= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
MugaSofer comments on Effective Altruism Through Advertising Vegetarianism? - LessWrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (551)
Well, considering the existence of healthy vegetarians, it seems clear that we evolved to be at least capable of surviving in a low-meat environment.
I don't have any sources or anything, and I'm pretty lazy, but I've been vegetarian since childhood, and never had any health problems as a result AFAICT.
I am entirely willing to take your word on this, but you know what they say about "anecdote" and declensions thereof. In this case specifically, one of the few things that seem to be reliably true about nutrition is that "people are different, and what works for some may fail or be outright disastrous for others".
In any case, Raemon seemed to be making a weaker claim than "vegetarianism has no serious health downsides". "Healthy portions of meat amount to far less than the 32 oz steak a day implied by some anti-vegetarian doomsayers" is something I'm completely willing to grant.
Fair enough.
Considering the existence of healthy vegetarians, it seems clear that we evolved to be at least capable of surviving in a low-meat environment supported by modern agriculture that produces large quantities of concentrated non-meat protein in the form of tofu, eggs, whey protein, beans, and the like. This may be a happy accident. Are there any vegetarian hunter-gatherer societies?
Wouldn't these be "gatherer societies" pretty much definitionally?
(Unless there are Triffids!)
Obligatory Far Side reference
I've been having a hell of a time finding trustworthy cites on this, possibly because there are so many groups with identity stakes in the matter -- obesity researchers and advocates, vegetarians, and paleo diet adherents all have somewhat conflicting interests in ancestral nutrition. That said, this survey paper describes relatively modern hunter-gatherer diets ranging from 1% vegetable (the Nunamiut of Alaska) to 74% vegetable (the Gwi of Africa), with a mean somewhere around one third; no entirely vegetarian hunter-gatherers are described. This one describes societies subsisting on up to 90% gathered food (I don't know whether or not this is synonymous with "vegetable"), but once again no exclusively vegetarian cultures and a mean around 30%.
I should mention by way of disclaimer that modern forager cultures tend to live in marginal environments and these numbers might not reflect the true ancestral proportions. And, of course, that this has no bearing either way on the ethical dimensions of the subject.