Studies showing humans are omnivores

[Dustin Kesselberg]

Im looking for studies or facts showing humans are evolutionarly omnivores.

What is it about humans that is designed for eating meat?

It gets frustrating when the only thing you can find concerning wether humans are omnivores or herbivores comes from vegitarian sites which obviously say herbivores.

I hear claims that humans front teeth are for biting meat. But that could easly just be for biting into fruits.

So what about the human body is made for consuming meat?


Also...Is it true meat "rots" in your stomach before being digested?

[Donks]

I wouldn't look for a site specific to the debate, as they'll be biased. I'd look for the enzymes and acids that are involved in digestion, and then look for what each targets.

[Capsid]

Originally posted by Dustin
Im looking for studies or facts showing humans are evolutionarly omnivores.

What is it about humans that is designed for eating meat?

It gets frustrating when the only thing you can find concerning wether humans are omnivores or herbivores comes from vegitarian sites which obviously say herbivores.

I hear claims that humans front teeth are for biting meat. But that could easly just be for biting into fruits.

So what about the human body is made for consuming meat?


Also...Is it true meat "rots" in your stomach before being digested?
My understanding is that there are two indications of our meat eating ability. One, we have canines and two, we do not have a gap between our incisors/canines and molars which is characteristic of herbivores. The name of the gap escapes me for now. Perhaps some vet could enlighten me.

Your stomach is a bag of very strong acid ~pH2.5, I don't think that meat rots in that environment, it is actively broken down.

[Jas]

Vitamin B12 baby.

Look at comparative anatomy and our nutritional requirements. Our dentition and digestion is comparable to omnivorous primates.

I don't have any of my textbooks on me, but check out some of the primatology/evolutionary anthropology textbooks at your local Uni library (or regular library, they might be there too). They're full of diagrams showing the digestive tracts and dentition of primates, and how this relates to diet.

I hear claims that humans front teeth are for biting meat. But that could easly just be for biting into fruits.

The dentition of frugivores is quite different than that of omnivores.

[bigred]

Because if not, nobody would buy supreme pizzas. duh.

[Capsid]

Duplicate post

[crimresearch]

Originally posted by Donks
I wouldn't look for a site specific to the debate, as they'll be biased. I'd look for the enzymes and acids that are involved in digestion, and then look for what each targets.

Which ties in to PER, and other protein measures (BV, PDCAA, etc.).

There are websites devote to 'Bodybuilding 101' which cover that sort of research.

Since the body is adapted to 'use' proteins from meat in a relatively effective manner, it might suggest that humans hve some business eating the stuff.

[Rolfe]

Originally posted by Dustin
Im looking for studies or facts showing humans are evolutionarly omnivores.

What is it about humans that is designed for eating meat?To me, this sounds a lot like asking for a study that shows that the sun is hot! The fact is that humans do eat meat, and fruits/vegetables, the species is omnivorous simply by definition.

Now, the idea that we're "natural" herbivores who have somehow become corrupted into eating meat seems to me just laughable. If some people have decided that they prefer not to eat meat as a moral stance in support of animal welfare, I respect and even admire them. But trying to rewrite the obvious facts of biology is just bizarre.

Genuine herbivores tend to have, in their intestine, some sort of fermentation vat. In cattle it is the rumen, in horses and rabbits it is the caecum, and in kangaroos it is a remarkably caecum-like stomach. Man has no such structure. It doesn't mean we can't live on a vegetarian diet, we obviously can, but it does mean that it's more of an effort.

Herbivores, also, seem to dislike meat. If you want them to consume animal material, you have to disguise it. I remember once, at a gymkhana, I bought a steak roll from the refreshment tent. I extracted the steak for me, and offered the roll to my pony. He rolled his lip up and gave me a "you expect me to eat that???" look. This from a notably greedy boy. I then rolled up the bread roll so that the meaty/gravy surface was inside, and he scoffed it happily.

Some people are weird.

Rolfe.

