Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Mercury]

The alarming thing about human-created eco-disaster afflicting our world is that those who would try to do something about it are actually opposed by those who would prefer to carry on living their lives in unsustainable luxury, regardless of the consequences. Those who try to direct our attention to the real world, and the real problems it has, are called protestors or even eco-terrorists. It's that blind opposition, and the denial that accompanies it, that is truly alarming.

You should be directing your guilt trip at those who produce and profit from fossil fuels, rather than those who have no choice but to use them.

I've described a scientifically proven viable alternative to fossil fuels - that would support a prosperous and sustainable future. Why haven't environmentalist demanded application of magma energy technology at any time in the past 40 years?

What this demonstrates is that the 'Limits to Growth' approach you advocate is political in nature - it's not the most practical means to secure the future. So how are you any better than a climate change denying capitalist - when you put your communistic political ideals before sustainability?

And why are you guilt tripping me? BP developed the idea of a carbon footprint to displace responsibility for climate change from them, to the individual - when it is they who have the capital, technology, and labour to develop and apply the technology to transcend fossil fuels. All I can do is go without. My question is - why should I?

[Pattern-chaser]

All I can do is go without. My question is - why should I?

Why? Because your consumption, along with that of the other 8 billion humans, is greater than the ability of the planet to provide it. Even with 'limitless' energy.

[Mercury]

All I can do is go without. My question is - why should I?

Why? Because your consumption, along with that of the other 8 billion humans, is greater than the ability of the planet to provide it. Even with 'limitless' energy.

No, it's not.

[Belindi]

Ernest wrote that it's alleged farmed salmon are bad for human health. I never heard of this except in the context of all salmon wild and farmed. I heard that salmon meat contains some bad metals from polluted oceans.

The best we can practically do is eat less first class protein. Say two smallish portions per week per person.

Why would we want to do that? I could gladly limit salmon to two small portions a week, but protein? I eat more protein than that per day. Eggs for breakfast say, and chicken for supper - is, as far as I'm concerned a healthy balanced diet. Two small portions of protein per WEEK? Why would you say that?

The title of this discussion implies that climate change and what we can do about it is important.

Animal meat is not the only source of first class protein. Soya is also first class protein. If we don't adopt reduction in animal based diet we will soon be driven to do so or worse.

[Mercury]

Ernest wrote that it's alleged farmed salmon are bad for human health. I never heard of this except in the context of all salmon wild and farmed. I heard that salmon meat contains some bad metals from polluted oceans.

The best we can practically do is eat less first class protein. Say two smallish portions per week per person.

Why would we want to do that? I could gladly limit salmon to two small portions a week, but protein? I eat more protein than that per day. Eggs for breakfast say, and chicken for supper - is, as far as I'm concerned a healthy balanced diet. Two small portions of protein per WEEK? Why would you say that?
[/quote]

The title of this discussion implies that climate change and what we can do about it is important. Animal meat is not the only source of first class protein. Soya is also first class protein. If we don't adopt reduction in animal based diet we will soon be driven to do so or worse.

I entirely agree that climate change is important; but disagree about what we can, and should do about it - with the entirety of the environmental movement, insofar as that movement follows in the course of (Meadows et al) hugely influential work 'Limits to Growth' (1972.) I am of the view that limits to growth is false, and that in fact resources are a function of the energy available to create them. Furthermore, I am apt to point out at the drop of a hat, that the earth is a big ball of molten rock containing limitless quantities of heat energy, easily converted into electricity and hydrogen.

From 1975-1982 NASA conducted a series of experiments that demonstrated the technology to harness energy directly from magma; and estimated the size of the resource at many, many thousands of times current global energy demand. The quantity of clean energy available from is so monolithic - it would be quite within our ability to desalinate sea water to irrigate land for agriculture and habitation, and so develop wastelands for agriculture - rather than burning forests in river valleys, and exhausting rivers, or aquifers, to produce food.

Nonetheless, this technology has not been applied. It has not even been demanded by environmentalists. I am not going to be guilt tripped by an environmentalist movement that deliberately ignored this technology for 40 years, to maintain an anti-capitalist 'Limits to Growth' political ideology. I agree, climate change is an extremely important issue - one far too important to be hijacked by those with a political agenda that they put before sustainability. I want a prosperous sustainable future - one that I've shown is technologically possible.

