impact we have on the planet no matter what we do would solve such an issue (in which people would most likely comply) given that the entire population of the globe would convert to plant eating and would suffer a rapid population increase.

And this:
"Ignoring your scenario and addressing the fundamental question that you've posed--"How [would] you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?" I think that is obvious because it's exactly what vegans and vegetarians have already done. Again, most vegans and vegetarians have adopted their diets. They've identified a problem that their behavior helped perpetuate and they've altered their behavior accordingly."

This is not answering my question. I'm asking that if the plant based diet and the lifestyle it requires caused the problem, then how would you fix it to minimize the effects of starvation?
Stop ignoring the question with "I eat plants therefore I'm better than you meat eaters even if you say you don't eat meat directly, therefore I must be more intelligent"

 

[Loonyyy]

Chris OBrien

So where would you morally stand if we did switch over to an all plant diet, and over time, the human population expanded to require say four or five times as much land to produce food as we use now and due to this, we needed to destroy animal reserve land and forests in order to get the amount of land necessary in order to feed everyone? Would you still support a plant based diet if in order to fulfill it it destroyed animal habitats and caused numerous species to go extinct?
And for this example, I'm not talking about eating animals, I'm asking how you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?

I think firstly you'd have to consider the problem with eating meat in that scenario. The inefficiency in the process of growing feed for livestock and keeping them would mean to continue eating meat in such a world would require even more space. So straight off the bat, vegetarianism would be the better alternative to eating meat in your scenario. Supporting a plant based diet would reduce the need to destroy habitat. Your argument fails on the face of it since you fail to understand the process of food production.

Having dismantled your case, I guess I should answer the question, huh? I think I'd go for a third option- I don't think that human population should be allowed to expand to the point where it must destroy the natural world to accomadate it, and would question the reason between allowing population expansion to quantities which endanger the population.


EDIT: This is what I get for not refreshing before posting.

Nguyen. You're still trying to question a Vegetarian or Vegan viewpoint with a hypothetical which does not concern that viewpoint. The problem is to do with food production and overpopulation in general, and has no relevance to a majority plant-based diet. He's not dodging your question, your question DOES NOT MAKE SENSE. The lifestyle problem in your question is EATING. If you mean to ask, should we continue to eat in that scenario, you've posed a scenario which is improbable in the extreme. How do we arrive at the precise point where our land is insufficient, and how do we run out of options, and why did we not limit our population or explore alternatives?

Which is exactly the response you got. Those who chose a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle are not those responsible for the problem. It's extremely odd that you'd question his reasoning when he's already closer to the ideal.

If we decided to destroy the land used by wild animals and use it for crop production, we'd be delaying the inevitable-we'd run out of land again sooner or later. The planet has limited resources, and is incapable of supporting an infinite amount of people. Sooner or later, population control will be an issue, and we'll have to deal with that. But the relation to vegetarianism is almost non-existant, and the question of whether the land reserved for wild animals is worth more or less than human population expansion (In my opinion, it's worth more, since I feel that population expansion in and of itself is worthless), is hardly going to get a specific answer from vegetarians, because it has literally nothing to do with whether you choose to eat meat, or consume animal products, or not.

 

[Angie7F]

I love dogs. They eat meat, so do I. Where's the problem in that?

My opinion, word per word.
If anything it is the humans that developed this crazy stuff called intelligence that sends them on a guilt trip about eating other animals.
You do what you gotta do to stay alive.

 

[BNguyen]

Chris OBrien

So where would you morally stand if we did switch over to an all plant diet, and over time, the human population expanded to require say four or five times as much land to produce food as we use now and due to this, we needed to destroy animal reserve land and forests in order to get the amount of land necessary in order to feed everyone? Would you still support a plant based diet if in order to fulfill it it destroyed animal habitats and caused numerous species to go extinct?
And for this example, I'm not talking about eating animals, I'm asking how you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?

I think firstly you'd have to consider the problem with eating meat in that scenario. The inefficiency in the process of growing feed for livestock and keeping them would mean to continue eating meat in such a world would require even more space. So straight off the bat, vegetarianism would be the better alternative to eating meat in your scenario. Supporting a plant based diet would reduce the need to destroy habitat. Your argument fails on the face of it since you fail to understand the process of food production.

Having dismantled your case, I guess I should answer the question, huh? I think I'd go for a third option- I don't think that human population should be allowed to expand to the point where it must destroy the natural world to accomadate it, and would question the reason between allowing population expansion to quantities which endanger the population.