[Bikewer]

Our closest cousins, the chimps, are decidedy omnivorous. In addition to plant foods, they consume large quantities of insects, and whatever small animals and monkeys that they catch.
Atenborough had a spectacular sequence he filmed showing a band of chimps hunting, capturing, and devouring a small monkey.

Surely our primitive ancestors ate meat as scavengers if nothing else, and very early in our evolution began to make tools to facilitate it's procurement and processing.

You do not need scrapers and spear-heads to gather plant foods, after all....

[Just thinking]

Originally posted by Capsid
My understanding is that there are two indications of our meat eating ability. One, we have canines and two, we do not have a gap between our incisors/canines and molars which is characteristic of herbivores.

Did anyone mention forward facing eyes? I believe that is an indication of a potential preditor -- hence meat (animal) eating. Now, not all animals with forward facing eyes eat meat, but I think it's more likely the case than for those without.

[Perpetual Notion]

I just read an article called "Food for Thought" by William R. Leonard who is an anthropologist at Northwestern. It was originally published in Scientific American in December 2002. I don't know if it's available online.

The reason humans are omnivorious is that because of our large brains, we need to take in as much nutrient rich food as possible to "feed" it. Animal products, before the advent of agriculture and cooking, were the the most calorie dense foods available.

We see the change from herbivores to omnivores in the fossil record through the loss of our sagittal crest which is still present in apes and is where the large muscles necessary for chewing fibrous plants attach to the top of the head. Also, humans have more delicate jaws and molars which are adapted for chewing meat and not so much for breaking down plants, although we still ate them.

We also relied on meat more when the climate changed and the woodlands receded and there was more open grassland with animals for hunting. We needed to spread out more to get them and Leonard argues that this is why we migrated out of Africa.

Here's a quote from the article:

"According to Loren Cordain of Colorado State University, contemporary hunter-gatherers derive, on average, 40 to 60 percent of their dietary energy from animal foods (meat, milk and other products). Modern chimps, in comparison, obtain only 5 to 7 percent of their calories from these comestibles. Animal foods are far denser in calories and nutrients than most plant foods. For example, 3.5 ounces of meat provides upward of 200 kilocalories. And a comparable serving of foliage yields just 10 to 20 kilo calories. It stands to reason, then, that for early Homo , acquiring more gray matter meant seeking out more of the energy-dense fare."

Hope this helps.

Edited to add link to the article here (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0007B7DC-6738-1DC9-AF71809EC588EEDF&pageNumber=1&catID=2)
It's the land 'o advertising over there though. Just a warning

[Terry]

Originally posted by Rolfe

Now, the idea that we're "natural" herbivores who have somehow become corrupted into eating meat seems to me just laughable. If some people have decided that they prefer not to eat meat as a moral stance in support of animal welfare, I respect and even admire them. But trying to rewrite the obvious facts of biology is just bizarre.

I just wanted to say that I 100% agree with this, and I am vegan. ( I also stipulate that my reasons for being vegan are not fully defensible in logical terms. I choose to behave this way, but I'm not saying anyone else should or must.)

--Terry.

[Goshawk]

Originally posted by Terry
I just wanted to say that I 100% agree with this, and I am vegan. ( I also stipulate that my reasons for being vegan are not fully defensible in logical terms. I choose to behave this way, but I'm not saying anyone else should or must.)

--Terry.
...I would really hope that we could keep this discussion to a "scientific" discussion of teeth and digestive tracts and protein requirements in primates, and that it doesn't get sidetracked onto who is (or isn't) an Evil Person because they do (or do not) eat meat or vegetables or fruit or Weetabix...




...she said wistfully, to the room in general...

:D

[Zep]

RANT! RANT! RAVE! RAVE...

rave rave


rave??




Sorry. Thought it was mandatory at this point.

Carry on!

[Rolfe]

Originally posted by Terry
I just wanted to say that I 100% agree with this, and I am vegan. ( I also stipulate that my reasons for being vegan are not fully defensible in logical terms. I choose to behave this way, but I'm not saying anyone else should or must.)I think that is very much to the point. You could certainly argue that man has a choice. Unlike cats, we are not obligate carnivores. Therefore, people may choose to become vegetarians or even (with a bit more effort) vegans.

