Food ethics: How do you choose what species are morally wrong to eat?

@dlowan,

dlowan wrote:

AbbieMcKenley wrote:

Umm.

I think in general, i wouldn't eat it if it's cute.
I'm sorry, thats a little shallow...

Personally, i wouldn't really call a chicken cute and cuddley, buuut a cat or a dog on the hand, i'd feel bad!

You people have it all wrong!!

There is little as soothing as lying in the garden in the sun, watching ecstatic chooks dust-bathing,
or or enjoying the sight and sound of them clucking softly and contentedly as they forage happily
in the garden in the sun.

I was coming out of a restaurant out on Long Island from the 1600s,
approaching my car in the parking lot, when I saw a mother chicken
with her baby chicks standing on a curb. She carefully looked both ways
and when traffic cleared, she gave a signal upon which thay all
rushed across the road, and mounted the other curb and began eating in the grass.

I re-entered the restaurant and brought them out some bread.

David

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@OmSigDAVID,

I knew that Om sig had a human side. Bread is no good for feeding birds, too much possibility of bacterial infections.

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Hey FM, would you please look at this post and comment?

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@Setanta,

yep, Im looking up some info on stability of STR's. It was a good question and I wanna make sure that Im on the right track with an answer.

Ill probably be back some time this PM

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Thanks, Boss . . .

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@Thomas,

Quote:

Humans are animals, too. Is killing humans a carrying capacity issue, not a moral issue?

Try to limit yer smartass comments to the topic.

Quote:

Fortunately, we needn't discuss this strawman, because nobody has defended this mantra here.

They make fun about US lack of humor. I submit that the Germans are probably the most humor-challenged people on the planet.
I was extending the concept of vegetarianism being justified by not killing animals. "Saving the veals" is merely my attempt a collectivising all the speies into one food source animal (that happens to be a cute little guy on the farm)

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@Robert Gentel,

Quote:

Upon what do you base such ethics (and as long as you want others not to be allowed to whale it is an ethic)?

AW weve been over this ad nauseum. Youre style is one of a deposition in that, if you dont get an answer that suits your own thesis, you will try to reask and compare others statements to elicit a totally different answer that you can then cherry pick..THATS BORING DEBATE .

One more from the top and Ill use the Japanese . THE JApanese have no long term investment on whales as a prinicpal source of food. The meiji had adopted eating of whale as a Royal Delicacy in the 1800's. AFter WWII (and with some dumb advice from the US after the surrender was signed by US and Japan) the Japanese took up the industry (like several other nations took up killing entirely new species like Hagfish, Monkfish, Chilean Sea "Bass", Mola Mola, river dolphins, ) and of course whales.

YOPURE entire argument of feigned incredulity is that you believe that Minke whales are being sustainably hunted. Thats about as uninformed a statement as you can make. EVEN the IWC is unsure about the environments "carrying Capacity" for Minkes and , on top of that, WHAT DOES SUSTAINABLE MEAN FOR THAT SPECIES?

YOU do not know, so dont please parade some false air that you do know.
1. I think that IWC should be allowed to develop what is a sustainable catch of Minkes and other species (Whaling should cease in that meantime because the entire estimates of populations are based only upon "catch reports"

2. Once a sustainability number and carrying capacity number is derived, then let the IWC apportion these among the subsistence whaling nations first. (Inuit, Icelanders, Norwegians).
At the end of the train IMHO lie the Japanese whose unilateral trashing of the Southern Sanctuary is the primary source of thsi kerfuffel.

3. Id prefer that whales not be hunted at all except by Inuit (who cant really be part of the world ag trade). And the world whale populations should be allowed to recover (as well as stocks of other fish and sea mammals). However, I recognize that special interests rule the planet and species security as a "Right thing to do" will probably never be achieved as long as theres a market for some product that these species provide.

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@Setanta,

AHA, found something of interest (Mulligan et al 2007). The AMerind genomic markers for alcoholsm (I could not find a damn thing about sugar or carbs). In AMering populations the genetic markers are MULTIVARIATE and not just a single allele. They include Alcohole dehydrogenase and two alleles for Aldehyde dehydrogenase. WSo, losing one genome marker by inter populational mixinh is possible but three, Im not sure thats the full answer but its recent and it seems on the money.

Thatwas a very interesting question , never thought that metabolism of alcohol was possibly multivariate in a population. The STRs for the opther great drunkard civilizations, namely the Russians and the Irsih ,seem only burdened with one allele, which, as normal genetics displays, would be sequentially "watered down" as the population gets admixed with people who dont have the allele.