So again, I ask you - why would I limit my protein intake? Why take that burden upon myself, in turn reducing the motive for positive change? Your approach means that I suffer, to allow others to continue with business as usual. That can't be right.

[Belindi]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

[Mercury]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

[Sculptor1]

the soup was splashed on the glass covering the picture.Give the girls a slap on the wrists and move on.

[Mercury]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare.

More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would not surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more, only doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

[Sculptor1]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

The horror of Malthus' predictions never happened.
I'm surprised to see anyone repeating that failure.
THe fact is that the rate of population growth is now in decline.

[Belindi]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

The horror of Malthus' predictions never happened.
I'm surprised to see anyone repeating that failure.
THe fact is that the rate of population growth is now in decline.

Human behaviour has affected the deliberate breeding of food animals. For instance the Aberdeen Angus has been bred to yield a lot of back and rump for its weight and moreover to grow muscle tissue that is marbled with fat.The efficient food animal is also a good doer, as is the case with AA beasts.Many modern beef herds have admixture of AA genes.

Production methods are impartially investigated by animal charities, and general investigative journalists from reputable media. Moreover, people who have to live close to feed lots pay less for their homes due to smells from over crowded and dead animals. Good pasturage and good veterinary welfare costs a lot of money:quality meat costs a lot of money.

It's well known that feed lot animals are dosed with antibiotics so they can stay alive in their horrendous conditions until slaughter. This practise has resulted in many precious antibiotic therapies becoming useless for humans.

[Mercury]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

The horror of Malthus' predictions never happened.
I'm surprised to see anyone repeating that failure.
THe fact is that the rate of population growth is now in decline.

Human behaviour has affected the deliberate breeding of food animals. For instance the Aberdeen Angus has been bred to yield a lot of back and rump for its weight and moreover to grow muscle tissue that is marbled with fat.The efficient food animal is also a good doer, as is the case with AA beasts.Many modern beef herds have admixture of AA genes.

Production methods are impartially investigated by animal charities, and general investigative journalists from reputable media. Moreover, people who have to live close to feed lots pay less for their homes due to smells from over crowded and dead animals. Good pasturage and good veterinary welfare costs a lot of money:quality meat costs a lot of money.

It's well known that feed lot animals are dosed with antibiotics so they can stay alive in their horrendous conditions until slaughter. This practise has resulted in many precious antibiotic therapies becoming useless for humans.

The rate of population growth is slowing. It is expected to level out at around 10 billion by 2100, and decline thereafter. But that projection is based on an assumption of maintaining living standards. Poorer people tend to have larger families - better off people tend to have smaller families. Global population could go as high as 16 billion by 2100 under certain scenarios - according to UNDP projections, as part of the Sustainable Development Goals, published in 2000. That would be problematic.

I can only reiterate that we need vast quantities of clean energy - not merely to use less dirty energy; because the price of energy is determined not by the cost of production, but by supply and demand. Wind and solar may be cheaper than fossil fuels to produce - but they produce less energy, and production costs do not determine the price; whereas, the cost of energy very definitely dictates what can be afforded in the economy, including animal welfare. It's difficult to show directly that intensive agriculture is a function of energy cost - but considered in relation to the possibility of agriculture practised with limitless clean energy to spend, then clearly, agriculture could be done less intensively, and with far less environmental impact.

Unfortunately, the environmentalist construe the problem as a zero sum game; and have only one solution to everything: Just Stop...whatever! That's a disastrous approach that will only create bigger problems, as in future, we have less energy, and more expensive energy in face of increasing problems; not least, anywhere between 2 and 8 billion more people in the next 80 years.

[Sculptor1]

If you and I eat only a sustainable amount of meat it would make no appreciable difference. However it's not only you and I , it's an ethic that is influential enough right now to affect producers and retailers.

There is a side effect of low meat consumption. Poor people eat poor quality low welfare meat and rich people eat well fed free range. A small amount of well fed free range is compatible with the environment. For all people to eat well fed free range there must also be a basic living wage and meat rationing.

