Essay-Question Poll: Dietary Choices

Alicorn

I have noticed that among philosophers, vegetarianism of one form or another is quite common. In fact, I became a vegetarian (technically a pescetarian) myself partly out of respect for an undergraduate philosophy professor. I am interested in finding out if there is a similar disproportion in the Less Wrong community.

I didn't request that this go into Yvain's survey because I want more information than just what animal products you do or don't eat; I'd also like to see nuances of the reasons behind your diet. There are a lot more shades than carnivore/vegetarian/vegan - if you want to be a vegetarian but are allergic to soy and gluten, that's a compelling reason to diversify protein sources, for instance. I'd also like to hear about if you avoid any plant foods (if you think they're farmed in a way that's environmentally destructive or that hurts people or if you have warm fuzzy feelings for plants, maybe). Here are some questions that come to mind:

What foods, if any, do you normally avoid for reasons other than pure culinary taste, cost, individual health concerns (allergies, diabetes, etc.) or ease of preparation? (Avoiding foods that are considered revolting or just non-food in your culture of origin, like balut or fried locusts, counts as "culinary taste".)
What are your reasons for avoiding those foods?
How strictly do you avoid them? For instance, will you eat them if you are served them while a guest at a meal, or if you are hungry and there is nothing else available? Do you check to see if they're in potentially questionable dishes at restaurants (and if so, do you trust what the server says?)
If you have children or plan to have children, will you expect or encourage them to avoid the same foods?
Do you try to convince your friends and family members to make dietary choices similar to yours? If so, have you ever succeeded?
If you avoid a class of foods with valuable nutritive content (as opposed to Twinkies), what do you replace it with to get complete nutrition?
What are your attitudes to people who are more restrictive in their diets than you are? Less restrictive?
What is the timeline of your dietary restrictions? (Transitions, lapses, increases or decreases in restrictiveness, etc.)
If you have not avoided these foods for your entire life, how much did you enjoy them when you ate them, and do you still sometimes want to eat them?
Is there anything else about your choice of diet that might be relevant or interesting?

What foods, if any, do you normally avoid for reasons other than pure culinary taste, cost, individual health concerns (allergies, diabetes, etc.) or ease of preparation? (Avoiding foods that are considered revolting or just non-food in your culture of origin, like balut or fried locusts, counts as "culinary taste".)
What are your reasons for avoiding those foods?
How strictly do you avoid them? For instance, will you eat them if you are served them while a guest at a meal, or if you are hungry and there is nothing else available? Do you check to see if they're in potentially questionable dishes at restaurants (and if so, do you trust what the server says?)
If you have children or plan to have children, will you expect or encourage them to avoid the same foods?
Do you try to convince your friends and family members to make dietary choices similar to yours? If so, have you ever succeeded?
If you avoid a class of foods with valuable nutritive content (as opposed to Twinkies), what do you replace it with to get complete nutrition?
What are your attitudes to people who are more restrictive in their diets than you are? Less restrictive?
What is the timeline of your dietary restrictions? (Transitions, lapses, increases or decreases in restrictiveness, etc.)
If you have not avoided these foods for your entire life, how much did you enjoy them when you ate them, and do you still sometimes want to eat them?
Is there anything else about your choice of diet that might be relevant or interesting?

Vegetarian. There are some plants I do not like, but I do not remember which. At home i mostly cook/eat vegan. To list it out: no meat for me - that includes fish, and also chicken. (The mental images some folks have about vegetarians are odd.) I do not by any pure dairy products, but consume them as part of meals while eating out, or buy some products that contain them like pizza.

I became a vegetarian in about '94 due to ethical reasoning and the scare of madcow disease that was rampant in the German media back then. Both reasons have since disappeared. I stayed a vegetarian out of habit and taste. in 2009 I learned about the health effects of the diet, and switched to a more healthy and more vegan leaning style.

Strict about the vegetarian part. Except for rare occasions about once or twice a year.

Yes and no. There are benefits to a general healthy diet. But as far as I know the occasional sinning is not that bad. Not being used to the current amounts of sugar in products might lead to some bad side effects. In general I want my kids to eat the same diet I consider healthy, but if they choose to do otherwise thats up to them.

Tried and failed and gave up. I managed to get convinced of a healthy diet myself - which was hard enough. In general dieting is subject to the same mental processes as arguments about all other topics are.

I take B12 supplements - which seems to be good for everyone.

I do not see strictness as that important anymore. If you eat 80% healthy or 98% or 99,5% or 100% thats almost the same. I noticed the amounts of different views and reasons for nutritional choices and collected them for a while. Animal rights activists can be annoying at times. But I am happy that there is some infrastructure to provide vegan food - even if they do it for very different reasons than me.

birth-94 normal local food, 94-09 desert vegetarian with no meat, but also no interest in healthy foods. My main dish was pizza yogurt and cheese. In 2009 that changed to my current mostly vegan one with the occasional bit of other stuff. I still enjoy fast food a lot!
I forgot the taste of meat. I could not ever imagine to give up on yogurt, but forming a mental image of what it does to me helped a lot. I have not bought any in about a year. The same process seemed to also have worked for sweets more recently. I remember hating the taste of liver, and enjoying to eat the stomachs of chickens. (home slaughtering).
I will write up an LW article on what I learned. Nutrition is a highly loaded topic where very little reasoning happens. But it is possible to find some good information and apply it.

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Essay-Question Poll: Dietary Choices

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Essay-Question Poll: Dietary Choices

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