Philosophical Vegan Forum

My friends talked to me about why he thinks that eating meat is good. First he said that people can't rely on crops and everything we grow because it can go bad and there is also the weather that has to be good. Also that we would need to import our food from country who can grow more plants and that would give those country more power on the world since food is important. He also said animal product are good because if what we grow goes bad we can still eat meat and meat last longer and about health he agreed that it was unhealthy but since a lot of people eat it and die it would slow overpopulation. So what do you think about this? How should I answer him?

Fluttershy wrote:First he said that people can't rely on crops and everything we grow because it can go bad and there is also the weather that has to be good.

Crops are grown to be fed to cows, pigs, and chickens. Those crops can just be fed to human beings. It's mostly soybeans and corn.

Crops -> farmed animals -> humans

or:

Crops -> humans

The second one is much easier. Farmed animals don't produce meat from nowhere, they have to eat crops.

Grains can be stored for long periods of time; much longer than meat can be stored for, to account for variation in weather. Pasta will last for years on the shelf, for example. The same with TVP, or dried beans.

Fluttershy wrote:Also that we would need to import our food from country who can grow more plants and that would give those country more power on the world since food is important.

That doesn't make any sense. If you have enough crops to feed farmed animals, to produce meat, then you already have enough crops to feed humans instead.

Fluttershy wrote:He also said animal product are good because if what we grow goes bad we can still eat meat and meat last longer

This is completely false. Meat is harder to store, and does not last as long as grain.

Dry beans and other grains can last years on the shelf. In order for meat to last on a shelf it must be "cured", and processed, like jerky, which is extremely carcinogenic.

Fluttershy wrote:and about health he agreed that it was unhealthy but since a lot of people eat it and die it would slow overpopulation.

Overpopulation is not a problem, over consumption of meat is a problem. Without people eating meat and wasting food, we would have plenty of food for everybody for several billion more yet.

People who eat meat can use up to ten times more resources than people eating vegan, due to thermodynamics. This is because the animals people eat had to eat plants, and each step there's a lot of waste.

brimstoneSalad wrote:That doesn't make any sense. If you have enough crops to feed farmed animals, to produce meat, then you already have enough crops to feed humans instead.

Yes but do we have all the necessary nutrients from what we can grow? How about in the winter? We can store things but do everything we can store have all we need? Can we grow all those plant that give us food that we can store? Some countries can grow plant that other countries can't grow like pineapple for example. Because of the climate.

brimstoneSalad wrote:

Fluttershy wrote:First he said that people can't rely on crops and everything we grow because it can go bad and there is also the weather that has to be good.

Crops are grown to be fed to cows, pigs, and chickens. Those crops can just be fed to human beings. It's mostly soybeans and corn.

brimstoneSalad wrote:

Fluttershy wrote:Also that we would need to import our food from country who can grow more plants and that would give those country more power on the world since food is important.

That doesn't make any sense. If you have enough crops to feed farmed animals, to produce meat, then you already have enough crops to feed humans instead.

Humans wouldn't eat those crops, and it's easier to grow, but we could probably use a lot of that land to produce crops that humans do eat.

Fluttershy wrote:Yes but do we have all the necessary nutrients from what we can grow? How about in the winter? We can store things but do everything we can store have all we need? Can we grow all those plant that give us food that we can store? Some countries can grow plant that other countries can't grow like pineapple for example. Because of the climate.

That's a good question, and the answer is YES. We could even obtain all nutrients from corn, it just has to be processed.

Look into some simple fermentation based processing, like tempeh, natto, miso, etc.

While corn is not a nutritious food on its own, any food product, fermented correctly and with the basic nutrients there, can become more complete. E.g. certain bacteria can produce extra lysine to make corn complete protein.

We ultimately only need certain amino acids, fatty acids, and an assortment of vitamins and minerals which could all be essentially corn derived (just not fresh corn).

The same is true of potatoes, wheat, etc.

Corn could be stored dry until ready to use, and then fermented right before eating.

Anon0045 wrote: Humans wouldn't eat those crops, and it's easier to grow, but we could probably use a lot of that land to produce crops that humans do eat.

That's a common mistake. While there are different varieties, nothing is inherently inedible about them.

Livestock are typically fed corn and soybeans themselves (meal) in adequate amounts to feed humans. In addition, they are fed silage, which is just corn and soybean crop (usually) harvested early while it's still green. These are all essentially human edible crops with basic processing.

Finally, even in the case of livestock eating grass, that's a perfectly viable human food source with some basic mechanical processing (it needs to be juiced).

brimstoneSalad wrote:That's a common mistake. While there are different varieties, nothing is inherently inedible about them.

Livestock are typically fed corn and soybeans themselves (meal) in adequate amounts to feed humans. In addition, they are fed silage, which is just corn and soybean crop (usually) harvested early while it's still green. These are all essentially human edible crops with basic processing.

Finally, even in the case of livestock eating grass, that's a perfectly viable human food source with some basic mechanical processing (it needs to be juiced).

Okay. I was assuming, that since those varieties used for animals are are not in the market for human consumption, they are not edible. Those crops can after all, be produced on more types of land, so it would make sense to me that those would be the go to choice if they were edible. Is it the processing of the varieties for livestock that is more expensive than the human ones, or do humans not enjoy the taste or something?

Anon0045 wrote: Okay. I was assuming, that since those varieties used for animals are are not in the market for human consumption, they are not edible.

We're not growing sweet corn and edamame to feed them (consider the distinction between what is technically edible, and what most people would want on their dinner plates), but I don't think they're necessarily different varieties when we're talking about the grain itself in terms of producing animal feed, oil, or flour.
Corn and soybean grades used for feed and processing aren't particularly delicious (I don't like them unless they're processed), but aren't inedible.

A large part of what makes something "food grade" is also the cleaning. Feed grade stuff has pebbles and chunks of corn cob in it, for example.

Anon0045 wrote:Those crops can after all, be produced on more types of land, so it would make sense to me that those would be the go to choice if they were edible.

I really don't know what you mean. You're talking about things like sweet corn and edamame?

I'd need to see a source on what varieties you're talking about.

The corn that's processed with lime and ground into tortilla flour should be the same sort (or very nearly) that's widely grown for feed.

Anon0045 wrote:Is it the processing of the varieties for livestock that is more expensive than the human ones, or do humans not enjoy the taste or something?

We don't eat them directly in the West, that's normally just sweet corn and edamame. They can be, though. They're just unpleasantly tough without being processed.

brimstoneSalad wrote: I really don't know what you mean. You're talking about things like sweet corn and edamame?

I'd need to see a source on what varieties you're talking about.

The corn that's processed with lime and ground into tortilla flour should be the same sort (or very nearly) that's widely grown for feed.

I was told that there was a difference by someone I had a discussion with some time ago. I don't have any other sources unfortunately.

Anon0045 wrote: I was told that there was a difference by someone I had a discussion with some time ago. I don't have any other sources unfortunately.

Most corn grown in the U.S. is Dent corn, but almost nobody just eats that on the cob, it's tough and just kind of horrible to eat directly. You have to grind it into flour, and usually process it with lime too. Sweet corn is what people eat on the cob, or in frozen "mixed veggies".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dent_corn

Usually white is used for flour, but you can find yellow corn flour too, along with yellow corn chips, etc. It's pretty much all Dent corn, and it could easily have come from the same field and seed stock that's growing corn for animal feed. There's nothing inherently inedible about it, it just has to be treated and milled.

That's good to know. Thanks for the info.