You do understand that my question goes around the entire meat production issue right? I'm asking that if it was done away with and we encounter that problem in a future of only having a diet of plants. I'm not including meat production into the argument at all, so no, it doesn't just fail.
While measures would be needed to be put into place in order to halt a population boom, isolated areas would still likely continue purely out of choice to do so, but I don't think an all plant diet is necessarily the end-all solution to such a problem.
With an increased population comes a greater demand for land needed to build homes, and currently, we tear down new land at a rapid rate in order to fulfill that, now add the land necessary to develop into viable farmland enough to feed the growing population and we have a low percentage of land that would be deemed good enough to actually use for growing.
What you people fail to realize is that the earth does not have infinite resources and in order to accommodate an expanding population even after an all-plant based diet economy, we would need to open up new areas to develop for food.
After all, when growing crops we have to deal with the threat of the weather such as hurricanes, tornadoes, and other such destructive forces are not entirely avoidable.

As I've read across this issue, a lot of people seem to think that 1) if we were to quite consuming meat, the industry would collapse and the government would have to recognize the choice (of the majority) to switch over. 2) that it would take a lot less land to feed people on a plant diet that an omnivorous diet. 3) that even with the sheer amount of crop rotation and need for resources, that it would be easy to maintain a plant-diet economy

Well, on one - not everybody is keen to this idea, a lot of people, and I'm sure yourself included, do not like to be told or even forced into doing something you don't want. As long as there are people who want meat, this omnivorous diet economy is going to continue. Two - even though it would take less land to accommodate a plant-diet, you still need to recognize that even with our current production levels of an omnivorous diet, people are still starving around the world. We have the resources to feed the people, but as long as money is to be exchanged and trade is business, the food will never reach the people that need it if they can't afford to acquire it. Three - we do not have enough land in order to 1) grow crops enough to feed people, 2)have land left over to perform crop rotation, 3) have the resources needed to ensure bountiful harvests that could continue to feed people if a disaster were to occur, for example, a fire that could consume a large amount of the crops or pest control.

As we continue to expand on the earth, our need for land to fulfill our ability to survive also increases and as we expand, we are competing with the flora and fauna in order to survive. We have too many issues right now in order to be able to survive on a plant-based diet especially when there are so many things that we have yet to control that work against us.
We have invasive plant species which can and do destroy the natural environment around them. As we continue to grow crops in areas where these plants did not exist, we increase the threat that such actions will have a negative impact on the environment which could cause animal populations to decrease or even go extinct - think in Australia when herders moved in, they saw the Thylacine as a threat and wiped it out. Or how farmers introduced kudzu to North America to fight soil erosion which only caused an infestation of the plant. Natural disasters occur every day - weather patterns, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis. These things are unavoidable and with a need for expanding farmland, we are more likely to encounter these problems than before when as primitive people we lived in smaller areas. And with an increasing need to feed our population, the resources needed are also dwindling - the amount of land that can be used, the suppliments needed to keep the land usable, fresh water. While eliminating the meat industry to supply at the very least the land portion of the equation, it would take much effort to minimalize the loss of animal life while converting the land into farmland, that and where would the animals go if we released them? Plenty of farm animals are not capable of surviving without humans, pigs are the most likely ones to pull it off, but even they can turn into pests. And the fresh water necessary to grow the crops doesn't just come from anywhere, it comes from our faucets and drinking sources. To grow more crops, we need more water and with a growing population to sustain, we also need more water, but we consume more water than the plants do, coupled with that that most of the fresh water we have is flowing right out into the oceans.
Even if we were to shift into using superstructures to grow crops, it would take an unbelievable amount of building materials and electricity to support them. Plants grow in buildings (and the buildings in this scenario would have to be enormous to prevent habitat destruction) would need a massive irrigation system as well as UV lighting to stimulate growth, and these would require enormous amounts of power to keep them going, such a frail and vulnerable system is likely to fail should the power source be even accidentally cut, and if this were to occur, the crops would most likely die before we could get it back up and going, causing widespread starvation.
But let's say that we could build and maintain a system of crops, the population boom would cause the system to reach it's limits in order to feed this population. So no, I don't believe an all plant based diet would be the end-all solution. My solution (coupled with the farming infrastructural plan) would be to utilize the oceans.
Only 30% of the plant is land and even less of that can be used for farming - i.e. deserts, frozen tundra, ice sheets, animal habitats, mountains, national parks and preserves, and add to the fact that humans, even with being able to alter our environments to live, only live where we are the most comfortable. With all of this, we would most likely run out of usable land long before we could get the system up and going, so I believe the ocean is the next best answer to solving the problem outside of Chris OBrein's plan of interstellar travel. The ocean is bountiful and if managed properly, could sustain just as much if not more people than a solely plant-based diet could.
Add to the fact that large portions of the year are devoted to simply getting the plants ready for harvest during this time, without a store of food to fall back on, we would starve before the plants produced edible food.