KEWL. Im gonna keep looking (seeing as how I already fucked away a perfectly good Friday looking at really dull biomolecular skin magazines)

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I could not find anything re: the sugar metabolism in ALgonquian people. Sugars were not unknown to these populations as honey or fructose in berries or maple sap. Ill keep trying, if you could find that link and maybe give me some context, maybe the multivariate stuff comes into play with the omission of an aldehyde pathway. (diabetics often emit an acetone smell from their bodies due to an aldehyde pathway being nonfunctional) Maybe thats some part of it, Im not sure and that last thing may just be my ignorance showing. All I can do is to re assert the multivariate nature of genetic markers of alcohol allergy in Amerind populations.

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I can't provide you a link, Boss, since this was part of reading in ethnology i did at university (1960s). Several authors, though, and very likely without benefit of any genetic information, were attempting to establish that Amerindians did not metabolize sugars the way Yer-a-peeins do, and that that accounted for their problems with alcohol.

As it happens, i was just looking for the reference to an Algonquian embassy to the clerics of Québec asking them to end the brandy trade (no hope there), so i stopped reading was what some really, really dull tripe as soon as i found what i was looking for. (My research was centered on whether or not it is valid to allege that white boys consistently and with the approval of authority attempted to corrupt the innocent and child-like Indian. I always figured that the Amerindians were adults, too, and that any such claims as that were demeaning to their intelligence, as well as forming a part of the evil-white-boys-corrupt-trusting-noble-savages propaganda which even in those days was well under way.)

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@Setanta,

WQell, the point is that the metabolism of alcohol and the metabolism of sugars is similar. THey follow the same enzyme paths and in both cases acetaldehyde , acetone, and dehydrogenase enzymes are key participants. The simple "univariate" pathway for certain Europen populations failure to metabolize alcohol is a function of the THIQ allele . Just like Darwin was on to something but didnt know why, Im assuming that the ethnology work in the 60"s had a finding but also didnt understand why until genomics became a routine applied science.

Im gonna keep following these little first steps by getting back on Venters "deep" web and what theyve got . Im sure that this could have important applications to public health breakthjroughs in treatment (as well as more nefarious breakthroughs in INSURANCE pre-existing condition lists)

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

WQell, the point is that the metabolism of alcohol and the metabolism of sugars is similar. THey follow the same enzyme paths and in both cases acetaldehyde , acetone, and dehydrogenase enzymes are key participants. The simple "univariate" pathway for certain Europen populations failure to metabolize alcohol is a function of the THIQ allele . Just like Darwin was on to something but didnt know why, Im assuming that the ethnology work in the 60"s had a finding but also didnt understand why until genomics became a routine applied science.

Im gonna keep following these little first steps by getting back on Venters "deep" web and what theyve got . Im sure that this could have important applications to public health breakthjroughs in treatment (as well as more nefarious breakthroughs in INSURANCE pre-existing condition lists)

Fascinating.

It would explain the appalling rate of diabetes 2 in Australian Aboriginal people (and, in fact, I had read something about this theory earlier) and possibly explain some of the devastating effects of alcohol in this community.

Their hunter/gatherer culture would have limited exposure to simple carbs...though honey was certainly sought with joy.

I am not sure if they brewed alcohol.

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@farmerman,

Quote:

Just like Darwin was on to something but didnt know why, Im assuming that the ethnology work in the 60"s had a finding but also didnt understand why until genomics became a routine applied science.

Yeah, you run into this sort of thing all the time in historical research. Many people in the middle ages believed disease was transmitted by "bad air," hence the use of "posies" in a futile attempt to ward off disease. But in northern Italy in the Renaissance, city planners assumed that disease might also be spread by "bad water," and a feature of the renovation they did of cities was to put in new water lines and to set up dedicated sewage canals. Not up to our standards, but, even without understanding epidemiological principles, it had the effect of dramatically reducing the spread of septic diseases. It did not, however, do anything to stop the spread of either bubonic or pneumonic plague, so they lost the thread, and it would be three hundred years and more before Dr. Snow made the connection again, and several decades after that until the vector mechanism was understood.

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@dlowan,

Quote:

I am not sure if they brewed alcohol.

I don't know about the Australian aborigines, but in North America, they did not produce alcohol. The ethnologists who whom i referred were working from the literature available to them to come to the conclusion that although these populations were familiar with concentrated sugar sources, such as honey and berries, these weren't a common part of their diets, and the tribal leaders attempted to keep a lid on it when they did bring in the honey or the berries.