The original OP was not purely scientific, it was addressing the fact that instead of simply saying "I choose not to eat meat", which is perfectly reasonable, some vegetarians/vegans seem to have an agenda to "prove" that our species is not naturally meat-eating.

This is a completely bizarre position, leading to bizarre requests like the OP, asking for evidence that man is a natural omnivore - which he simply is by definition.

Rolfe.

[RandFan]

Good thread. This is one of my pet peeves. I too respect and admire vegetarians. I also think the day will come when we will move to a largely vegetarian diet. Though I don't know how far in the future that will be. I think we will grow almost all of our food and that the plants will largely be genetically engineered. Pure speculation on my part.

In any event. I remember a show on cable that sought to prove that humans were vegetarian (herbivore). I could give a long list of the fallacies but the one that I thought the most ridiculous was a comparison of a cow and mountain lion. The narrator asked the question, "which are we more like?" False dilemma I screamed at the TV. Both are specialists and humans are not for one thing. And there is another category, omnivore. Why did the narrator not choose another primate or even a bear for comparison? A cow and a mountain lion?

The simple fact of the matter is that humans are by and large generalists that eat meat. Doing so has allowed us to become one of the most successful mammals on earth. Long before civilization we were able to inhabit some very extreme locals that we could not have done so if we were specialists or even generalists that only ate plants. Further we are so successful at survival that we have put stress on the environmental systems that we inhabit. Further we extended our life span so much that we are now warehousing humans (retirement centers) because our bodies are outlasting our mental capabilities.

One could argue that there is a quality of life issue and perhaps the quality of life for an individual could be better by being vegetarian. That point is arguable and I might be inclined to agree (the obese meat eater that I am). What is not arguable is whether or not the consumption of meat has an over all negative impact to humans. You see, a species that behaves in a such a way will not persist and humans are not in any danger of extinction at the moment.

[David Carroll]

Perpetual Notion wrote:
I just read an article called "Food for Thought" by William R. Leonard who is an anthropologist at Northwestern. It was originally published in Scientific American in December 2002

Arrgh! You beat me to it. It's funny how every time I provide a link to that article when some ara starts talking that old "humans are natural vegetarians" crap, it absolutely kills the thread. Have not ever had one rebuttal to that article.

[David Carroll]

Dustin asked:
Also...Is it true meat "rots" in your stomach before being digested?

Actually what they usually claim is that meat sits and rots in one's colon, which is pure BS. Some clown I can't remember the name of just now came up with that stupid notion decades ago and it still makes the rounds of the vegan/animal rights websites.

[Rob Lister]

Originally posted by RandFan
Good thread. This is one of my pet peeves. I too respect and admire vegetarians. I also think the day will come when we will move to a largely vegetarian diet. Though I don't know how far in the future that will be. I think we will grow almost all of our food and that the plants will largely be genetically engineered. Pure speculation on my part.


I loved all of your post but this part struck me as being right and wrong at the same time. Humans will never, as a majority, be vegetarians in the sense it is understood today. Because we're humans, we'll invent a way to grow our ribeye's and ribs and chicken legs in flower pots but meat they will remain. We'll just do away with the moo, oink, cluck aspect of it. Hell, we're practically there now. When was the last time you milked a cow?

[RandFan]

Originally posted by Rob Lister
I loved all of your post but this part struck me as being right and wrong at the same time. Humans will never, as a majority, be vegetarians in the sense it is understood today. Because we're humans, we'll invent a way to grow our ribeye's and ribs and chicken legs in flower pots but meat they will remain. We'll just do away with the moo, oink, cluck aspect of it. Hell, we're practically there now. When was the last time you milked a cow? Yes, that was my point. I guess by "vegetarian" I was thinking not killing things with brains. It was sloppy on my part. Thanks for the clarification.

Oh, I haven't milked a cow since 1978.

[Rob Lister]

Originally posted by RandFan
Yes, that was my point. I guess by "vegetarian" I was thinking not killing things with brains. It was sloppy on my part. Thanks for the clarification.

