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Random thought:
If cows are a "significant source of methane gas" why the hell aren't we strapping tanks to their asses and collecting that stuff? Methane is natural gas, the same stuff you use to heat your homes. People die mining for it.
2 possible conclusions.
1. The article is overstating their production capability as it conveniently skips over how much they actually produce.
2. We should really get some of those cow farts
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On October 28 2009 16:13 baal wrote:Show nested quote +On October 28 2009 13:37 Lucktar wrote:On October 28 2009 13:10 baal wrote:On October 28 2009 12:03 Liquid`Drone wrote: i work in a meat factory and most of the meat I eat wouldve been discarded if I didnt buy it for 1/10th of the store price
I should eat less beef and more pork and chicken tho. i lived without a freezer for a while and a couple times I was forced to eat 3kg of beef in 3-ish days lol
fruits and vegetables are delicious and it is absolutely true that a vast majority of people in western countries eat too much meat. people like the guy interviewed in OP should just advice people to eat less meat rather than to stop eating it completely because this is so unappealing to many people that they end up completely ignoring a very valid piece of advice. thats because the guy on OP is trying to push his moral agenda through lies and its not really honestly concerned about realistic ways to improve others lives even if his own fucked up hypocrite brains think he is. God damn, defensive much? You've decided that the OP article is full of lies and propaganda, without supplying a shred of reasoning or evidence to support this, and you're trying to paint vegetarianism as some sort of quasi-religious cult a la Scientology. Argue the issues if you like, but leave the vitriol and indignation at home, please. You're making yourself look like an idiot. Vegetarianism has real and demonstrable benefits for both health and the environment, and addresses some real issues of morality regarding animals as well. If you don't give two fucks about animal rights, and you like steak, that's fine. But if your argument is 'I don't care,' then you're hardly in a position to blast people who attempt to argue with scientific studies, statistics, etc. Quit acting like vegetarians are obligated not to talk about vegetarianism, for fear of offending your carnivorous sensibilities. As mora said, i am not arguing about vegetarianism, i am arguing about OPs interviewed asshole. Global Warming to advocate vegetarianism? fuck that shit, could that asshole try to use any more pathetic vile manipulation to pursue his personal agendas?. Discussions about vegetarianism for the following reasons make sense: - Health - The morality in animal consumption - World Hunger But climate change? fuck him and all his offspring for doing such a pathetic attempt, especially when its not even proven that man has something to do with it, and now a big portion of the scientific community is claiming that we were actually in a micro ice-age till mid 1800s, and that in the roman times the average weather was way hotter than nowadays, not to mention earlier stages of the earth. Also it is clear that he is leading people to follow his beliefs by the wrong way when he says that in the end "everyone" will be a vegetarian, which says he is not worried about climate, but about morality. If you want to discuss the morality of eating meat i have some decent arguments on it too.
settle petal, no need to throw out junk like 'fuck him and his offspring' and 'pathetic vile manipulation'
:C
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a point i'd like to make is that global warming is what you can call an disease that was accumulated through either a major factor or several factors but all in their selves could alone disrupt the earths system to a disaster.
some of the factors and the leading ones are (which most is already very known)
- the downfall of our tree population(the rate we're cutting tree's is not sustainable) - the marine life (especially the plankton or whatever it's called that i dont recall but according to very strong studies they contribute to our oxygen by at least 60% alone) but then we got the fishes of course, or what's left of them... and fish is a important part of our diet if u care about health! - pollution both on land, the sea and our air by toxic chemicals - human population is too high ( not sustainable)
i want to mention on the last point that there's several studies which is hard to find on the internet and kinda has to be read in books that for an example an island that had around 2600 deer's. Over 3 times as much deer's that was calculated sustainable, and in the near future they all started to die because there was no food left for them... and in the end of the study there was only like 47 left. That's nature's way of dealing with imbalance
so my point is, and nearly all intelligent people would agree, our world population is way to high.
A study that was made by Rockerfeller back in the 70s or so concluded that our world would only be sustainable in long-term if our population never got past 1 billion (500 million was 'prime population'. We currently have a population of 6,9 billion or even 7 now. Do the math on how far off we are and how hard we will fall if that's really the case.
and that's assuming the world economy wouldn't fall and a third world war would break out before/after that. (and anyone that believes the economy wont fall in the near future is uneducated, it practically already has...stupid delays)
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really plankton contribute that much oxygen? wow that kicks ass
i never really gave a shit about the whole japanese whaling thing but i can use this against the retards that are so adamant about saving the useless whale population
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That said study was what earned economist a reputation of being pessimists. However, its common opinion among economists now (according to my high school econ teacher) that the study failed to account for advances in technology.
There's still a lot of research going on in all fields today, including agriculture. So a study saying we won't have enough food 40 years ago, doesn't necessarily hold up today.
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On October 28 2009 17:17 wdreamer wrote: That said study was what earned economist a reputation of being pessimists. However, its common opinion among economists now (according to my high school econ teacher) that the study failed to account for advances in technology.