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@Setanta,

No, they had no alcohol. This from a proprietary database, so no link:

Quote:

Alcohol dependence among Native Americans and Alaska Natives is twice that found in the general population. Alaska Natives are 7 times more likely to die of alcohol-related problems. This study investigated differences in the course and consequences of alcoholism and co-occurring polysubstance dependence in a sample of 582 alcohol-dependent Alaska Natives undergoing inpatient lifetime treatment in Anchorage between 1994 and 1999. Mean age was 33.9 years. Information on lifetime psychiatric symptoms and disorders was collected by using the Semi-Structured Assessment for the Genetics of Alcoholism (SSAGA), a research diagnostic interview. Results indicate that in addition to alcohol dependence, the majority of subjects were dependent on other substances. Marijuana dependence was most common, followed by dependence on cocaine and opiates. Compared with subjects not dependent on any other drugs, subjects with co-occurring alcohol and opiate dependence showed significant differences in relation to age of first regular drink, intoxication, tolerance and withdrawal symptoms, number of medical problems, and number of psychological problems.

Multiple Substance Dependence and Course of Alcoholism among Alaska Native Men and Women.
Authors:
Malcolm, Barris P.1 [email protected]
Hesselbrock, Michie N.1,2
Segal, Bernard3
Source:
Substance Use & Misuse; 2006, Vol. 41 Issue 5, p729-741, 13p, 5 charts

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What do you mean "no?" I said they had no alcohol.

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@Setanta,

Alcohol was pretty much unknown except for the SW Indians who had **** like tesguino (named after the town near Durango), Pulque or Saguaro "squeeze" pulque and the tesguino were only used for ritual purposes and were therefore limited in distribution. They were more like beers than booze and were used in rain ceremonies. Seems to me that, if the Anasazi were experiencing their onset of drought in the first millenium, they would have been hammered all the time praying for rain. (Afetr a while theyd just say "screw it, pass me the jug"

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@dlowan,

dlowan wrote:

Fascinating.

It would explain the appalling rate of diabetes 2 in Australian Aboriginal people (and, in fact, I had read something about this theory earlier) and possibly explain some of the devastating effects of alcohol in this community.

Their hunter/gatherer culture would have limited exposure to simple carbs...though honey was certainly sought with joy.

I am not sure if they brewed alcohol.

the only recorded incidence of alcohol use (abuse?) prior to white settlemnt occored in tasmania.
the sap fom E. gunnii was tapped during spring and collected in a bowl then allowed to ferment. (interesting side note is that we have not been abe to manufacture sufficiant sap flows in victoria to tap the sap on imported trees but this happens readily in tasmania. we assume this is to do with the reletive changes in season)

carbohydrates are only available in reletivly small amounts from native australian plants. root vegetables such as yam daisy [myrnong (spelling varies)] supplied a majority of the daily intake in victoria and nsw. yam daisy stores its energy as a sugar (fructosan) which is broken down during digestion by fementation (which makes you fart something cronic).

some early observers noted the large bodyweight increase especially in aboriginal women after white settlement and felt this was due to the replacemnt of natve plants with refined flour and sugar.
some health officials and plant proponants have suggested research projects into diabetes control using yam daisy

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@farmerman,

It is fascinating to read about what modern archaeologists and paeleoanthropologists have to say about the collapse of the Anasazi. Whether or not they had the means, i couldn't say, but getting hammered would have been the best thing they could have done. As the Northern hemisphere began to get colder, they were (apparently) unable to culturally adjust to the change in agricultural conditions, and equally unable to revert to hunting and gathering. Some paeleoanthropologists believe that some of them did revert to hunting and gathering, and that they became the foundation for tribes which formed when the survivors wandered south into the Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts.

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@dadpad,

Am i correct that the aborigines did not domesticate plants and animals? I have read that even the dingo derives from dogs imported from the Indonesian archipelago.

I believe that paeleobotanists have claimed that sugars and starches were not concentrated in even significant fraction amounts in the ancestor plants of those which were domesticated. Plant domestication was a relatively new cultural artifact of the North American Amerindians, and apart from gourds, had diffused north from the Mexican plateau. Even the Algonquians (from which my chat with FM started) did not then use maize--i believe i'm correct in that statement--when the French arrived, and the gourds don't concentrate sugars or starches, not naturally. I don't know if they had beans or other pulses, but from what the Jesuits wrote, they were, although largely sedentary, dependent to a great degree on fishing, hunting and gathering. They were well placed for those activities, and they called the Hurons "the Granfathers," telling the Jesuits that all of "the good things" which they had they had gotten from the Hurons. The Hurons and the Iroquois were cultural and linguistic cousins (their languages were mutually comprehensible), which makes it even more of a mystery to understand why they drove the Iroquois from the valley of the St. Laurent, but revered the Hurons.

This kinda **** just fascinates me.

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Food ethics: How do you choose what species are morally wrong to eat?

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