EDIT: had to add in disease (as long as we continue to genetically alter food - i.e. breeding plants to produce quality, well, produce, we are making plants that are losing their genetic diversity and therefore making them more susceptible to diseases, and as long as we are trying to develop plants like this, it would only be too easy for a disease to spread and wipe out the entire crop). As well as droughts - if we did not implement the superstructure crop plan and relied on open fields, if droughts were to occur, we would lose both the plants and time to outlast the drought. In order to decrease the effects, we would need to bring in water from outside sources, something that would 1)destroy the environment we got it from should we build something akin to oil pipelines or even used tanker trucks, as well as pollute the environment by shipping the water or even building the pipes.
And a third note: chemicals and the rick of poisoning the environment through crop runoff. As we continue to spread crop land, we increase the need for chemicals to prevent pests from destroying them. When we water our crops, we are letting these chemicals wash down into underground water sources or animal habitats and poison them. If we were to go organic, thus eliminating the need for chemicals, more than half of the crops would die from pests and little to no fertilizers to stimulate good growth.

Now if you can give an answer as to how we would deal with all of the problems I've stated, then we'd be good to go on an all-plant based diet.

 

[BNguyen]

I love dogs. They eat meat, so do I. Where's the problem in that?

My opinion, word per word.
If anything it is the humans that developed this crazy stuff called intelligence that sends them on a guilt trip about eating other animals.
You do what you gotta do to stay alive.

Thank you, my opinion exactly.
If humans didn't develop intelligence such as we have now, we wouldn't care how many animals we kill as long as our stomachs are full enough to carry us to the next day. Survival is key and if biting into an animal helps me stay alive, I'll most likely do it (excluding the animals I call my pets). Besides, when out in the wild, it is easier to find an animal to hunt that an edible plant.

 

[RoBi3.0]

Chris OBrien

So where would you morally stand if we did switch over to an all plant diet, and over time, the human population expanded to require say four or five times as much land to produce food as we use now and due to this, we needed to destroy animal reserve land and forests in order to get the amount of land necessary in order to feed everyone? Would you still support a plant based diet if in order to fulfill it it destroyed animal habitats and caused numerous species to go extinct?
And for this example, I'm not talking about eating animals, I'm asking how you would fix the problem if your life style was the cause of the problem?

Well in this completely bullshit "what if situation", there would be really only two choices. Let the human race, or at least a large portion of it die off. Choice number two consist a global switch to the most efficient and most substitutable means of food production in order to reduce that overall destruct that you have described. The means of food production I mentioned in growing crops and not meat.

So even in a completely bullshit scenario meant to make a vegetarian lifestyle look bad it actually becomes the best option. You know unless willing letting vast amounts of human beings starve to death is more your thing.

Okay now on to why this is a bullshit scenario. For world populations to reach level required to produce your scenario it would take many many many years of uncontrolled population growth. World governments would have to simply not give a shit for a few decades in order for the world population to get any where near that kind of out of control. furthermore is is the case now such growth would take place (if it happened at all) in third world countries, where technology and cultural practices have not naturally tapered of birth rates. So realistically uncontrolled population growth (If people choose to ignore it) would be contained to underdeveloped countries. Now this is sad but it is the truth. When faced if putting there own country's economies and ecosystems at risked, leaders of developed countries, especially the U.S. are more likely to ignore the over-population and hunger problem in third world nations then step in and put themselves at risk. Therefor after a famine or two the population would drop dramatically back below the maximum sustainable amount that can be supported by the land with in that country.

Secondly, what you described is a lose lose situation. There is not a best choice. Which is something a thought experiment meant to gauge morality kind of needs.

 

[RoBi3.0]

Holy double post batman!

 

[BNguyen]

Holy double post batman!

so just because it is a possible scenario but goes against your moral code that makes it a bullshit scenario?
You know, even if the government were to implement a system for population growth it isn't likely that people would follow it. I'm not in support of letting people die by their own stupidity, I want to prevent death as much as possible, but given our current situation and how much we tamper with the environment to maintain our level of society, we need to find other food sources, completely cutting off meat at the moment is not the best option - from an economic stand-point but if we were to tap a bit more into the ocean, then we could sustain a very large population, at least for a short while.

And no, it wouldn't take many years for the population to explode in my scenario, it would only take a handful of years, and a large number of people who are fertile and want to have continuous bouts of sex - i.e. under-aged teenagers and unintelligent adults which we have in abundance across the globe. And even if the world leaders were to favor the economy more than the people in a famine situation, the people would likely revolt and widespread panic and chaos would ensue long before they die off from starvation.
You seem to forget that the vast majority of people are not intelligent and will start a fight to survive when the time comes, all that we can do is hope to placate their anger long enough until the panic goes away.

