Humans are natural meat eaters (or are they)

[SteveHd]

Yikes. Raw pork is fine for the kids?

That reminds me of ordering grilled pork chops at an upscale restaurant. The waiter asked "How would you like them cooked?" Instinctively I said "well done" and immediately thought: Was that for real?

 

[dong20]

Ick no, it's supposed to be full of tape worms, but no one told us in cookery class.

I've heard equally scary stories about liver....

 

[B_dxjnorto]

What do chimpanzees and bonobos eat?

Sometimes they eat each other. I did see an Animal Planet documentary the other day about a brand of orangutan that live on top of some plateau somewhere. The documentary is titled Mountains if you want to give it a look. I love Animal Planet. I have it on my DVR, if anyone is interested I'll watch it again and give you the name and where they live. Shows them running up and down the sides of mountains, but my point is they have adapted to eat only grass because that's all they have up there, so there goes the supposition that animals that eat only grass need multiple stomachs. And orangutans are primates of course.

 

[B_big dirigible]

Pork is often infested with the trichinoidal worm. A pig is a sturdy beast and can be riddled with the worms but still show no obvious sign of illness. The worm is just barely microscopic - simple optical instruments will reveal it, but as a practical matter it's invisible to the naked eye. It's much more dangerous than tapeworms or roundworms, which mainly confine themselves to the digestive system and eat your food but won't kill you. Digestive acids don't kill the trichinoidal worm, but heat does. Cook pork before eating, and you won't get trichinosis.

 

[DaveyR]

Pork is often infested with the trichinoidal worm. A pig is a sturdy beast and can be riddled with the worms but still show no obvious sign of illness. The worm is just barely microscopic - simple optical instruments will reveal it, but as a practical matter it's invisible to the naked eye. It's much more dangerous than tapeworms or roundworms, which mainly confine themselves to the digestive system and eat your food but won't kill you. Digestive acids don't kill the trichinoidal worm, but heat does. Cook pork before eating, and you won't get trichinosis.

Some of the restaurants here in the Canaries insist that undercooked pork is perfectly ok. I won't touch it. I'm pleased I've taken that stance after reading your post BD.

 

[50%more]

Most primates are omnivorous. Our predatory aspect might also have helped produced the level of intelligence enjoyed by humans. Predatory animals in general are more intelligent than herbivores.

 

[Kassokilleri2ff]

Is this an attempt by vegetarians to justify thier viewpoint? i dont care what you think about the subject, i like meat and i like to eat it.

 

[dong20]

Some of the restaurants here in the Canaries insist that undercooked pork is perfectly ok. I won't touch it. I'm pleased I've taken that stance after reading your post BD.

I take that view with most meat. I like meat on the rare side for taste and texture but prefer it well cooked for all other reasons. I seldom eat any 'meat' other than chicken and fish. Both of which carry their own health risks of course...

 

[dong20]

Is this an attempt by vegetarians to justify thier viewpoint? i dont care what you think about the subject, i like meat and i like to eat it.

Not by me, though I think it would be fair to say some of the articles out there seek to do just that.

 

[DaveyR]

I take that view with most meat. I like meat on the rare side for taste and texture but prefer it well cooked for all other reasons. I seldom eat any 'meat' other than chicken and fish. Both of which carry their own health risks of course...

The only exception I make is steak which you know about from the thread on it :wink:

 

[B_big dirigible]

Some of the restaurants here in the Canaries insist that undercooked pork is perfectly ok. I won't touch it. I'm pleased I've taken that stance after reading your post BD.

No need to worry excessively. It is perfectly OK if the pig isn't infected with the worm. That's ensured by keeping the pig stock away from sources of infection - other infected pigs or infected feed. And it can be checked by simple microscopic inspection after the pig is slaughtered, which is all that USDA inspectors in the US routinely do when certifying any meat to be good. So if the board of health is even partially competent and the restaurant isn't too much of a cheapjack operation, even raw pork is most likely fine. Even if somebody screws up and a customer is infected, trichonisis can be treated and cured nowadays without undue trouble (I think - might be worth a Google for the latest, I suppose). And even without treatment, natural defenses may kill the worms off fine as long as the dosage isn't too heavy.

 

[DaveyR]

Thanks for that BD. The problem is that nearly all meat products here are imported. A lot of it comes from South America, well beef products anyway. I'm not sure where the restaurants source their pork.

I'm just not convinced that the controls in some of the Countries will be at the level you describe.

 

[50%more]

In realy cold climates it is nearly impossible to maintain a self-sustaining vegetarian diet. What exactly would Innuits eat if they couldn't hunt animals?

 

[SteveHd]

It is perfectly OK if the pig isn't infected with the worm.

Something which has perplexed me is: why is it o.k. to eat beef rare but not pork? They're both mammals. They both eat stuff on the ground. They're both susceptible to trichinae. I don't get it.

 

[SteveHd]

In realy cold climates it is nearly impossible to maintain a self-sustaining vegetarian diet.

I saw on a TV documentary that the Innuits eat blubber and if they didn't they wouldn't get enough calories. I forgot the daily requirement but it was eye-opening.

 

[50%more]

I saw on a TV documentary that the Innuits eat blubber and if they didn't they wouldn't get enough calories. I forgot the daily requirement but it was eye-opening.

A lesbian friend of mine in college tried to convince me that hunting meat was the male way of expressing dominance over women. Her rationalization goes back to when we were hunters an gatherers. Women generally did the gathering, men generally did the hunting. About 70% of our diet was from the gathering, the other 30% was from hunting. However the meat from the hunts was especially valued by the tribe. This gave men a certain level of social control.

 

[arliss]

An LPSG member and I discussed this way back because we disagreed on the subject of wheher Humans choose to eat meat and are not thus Omnivorous by nature or the reverse. I long ago said I would start a thread.

Yes, I know the strict defintion of Omnivore is debatable but I'm using it here to as a genral label for adaptation not choice e.g. vegetarian or vegan. There are several other '-ivores' of course and as Humans we pretty much have the lot covered.

Does the evidence suggest Humans have evolved as Omnivoires? For, while we can eat both meat and vegetable matter and other things, cooked or raw, our biology is not fully adapted to one to the exclusion of the other - i.e that we don't posses the full range of adapations typically defining Carnivores or Herbivores. Or, does over 2m years of eating meat combined with those partial adaptations suggest otherwise.

After all, few mammals are entirely selective and one could argue most could be considered omnivorous - if you define that by being able to eat both meat and vegetable matter and not die then yes I agree, within reason. But is that enough? I'm sure not everyone at first thought would think of; Wolves as herbivores - because they do eat plenty of plant material or Chimps as carnivores - because they do kill and eat meat.

To start off, here a a couple of opposing viewpoints on the subject of Human meat eating being 'natural'.

Anti:
How humans are not physically created to eat meat

Pro:
Comparative Anatomy Updated. Humans--Omnivores or Vegetarians?

read the bible and you will find the answer within ..there is no debate here...

 

[dong20]

read the bible and you will find the answer within ..there is no debate here...

No, thanks.

 

[DaveyR]

read the bible and you will find the answer within ..there is no debate here...

I'd rather eat a raw pork chop thanks.

Next you'll be lecturing us on the error of our ways.

 

[dong20]

...that while Gorillas*, Orangutans* and Chimps* are predominately herbivores they are not exclusively so.

If you doubted me, here's proof.

Dutch woman still likes gorilla despite attack - Yahoo! News UK