What is most likely to happen is more and more right wing regimes which suit really rich people who will be battening down the hatches against the masses of the poor. I mean that, with dwindling resources for meat production, the rich will make sure they get as much as they want while the poor are deprived.

I guess you are something like me in your income and diet. People like us are not numbered among the very rich .

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

The horror of Malthus' predictions never happened.
I'm surprised to see anyone repeating that failure.
THe fact is that the rate of population growth is now in decline.

Human behaviour has affected the deliberate breeding of food animals. For instance the Aberdeen Angus has been bred to yield a lot of back and rump for its weight and moreover to grow muscle tissue that is marbled with fat.The efficient food animal is also a good doer, as is the case with AA beasts.Many modern beef herds have admixture of AA genes.

Production methods are impartially investigated by animal charities, and general investigative journalists from reputable media. Moreover, people who have to live close to feed lots pay less for their homes due to smells from over crowded and dead animals. Good pasturage and good veterinary welfare costs a lot of money:quality meat costs a lot of money.

It's well known that feed lot animals are dosed with antibiotics so they can stay alive in their horrendous conditions until slaughter. This practise has resulted in many precious antibiotic therapies becoming useless for humans.

"It is well known" amongst those that are rabid vegans who relish in conspiracy theories. THe truth is otherwise.

Wonderfully the breeding of farm stock only enhances the nutrition of the meat.
(Not so for many plant species.)
Whilst SOME animals are kept without scant regard to welfare this is not the norm and in the UK, and EU they are protected by law.
Antibiotics used for animals are not the same as those applied to humans and since there are very few zoonotic diseases their uses have not in any way affected the value of antibiotics for humans.
If you have any evidence to back up these hysterical assertions please furnish the thread with them.

[Sculptor1]

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

The horror of Malthus' predictions never happened.
I'm surprised to see anyone repeating that failure.
THe fact is that the rate of population growth is now in decline.

Human behaviour has affected the deliberate breeding of food animals. For instance the Aberdeen Angus has been bred to yield a lot of back and rump for its weight and moreover to grow muscle tissue that is marbled with fat.The efficient food animal is also a good doer, as is the case with AA beasts.Many modern beef herds have admixture of AA genes.

Production methods are impartially investigated by animal charities, and general investigative journalists from reputable media. Moreover, people who have to live close to feed lots pay less for their homes due to smells from over crowded and dead animals. Good pasturage and good veterinary welfare costs a lot of money:quality meat costs a lot of money.

It's well known that feed lot animals are dosed with antibiotics so they can stay alive in their horrendous conditions until slaughter. This practise has resulted in many precious antibiotic therapies becoming useless for humans.

The rate of population growth is slowing. It is expected to level out at around 10 billion by 2100, and decline thereafter. But that projection is based on an assumption of maintaining living standards. Poorer people tend to have larger families - better off people tend to have smaller families. Global population could go as high as 16 billion by 2100 under certain scenarios - according to UNDP projections, as part of the Sustainable Development Goals, published in 2000. That would be problematic.

I can only reiterate that we need vast quantities of clean energy - not merely to use less dirty energy; because the price of energy is determined not by the cost of production, but by supply and demand. Wind and solar may be cheaper than fossil fuels to produce - but they produce less energy, and production costs do not determine the price; whereas, the cost of energy very definitely dictates what can be afforded in the economy, including animal welfare. It's difficult to show directly that intensive agriculture is a function of energy cost - but considered in relation to the possibility of agriculture practised with limitless clean energy to spend, then clearly, agriculture could be done less intensively, and with far less environmental impact.

Unfortunately, the environmentalist construe the problem as a zero sum game; and have only one solution to everything: Just Stop...whatever! That's a disastrous approach that will only create bigger problems, as in future, we have less energy, and more expensive energy in face of increasing problems; not least, anywhere between 2 and 8 billion more people in the next 80 years.

I am all in favour of reducing human numbers whilst increasing the health span of humans.
This is the best way to ensure that we can all have a natural human diet and reduce our dependance on wheat and rice based products which are harmful to metabolic health

[Belindi]

Graphic content warning.

