What if Vegans are Actually Right?

[Scot Dutchy]

New research connects vegetarianism and depression.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/za/blog ... depression

Not surprised. I can manage one or two vegetarian meals a week but no soya or any meat substitutes. I like omelets.

[pErvinalia]

You do not. You hate everything.

[Brian Peacock]

Moral meat?

No-kill, lab-grown meat to go on sale for first time

Cultured meat, produced in bioreactors without the slaughter of an animal, has been approved for sale by a regulatory authority for the first time. The development has been hailed as a landmark moment across the meat industry.

The “chicken bites”, produced by the US company Eat Just, have passed a safety review by the Singapore Food Agency and the approval could open the door to a future when all meat is produced without the killing of livestock, the company said.

Dozens of firms are developing cultivated chicken, beef and pork, with a view to slashing the impact of industrial livestock production on the climate and nature crises, as well as providing cleaner, drug-free and cruelty-free meat. Currently, about 130 million chickens are slaughtered every day for meat, and 4 million pigs. Of all the mammals on Earth, 60% are livestock, 36% are humans and only 4% are wild.

The cells for Eat Just’s product are grown in a 1,200-litre bioreactor and then combined with plant-based ingredients. Initial availability would be limited, the company said, and the bites would be sold in a restaurant in Singapore. The product would be significantly more expensive than conventional chicken until production was scaled up, but Eat Just said it would ultimately be cheaper.

The cells used to start the process came from a cell bank and did not require the slaughter of a chicken because cells can be taken from biopsies of live animals. The nutrients supplied to the growing cells were all from plants....

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... first-time

[NineBerry]

One small cell cluster for a chicken, but a giant leap for humanity

[Hermit]

New research connects vegetarianism and depression.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/za/blog ... depression

Last section of the above article:

Does Vegetarianism Cause Depression?

What is going on? I can think of a couple of possibilities. First, it could be the case that vegetarian diets actually produce biological changes in brain chemistry, or even the microbiome, that causes some people to be depressed. I am a bit skeptical of this explanation, but the German study mentioned above found that 34 percent of people with depression started on a vegetarian diet before the onset of their mental disorders, compared to 9 percent of people with anxiety disorders.

I think it is more likely that some traits may predispose some people to both depression and to vegetarianism. Women, for example, are twice as likely as men to suffer from depression, and there are also more female vegetarians than male vegetarians. And, while the evidence is mixed, some personality types may also be particularly drawn to vegetarianism. In addition, vegetarian diets can be isolating. A woman who recently became a vegan told me that she suddenly gets fewer dinner invitations from old friends: They don’t know how to cook for her. And one young woman told me, “I won’t go out with anyone who is not a vegetarian. It limits my pool of possible men.” Further, social reasons rank high when former vegetarians and vegans are asked why they returned to meat. (See Why Do Most Vegetarians Go Back To Eating Meat?)

Finally, as several animal activists pointed out to me after this post was initially written, the vegetarian-depression link could be the result of moral commitment. As Lori Marino, executive director of the Kimmela Center for Animal Advocacy wrote on Facebook, vegetarians and vegans are more aware of the cruelties of the world and this is more depressing than living in a state of ignorant bliss. Lori is right. Indeed, the emotional and psychological costs of devoting your life to animal protection was a major theme in one of my first studies of human-animal relationships. (Full text here.)

In short, we don’t know why the rates of depression seem substantially higher among vegetarians than in omnivores. But we do know that “correlation does not imply causality” and “more research is needed.”

[rainbow]

But we do know that “correlation does not imply causality”

That is quite true.

However
correlations do cause implications

[Scot Dutchy]

Eating meat led to smaller stomachs, bigger brains

The social implications of increased meat eating were interesting, said Aiellio. In most primates, there’s no food sharing between females and offspring, she said. But the difficulty of getting meat led to cooperative food sharing among early humans, strengthening the bond between a female and her offspring.

Increased meat eating also likely led to an increased division of labor between the sexes, said Aiello. The males would hunt and provide; the females — faced with more intensive motherhoods — would raise the hominid young, who were dependent longer than ape infants.

But is there evidence in the fossil record for a transition to what Aiello called “a high-quality animal-based diet”?

Briefly, yes. For one, animal bones from 2.5 million years ago showed cut marks thought to be from the earliest stone tools. And earlier species of early hominids had strong jaws and molar-like teeth; later species were more like modern humans, with weaker jaws, smaller faces, and smaller teeth.

There are other of bits of evidence pointing to meat eating by early humans, said Aiello. “My favorite are the tapeworms.”

If we kept to eating veggies we would have lost.

[Hermit]

But we do know that “correlation does not imply causality”

That is quite true.

However
correlations do cause implications

Also true. The question remains: Does veg*ism cause depression, or are depressed people drawn to veg*ism? The excerpt I quoted noted that

the German study mentioned above found that 34 percent of people with depression started on a vegetarian diet before the onset of their mental disorders.

This means that 66 percent of depressed veg*ans already suffered from depression before they commenced their veggie diet.

[Brian Peacock]

Isn't someone going to point out that Hitler was a vegetarian? Come on guys... someone... anyone?

[Brian Peacock]

Eating meat led to smaller stomachs, bigger brains

The social implications of increased meat eating were interesting, said Aiellio. In most primates, there’s no food sharing between females and offspring, she said. But the difficulty of getting meat led to cooperative food sharing among early humans, strengthening the bond between a female and her offspring.

Increased meat eating also likely led to an increased division of labor between the sexes, said Aiello. The males would hunt and provide; the females — faced with more intensive motherhoods — would raise the hominid young, who were dependent longer than ape infants.

But is there evidence in the fossil record for a transition to what Aiello called “a high-quality animal-based diet”?

Briefly, yes. For one, animal bones from 2.5 million years ago showed cut marks thought to be from the earliest stone tools. And earlier species of early hominids had strong jaws and molar-like teeth; later species were more like modern humans, with weaker jaws, smaller faces, and smaller teeth.

There are other of bits of evidence pointing to meat eating by early humans, said Aiello. “My favorite are the tapeworms.”

If we kept to eating veggies we would have lost.

That hypothesis might have some merit. But so what?

[Scot Dutchy]

In the Peacock Paradox it does not matter because the converse cant be proven so therefore it is disregarded.

[Brian Peacock]

No, seriously. That might have been the case in human evolutionary terms, but so what?

[Scot Dutchy]

So what? Just throw that simple fact aside in this PC world? Is that it?

Btw veganism is not vegetarianism. Stop lumping it together. A wise vegetarian eats plenty of dairy products. Some eat fish and eggs.

[rainbow]

Meh. Veganism is just vegetarianism on plant steroids.

[Brian Peacock]

So what? Just throw that simple fact aside in this PC world? Is that it?

Btw veganism is not vegetarianism. Stop lumping it together. A wise vegetarian eats plenty of dairy products. Some eat fish and eggs.

Look, I'm clearly willing to accept the hypothesis for the sake of argument. My question is still: even given that possible factor in human evolution, so what? What point are you trying to make?

As for my use of the asterisk: I've explained that before - veg*ns just means 'vegetarians and vegans'. I'm not claiming that they're the same thing or ignoring the differences. So now I've repeated that, again, you should probably keep your knickers on and just take it in that context.