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What do you think about eating meat?
We evolved as meat-eaters and we should eat it 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
We evolved as meat-eaters but we shouldn't eat it 67%  67%  [ 2 ]
We didn't evolve as meat-eaters but we should eat it 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
We didn't evolve as meat-eaters and we shouldn't eat it 33%  33%  [ 1 ]
Total votes : 3

AstroPi
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26 May 2018, 1:05 pm

I don't want to hijack any other thread for this, so here's the place for discussion (proving I'm wrong ;) ) I'm not sure if it's possible to move posts from "The Most Annoying Ways in Which Prehistory is Misrepresented" here because it would be the ideal solution (anyone knows how to do that?), but if not I'll write summary soon. For now I've added some poll, hopefully it will get more than zero responses. Any comments are welcomed.


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naturalplastic
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26 May 2018, 1:25 pm

Bears are carnivores that drifted into omnivory. And one species, the great panda, is solidly vegetarian.

Humans are fruiting eating monkeys/apes that difted into omnivory. Like our chimp cousins it was natural for our most recent prehumen ancestors to bolster our largely vegetarian diet with insects, and small vertebrate game (small mammals, birds, and birds eggs).

We did not "evolve to eat meat" in the way that cats and dogs evolved to be meat eaters. Our stomachs are not even designed to digest meat.

But we did evolve to be flexible feeders who can adapt to different environments. That combined with the fact that we lost our instinctive land mammal fear of fire and long ago and learned to use fire to cook - and thus to partially digest food outside of our bodies before we even put it in our mouths made us able to survive anywhere, even where meat is the only thing to eat (like if become eskimos and need to survive on fish and sea mammals alone without garden vegitables.

So the short answer is NO we did not "evolve TO eat meat", at best we evolved to "tolerate meat".

Whether we should eat meat now, and into the future. Hard to say. Eating meat is hard on the planet, and it would eliminate some problems if we got rid of that extra link on the food chain. Some say that in the not so far future they will be able clone prime cuts of filet mignon in factories without having to raise the rest of the cows. I guess that would eliminate the morality issue.



Kurgan
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26 May 2018, 1:31 pm

We evolved as omnivores, but eat too much carbohydrates and too little protein today. We can pretty much digest any form of meat, but not digest cellulose, like any true vegetarian animal does.

We "like" sweet-tasting vegetarian food, just like bears, rats, wolves and other omnivores, though.


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26 May 2018, 1:57 pm

Can't we just learn about nature without being fed a far-left guilt trip?


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Tanker
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28 May 2018, 6:34 pm

i'm missing an important options. namely "omnivorous". since that's what we evolved from and have always been, it seem a cheat to leave that out.
the real question is: do you object to eating meat? if so, dont eat it. if not, enjoy.



AstroPi
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29 May 2018, 2:17 pm

DarthMetaKnight wrote:
Can't we just learn about nature without being fed a far-left guilt trip?

Nature teaches us many things. Scientific approach requires considering every possible option, even if it's "far-left". Because in the end only truth matters.

Tanker wrote:
i'm missing an important options. namely "omnivorous". since that's what we evolved from and have always been, it seem a cheat to leave that out.

I didn't write carnivorous anywhere, so there's no place for word omnivorous either. In that case it means we were meat-eaters, even if only accidentally, and you could use this option. It can negatively affects only meat-free options

Tanker wrote:
the real question is: do you object to eating meat? if so, dont eat it. if not, enjoy.

But by this poll I want to find out something else: how current diet affects one's views, is there any correlation? I don't write anywhere what you should or shouldn't do, I leave that to your conscience, I just try to establish the truth about our evolution. For that I need some constructive arguments against my views, because I may be skewed and maybe I miss something important.


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Tanker
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29 May 2018, 3:45 pm

dont be disingenuous, now. you wrote "meat-eater" which translates directly into and means "carnivore".
"meat-eater" suggests "something that eats mostly or only meat".

so either you are leading the question or you need to work on your writing skills.

and that doesnt correct the blatant omission of omnivores. which we humans, again, evolved from.



AstroPi
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30 May 2018, 1:35 pm

Tanker wrote:
dont be disingenuous, now. you wrote "meat-eater" which translates directly into and means "carnivore".
"meat-eater" suggests "something that eats mostly or only meat".

What "mostly" means? I've explained what I mean by meat-eater, don't know any better word I could use here. Omnivore is not good either, 'cause where's the line between meat-eating omnivore and carnivore? We were omnivores like other monkeys, but they didn't evolve as we did, so there's obvious difference, so how many "omnivorous" options should I use? Monkey-like omnivore, bear-like omnivore, how many others? Meat-eater is a good option, because hypothesis says we started to eat meat in high quantities and this made the difference

Quote:
so either you are leading the question or you need to work on your writing skills.

Well, I admit, my writing skills are not too good, I'm not verbal thinker, but I think the poll options are good enough for my purpose.

Quote:
and that doesnt correct the blatant omission of omnivores. which we humans, again, evolved from.

But I don't ask from what we've evolved, it's obvious that few million years ago we were omnivores like other monkeys, and it doesn't need to be asked. But something happened, and we went in a different direction, so I ask about this direction.


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Tanker
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30 May 2018, 4:43 pm

but... humans are still omnivores. we didnt change direction. it is entirely logical that we prefer meat over vegetables or even fruit, because it's a better, more compact means of getting protein and lots of fat. and our brains reward us for that. making it delicious.

and no, meat-eater is not a good options, but i see that you are dealing with absolutes and from some kind of ideological stance, as you have already assigned anything or anyone eating meat, to the bad camp.

that makes this line of questioning biased at best. prejudiced at worst and in all cased, unscientific.

you are beginning with an assumption and trying to find evidence to support it.

a more interesting and also much more difficult question is: is their a link between the quantity of meat in diet and behaviour?



mr_bigmouth_502
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30 May 2018, 5:45 pm

Humans evolved as meat eaters, and I enjoy eating meat, but I think vegetarians are really doing the right thing by not eating meat. I grew up eating meat, and I don't think I could ever stop, but if you have the willpower to be vegetarian, then power to you.


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