 

[RoBi3.0]

Holy double post batman!

so just because it is a possible scenario but goes against your moral code that makes it a bullshit scenario?
You know, even if the government were to implement a system for population growth it isn't likely that people would follow it. I'm not in support of letting people die by their own stupidity, I want to prevent death as much as possible, but given our current situation and how much we tamper with the environment to maintain our level of society, we need to find other food sources, completely cutting off meat at the moment is not the best option - from an economic stand-point but if we were to tap a bit more into the ocean, then we could sustain a very large population, at least for a short while.

And no, it wouldn't take many years for the population to explode in my scenario, it would only take a handful of years, and a large number of people who are fertile and want to have continuous bouts of sex - i.e. under-aged teenagers and unintelligent adults which we have in abundance across the globe. And even if the world leaders were to favor the economy more than the people in a famine situation, the people would likely revolt and widespread panic and chaos would ensue long before they die off from starvation.
You seem to forget that the vast majority of people are not intelligent and will start a fight to survive when the time comes, all that we can do is hope to placate their anger long enough until the panic goes away.

I am fairly sure you have no clue what my moral code is. Second it is a bullshit scenario because there is a larger chance of Jesus parting the clouds and ascending from heaven then it actually happening(hint: I don't believe in heaven or "God").



The thing with effective population control is that you do not give people a choice to follow or not. China has in place a plan for population control ask any Chinese woman who has went and got pregnant after exceeding their limit (the limit is 1 child) if she is given a choice to keep the baby or not. I don't however believe that it needs to come to that kind of extreme proper family-planning education and better availability of contraceptives will go a long way. People as stupid as you seem to think they are, when given the choice to prevent having a baby or having one and watching it starve, will choose prevention. This is an actual problem currently in third world countries. In the U.S. is a little different as having enough babies you cant take care for actually gets you a free ride from the government. Which is a glaring problem with the welfare system IMO, but that is topic for another thread. As I point out below first-world populations are pretty stable anyhow.

Look despite your obvious displeasure with under-age teenagers and stupid adults fornicating the fact of the matter is that is industrialized nations population growth is not on the rise it is actually pretty stable. Places were population is current high is as I pointed of earlier in under-developed nations. They lack family-planning eduction and forms of effective birth control.

It is in these under-developed nation where populations would become out of control first. It is these countries that the overpopulation problem would be contained.

I find it laughable that you think the people would raise up if world leaders put their economies over starving people, because this is exactly the practices that are employed today. As I pointed out earlier in the thread farmers in America are paid by the government NOT to grow food so that the supply does not off-set the demand in an effort to stabilized food markets. Everyday people in the U.S. go hungry because they fall in between the gape where they can actually afford take care of themselves and were they qualify for welfare assistance, and this occurs in a nation that is 100% capable of feeding all of its people. Not to mentions the countless individual starving to death in Africa and other parts of the third world. Where are the people raising up to over throw our leaders? Here is a hint, they are not coming. The world is capable producing enough food to support our current population. The sad fact is that we do not do it because it is not profitable.

 

[BNguyen]

RoBi3.0
I already made a point in an earlier post about how we have the means to provide for our population and don't do it, we are essentially allowing the population that can't afford food to starve.
And stupid people will always do stupid things no matter how much you try to educate them over the issues, which is why kids still have sex, do drugs, smoke, and drink, and why we have so many car accidents because people will always take risks with what they got to work with, no matter how much you try, people will always have their brains work around with reverse psychology, the more you tell them not to do it the more inclined they are to do so.
And First World nations may have stable populations - i.e. not exploding, but the fact of the matter is we still have a large and growing percentage of people who can't afford to take care of their families and wind up being homeless.
I think we need to make an effort to have a population that meets the needs of the economy in order to be able to provide for everyone, but as long as we have uneducated and even educated yet stupid people, we will have a hunger crisis that politicians will not deal with for greed.

And the whole part of containing over population to third-world nations is not something that will forever be contained. Populations will continue to expand beyond our means to effectively govern them.
And maybe the people wouldn't rebel if the governments limited food sources... hah! couldn't say that with a straight face. You do understand that it's happened before don't you?
http://www.enotes.com/food-riots-reference/food-riots
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/food-riots-2011
http://www.euronews.com/2011/01/07/algerian-riots-over-food-prices-and-unemployment/

As long as people hoard the food sources, there will always be people who will protest and often turn violent in order to get at that food.

 

[BNguyen]

Now based on recent posts, this thread has gotten way off hand from what we were supposed to talk about so I'm dropping this here and now