When an animal is butchered there are a variety of cuts of meat of different quality, and there's a ton of giblets for every filet mignon. Almost entirely, distinctions about the quality of meat consumed are of this variety - and only secondarily about how the animal is raised. Consequently, consumer behaviour is going to have very little impact on animal or environmental welfare. More generally, such 'consumer sovereignty' approaches displace responsibility from the producer to consumer, and impose upon the consumer a cognitive burden they are unwilling to bear even if they were able. But it's simply not possible to know how everything one consumes is produced. People don't have the time - not willingness to expend the effort, and even if they did, producers lie! For goodness sake, we've been eating horse-meat lasagne for years. It would surprise me to find out it was labelled 'organic'!

The rightful approach is a supply side approach beginning with energy. Agriculture, done properly, could be an environmental boon. Currently, we appropriate arable land from nature; whereas we could be creating it - if only we had the energy to desalinate sea water to irrigate currently unproductive land - we would not be in a direct competition with nature to produce food for human consumption. In that context; given limitless clean energy to spend - the production of animal protein can resist desertification, create biomass, transform deserts into pasture.

This idea of a zero sum trade-off between human and environmental welfare is a consequence of a particular technological state; wherein energy is scarce and expensive, but that is not an absolute fact. The earth is a big ball of molten rock - and the technology exists to harness that energy. That's how we need to approach sustainability - not with a consumer led, guilt trip driven backing down and eeking it out, but by pushing forward - producing more but doing it better!

Thomas Malthus, 1798 - in his 'Essay on the Principle of Population' predicted that because population grows geometrically (2,4,8,16,32) while agricultural land can only be added arithmetically (1,2,3,4,5) - one acre at a time, population would necessarily outstrip food production and people would starve. His logic seemed irrefutable - as does 'Limits to Growth' - it's essentially the same argument. But in the event, people invented tractors, trains, fertilisers and refrigeration - multiplying food resources exponentially, such that more people are better fed today than ever before.

We need to do the same again; transcend the situation - and energy is the key. But it's a supply side problem; not a demand side problem.

The horror of Malthus' predictions never happened.
I'm surprised to see anyone repeating that failure.
THe fact is that the rate of population growth is now in decline.

Human behaviour has affected the deliberate breeding of food animals. For instance the Aberdeen Angus has been bred to yield a lot of back and rump for its weight and moreover to grow muscle tissue that is marbled with fat.The efficient food animal is also a good doer, as is the case with AA beasts.Many modern beef herds have admixture of AA genes.

Production methods are impartially investigated by animal charities, and general investigative journalists from reputable media. Moreover, people who have to live close to feed lots pay less for their homes due to smells from over crowded and dead animals. Good pasturage and good veterinary welfare costs a lot of money:quality meat costs a lot of money.

It's well known that feed lot animals are dosed with antibiotics so they can stay alive in their horrendous conditions until slaughter. This practise has resulted in many precious antibiotic therapies becoming useless for humans.

"It is well known" amongst those that are rabid vegans who relish in conspiracy theories. THe truth is otherwise.

Wonderfully the breeding of farm stock only enhances the nutrition of the meat.
(Not so for many plant species.)
Whilst SOME animals are kept without scant regard to welfare this is not the norm and in the UK, and EU they are protected by law.
Antibiotics used for animals are not the same as those applied to humans and since there are very few zoonotic diseases their uses have not in any way affected the value of antibiotics for humans.
If you have any evidence to back up these hysterical assertions please furnish the thread with them.

Veterinary antibiotics are the same as those used for humans. Food animals get these antibiotics prophylactically and to help to get them fatter sooner. We eat flesh which contains antibiotics and consequently we get antibiotic-resistant infections. Organic meat is obtainable but is much more expensive. People want to pay as little as possible for meat . The industry in order to profit from public demand will continue to provide cheap low welfare meat .

https://www.saveourantibiotics.org/the- ... k-farming/

I nursed people with acute infectious fevers in the late 40s early 50s and I and my colleagues were made very aware of the danger of overuse of antibiotics causing antibiotic -resistance. These were amazing wonder drugs which saved children dying from horrible bacterial infections. I feel disappointed that us young girls' care not to provoke antibiotic-resistance has been rubbished by greed.