There's still a lot of research going on in all fields today, including agriculture. So a study saying we won't have enough food 40 years ago, doesn't necessarily hold up today.
so you believe we are not putting a stress on the earth just by all the natural resources and our food etc with our current population?
I'm not saying the study HAS to be 100% accurate but there are valid points in it, im unsure about the "safe population number" aswell but our current population leans towards disaster, honestly.
Conspiracy-theorists believes that the so called swine flu and its vaccine was purposely created in the use of "population control". Even the swine flu incident back in 76
Now they point out valid points, and the ingredients in the vaccine, and how the swine flu appearantly was created in a lab etcetc and all stuff going around now that most mainstream media dont dare bring up.
edit: god im changing topic each minute :/ too sleepy, gn
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I can't give it up, it's too hard
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Naw, I didn't say that. I just wanted to point out that the study is invalid. Well we probably do have enough food though. I mean think about how much food you actually need, and how much you waste. We could probably survive on like half of what we eat, it wouldn't be fun or healthy, but just surviving. But if that we did that, there'd be plenty of food to support a much larger population.
Now other limiting factors like air, space, and energy are entirely different matters. However, I personally think the approach we're taking towards the problem is wrong. Our track record for conserving and preventative is pretty bad. I think instead of focusing only on reducing consumption/output, we should instead try to re-engineer the situation.
For example, like I stated above, if we have a surplus of methane from cow farts, why don't we collect it and put it to use? I know that not every situation works that nicely, but its an option I think should be explored more thoroughly. The way humans became the top of the food chain was by changing their environment. So why do we assume we have to backtrack our changes to fix our current problems. Why do we just find more advanced and beneficial changes we could implement?
Sorry for rambling so much and not addressing your question too much, BTW.
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The End is Nigh!!!
Most of the predictions and statistics represented by super green people are bullshit, we will never run out of food or places to put garbage, and I don't think we'll run out of lumber, I mean we are already using concrete for building and internet is the new paper. As for running out of oil we can just use something else. gasoline wasn't chosen because it was the best fuel it was chosen because it was the first "good" one. The problem is that everything is geared to be run by gas, we can't just replace all cars with electric cars, It's gonna take a long ass time.
I think people underestimate how big the goddamn world is.
This is all my completely uninformed opinion BTW.
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On October 28 2009 17:42 ShaperofDreams wrote: The End is Nigh!!!
Most of the predictions and statistics represented by super green people are bullshit, we will never run out of food or places to put garbage, and I don't think we'll run out of lumber, I mean we are already using concrete for building and internet is the new paper. As for running out of oil we can just use something else. gasoline wasn't chosen because it was the best fuel it was chosen because it was the first "good" one. The problem is that everything is geared to be run by gas, we can't just replace all cars with electric cars, It's gonna take a long ass time.
I think people underestimate how big the goddamn world is.
This is all my completely uninformed opinion BTW.
Completely uninformed indeed. You are an idiot.
edit: sorry, that was kind of mean. you are right about the practical difficulty of switching fuels a least. there is a lot to learn though.
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Energy is a pretty legitimate problem. What else can we use? I mean you mentioned electric cars, but where do you think they get their energy. You plug them in and they get charged up from your outlet. Where did that come from? A power plant that probably works runs on coal.
Solar, wind, water, and other "green fuels" have ineffective output except in certain situations. Like if you're gonna build windmills it only makes sense to build them in really windy places. Solar cells are ridiculously cost-ineffective until we can improve their efficiency.
Another random thought: Why do we even assume that these will have no adverse affect on the environment? Right now there's just so few of them that it doesn't' seem to do anything. But I bet if we mass produced windmills, so that all wind speeds were cut in half, there would be some major climate changes. The light from the sun is part of the environment too. If we drain a lot of it, it makes sense that we'd make a general cooling effect. Probably, the best solution is that we use lots of sources of energy, or sources where their effects would cancel out each other.
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Been vegeterian for 9 years now.
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didnt want to sleep 
about energy, if ur a extra-terrestial believer like me and all the hokus pokus that is appearantly kept behind our back then we could use a power source that channels power from other dimensions! like in stargate (zero point module)
imagine that powering everything you need
on a more serious note, why havent anyone brought up the fact that whole our solar system is actually changing rapidly according to the studies N.A.S.A have done recently.
Nearly all planets have increased temperature, saturn spins faster etc
You guys think there's something bigger going on than just our little planet?
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the more vegetarians there are, the more meat there is for me.
i do think that becoming a vegetarian can save a lot of money, though, although i personally wouldn't go that far.
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I'm sorry but the meat people are comedy. The "Meat = Manly" thing has been done so well. You gotta love what TV can do to people. Live on just meat for 2 months. Please.
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Right now there's just so few of them that it doesn't' seem to do anything. But I bet if we mass produced windmills, so that all wind speeds were cut in half, there would be some major climate changes. The light from the sun is part of the environment too. If we drain a lot of it, it makes sense that we'd make a general cooling effect.
Your post was good until this retarded couple of sentences. I don't know where you people hear this garbage (TV?, friends?) but everyone citing this doesn't have the slightest idea of the energy forces that drive the climate system. In the end wind is also driven by solar energy and the rotation of the Earth and our civilization does not currently possess any means to impact either the amount of sunlight hitting Earth or somehow slow down its rotation.