Oh, I haven't milked a cow since 1978.

'75 for me. I got a woody and decided to stop for humanity's sake.

[RandFan]

Originally posted by Rob Lister
'75 for me. I got a woody and decided to stop for humanity's sake. :D

My father was talking to our neighbor who had a few cows. He told my father he had just gotten a new bull, "oh, are you planning on breeding your cows yourself?" my father asked. "I like my cows" the many said, but not that much.

I used to work at a dairy and was asked to assist in artificially inseminating some of the cows. I declined. I guess I wasn't that secure in my sexuality I guess.

[plindboe]

Originally posted by Dustin
It gets frustrating when the only thing you can find concerning wether humans are omnivores or herbivores comes from vegitarian sites which obviously say herbivores.

You need to practice on your Google skills methinks. A simple search (http://www.google.dk/search?num=100&hl=da&as_qdr=all&q=humans+omnivores&meta=) for "humans omnivores" gave many useful links explaining that humans are indeed omnivores.

[Bikewer]

An interesting little book on human dietary habits and foibles (cow love and pig hate, for instance) is Marvin Harris'
"Good To Eat"

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1577660153/qid=1120966762/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/103-8445205-2939034

[RandFan]

Originally posted by Rob Lister
Because we're humans, we'll invent a way to grow our ribeye's and ribs and chicken legs in flower pots but meat they will remain. It seems were much closer than I could have ever dreamed.

Cow-free Beef Proposed (http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/cowfreebeefproposed;_ylt=AsM9shbleJOqEAtlp3kS4yEbr 7sF;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl)

Scientists have proposed two new techniques for growing meat in a lab by a process that could one day make beef cows obsolete.

Don't toss out those beef steaks just yet, however. The technology is in its infant stages and it is not clear whether large-scale production will work. It's not known, for example, how to exercise an animal that doesn't exist, in order to give lab meat the full range of cow-like qualities.

[Debaroo]

My pet peeve about most (not all) veg*n stance is the claim of "not eating meat" somehow means that animals are not killed in the process of producing the cheap vegetables and grains that grace the veg*n table.

Just because there are no animals parts on ones plate doesn't mean that animals did not die for ones food production.

Deb

[RandFan]

Originally posted by Debaroo
My pet peeve about most (not all) veg*n stance is the claim of "not eating meat" somehow means that animals are not killed in the process of producing the cheap vegetables and grains that grace the veg*n table.

Just because there are no animals parts on ones plate doesn't mean that animals did not die for ones food production.

Deb Good point. I always point out that any change in human behavior to animals will not appreciably change the suffering of animals in fact it will make it much worse (from a statistical point of view).

The life of animals in the wild is survival of the fittest. Many animals are killed and or eaten shortly after birth. Those animals that survive this slaughter will likely die from the elements, disease or predation before they reach maturity. Those who lucky enough to reach maturity will not die from natural causes. As their pace slows and they get weaker they will succumb to the same fates as their fallen brethren.

Animals in captivity survive long after death and most reach maturity. Most are protected from the elements, protected from predation (until and if they are slaughtered) and receive treatment for disease. Though to be sure there are some real horror stories on factory farms and brutality from large scale butchering plants. It's not all happy news for animals in captivity. But even if we ended captive breeding it would not end animal suffering. It would just end the suffering by humans. And of course the fact that animals suffer in the wild is not an excuse for humans to abuse them.

[SezMe]

Originally posted by Rob Lister
'75 for me. I got a woody and decided to stop for humanity's sake.
Not sure I can speak for humanity but, in any case, thank you.

[SezMe]

Originally posted by RandFan
Animals in captivity survive long after death and most reach maturity.
Hey, RandFan, you been reading too many of Interesting Ian's posts? :) :)

'Jes atwiting you. I know what you meant.

[RandFan]

Originally posted by SezMe
Hey, RandFan, you been reading too many of Interesting Ian's posts? :) :)

'Jes atwiting you. I know what you meant. :dl:

Damn, there is an afterlife.