So no, making a lot of windmills isnt going to "slow down wind" or stop the earth from rotating and solar panels aren't going to induce a "general cooling effect" (whatever the hell that even means). If anything, it would decrease Earth's albedo, because solar cells tend to be dark (deep blue/black), so our surface will actually absorb more energy.
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http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/05/20/low-emission-cow.html
This is the way to change the system if you are truly dedicated to the cause. Vegetarians, I respect your right to choose what you want to eat, but honestly, you aren't going to change the social norms of billions of people nor are you going to take down a vital economic infrastructure that has been around for thousands of years.
Vegetarianism is an urban luxury that isn't practical for the majority of the people in the United States and in developing countries. As is, living in San Francisco (arguably, one of the hottest spots for vegetarianism), I would have to easily pay 2 or 3 times as much for the equivalent protein yield of a vegetarian diet. Spinach easily costs almost $2/lb; dal costs $3+/lb; the cheapest nuts cost $5/lb. Comparatively, most of the protein I eat costs less than $2/lb (yes, I know this is on the cheap end). My point is though, is that in a major vegetarian area, it's pretty expensive to be a healthy vegetarian.
Now try to apply that to areas outside of New England and the Pacific Coast. How many people do you think have the resources and access to eat a healthy vegetarian diet? How many people do you think have the knowledge of how to eat a healthy vegetarian diet? And this is excluding the fact that a lot of times, meat is cheaper out in the rural areas than it is in urban areas. From a purely utility maximizing standpoint, people aren't going to be vegetarian. If you are truly committed to the cause of vegetarianism for the sake of global warming, then save a couple extra bucks by eating meat and donate that money to good research causes. You can't beat the marginal utility on a per dollar basis. If you are truly committed to the cause of vegetarianism for other reasons, this doesn't apply to you.
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On October 28 2009 18:51 gchan wrote: Vegetarianism is an urban luxury that isn't practical for the majority of the people in the United States and in developing countries.
Vegetarianism is an urban luxury in developing countries? By 'developing countries' you are clearly referring to most of Africa where hardly anyone can afford to eat meat. Yep.
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On October 28 2009 18:51 gchan wrote:http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/05/20/low-emission-cow.htmlThis is the way to change the system if you are truly dedicated to the cause. Vegetarians, I respect your right to choose what you want to eat, but honestly, you aren't going to change the social norms of billions of people nor are you going to take down a vital economic infrastructure that has been around for thousands of years. Vegetarianism is an urban luxury that isn't practical for the majority of the people in the United States and in developing countries. As is, living in San Francisco (arguably, one of the hottest spots for vegetarianism), I would have to easily pay 2 or 3 times as much for the equivalent protein yield of a vegetarian diet. Spinach easily costs almost $2/lb; dal costs $3+/lb; the cheapest nuts cost $5/lb. Comparatively, most of the protein I eat costs less than $2/lb (yes, I know this is on the cheap end). My point is though, is that in a major vegetarian area, it's pretty expensive to be a healthy vegetarian. Now try to apply that to areas outside of New England and the Pacific Coast. How many people do you think have the resources and access to eat a healthy vegetarian diet? How many people do you think have the knowledge of how to eat a healthy vegetarian diet? And this is excluding the fact that a lot of times, meat is cheaper out in the rural areas than it is in urban areas. From a purely utility maximizing standpoint, people aren't going to be vegetarian. If you are truly committed to the cause of vegetarianism for the sake of global warming, then save a couple extra bucks by eating meat and donate that money to good research causes. You can't beat the marginal utility on a per dollar basis. If you are truly committed to the cause of vegetarianism for other reasons, this doesn't apply to you.
This is just fundamentally untrue on several levels. Firstly, low quality meat is not a traditional part of a healthy diet, regardless of how much protein it contains. Secondly, you would have to eat an absurd (ABSURD!) amount of vegetables to get the same quantity of protein that you get in meat. So using a lb for lb ratio to argue cost is just stupid. But the point your missing is that eating less protein isn't a bad thing, as the average meat eater eats far more protein than is good for them anyway.
Now perhaps it's different in America, I don't know, I've never been there (although all Americans in the UK complain about our food prices). If I go into a supermarket I can buy 4 chicken breasts for £2 - £2.50 or I can buy a 1kg bag of dried beans for £0.90. Or I could buy a large bag of potatos and feed myself for a week. The thing is, if you're eating meat, you still need to buy things like leafy vegetables, root vegetables, fruit and pulses to have a healthy diet, but the meat can easily be replaced by beans/potatos/nuts (which I feel you've misrepresented) and can still provide you with sufficient calories and protein.
It's one of the fairly well kept secrets of the meat industry, but in almost all cases, even if you're a vegan, if you're getting enough calories, you're getting enough protein.
So don't try and wrangle out the "it's not viable for most people" argument. In fact, one of the reasons for the depreciation in meat and appreciation in vegetables is due to the fact that meat producers are taking up more and more of the land to grow animals rather than vegetables.
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