Having spent most of my life with a circle of friends, some of whom are vegetarians, some of whom are not vegetarians and some of whom have waffled back and forth with vegetarianism, the only real trend I can see in healthfulness is that those who get regular exercise are by far the healthiest, regardless of diet. One of my closest friends has been a vegetarian his entire adult life (he's now 60) and is very healthy, but also takes daily long walks and has a generally active lifestyle. He now says that he finds no real justification for his vegetarianism, but continues with it because he likes it and he is pretty versatile around the kitchen.
Doug
a small carbon footprint,as relates to vegetarianism, in some of the worlds seasonal climes.
personally, we eat seasonally which means i'm largely a vegetarian 6mos of the year and increase meat consumption in late fall winter and early spring. this style of diet(i'm a farmer)fits with low food storage/energy needs and gives my body a variety of foods through out the year, a body evolved thru thousands of years of similar patterns on the archipelago of whats now the UK.
robie, a poor and reluctant typist
I think that this is an important topic in terms of it's relevance to the three E's. (and other important environmental and ethical issues). I'm also certain that I have only a fraction of Pioneer's knowlege on this subject (he also writes far better than I do). So I feel that I can only speak for myself on this topic. But Pioneer did mention that a vegatarian diet needs to be flexible for a number of reasons. For example persons that are very active would not be healthy or able to work/exercise if they were eating just vegetables.This is dairy based (but I'm not a purist), so I do take protein powder daily. This is because I was concerned that I was only getting about half of my daily protein needs when I stopped eating meat. I also increased the amount of nuts, beans and other sources of protien in my diet. And I do eat some canned fish and a little bit of meat sometimes when it's hard to avoid. I also take some supplements such as a multi vitamin, omega 3 and extra D in the winter. I'm strong and I feel good. I paddle whitewater, cycle, hike, dance and I work hard as a carpenter/renovator. I'm 50 and most people don't believe it, they think I'm in my early 40's. I have likely inherited "good" genes, but it is the combination of a healthy diet and exercise that's most important I think.
Every Society to Survive and Prosper, must place JUSTICE above all else, otherwise such Societies must fail.
All previous Societies rose on opportunity, changed and then curtailed opportunity. via Lack of Justice.
Each grain of Knowledge, contains within, a grain of responsibility, you may choose Evil by not embracing that Responsibility or choose to accept that grain of responsibiliy and be rewarded.
We have chosen to take the knowledge, and reject the responsibility. Thus our punishment will be ever more severe.
Individual achivement, from a Society point of view, has no value, unless it improves that Societies Justice.
learned seasonal supply by the mother of invention. i'm doubtful protien powders were or will be available in the future. My family follows a seasonal diet with very low physical, our body,energy needed for preservation as that energy is used for many other agricultural/good time pleasures.
please do research, while you can, on local cultivars of fruit(pomme and stone) trees, caning andnut producing plants/herbs. nature cannot be anthropomorphized successfully as is her value system is efficiency or else…
wishing you the best, robie
Well, I kind of see your point about belief systems but my sense is that human values are not a religious consideration but at the core of human motivation, human behavior and so are a critical reason for the ills of the Old Pardigm created by human behavior and so a change in those values are essential to the healing of these ills and the resulting New Paradigm. To care about Nature - the source of all wealth - is essential to coming out with a better world on the other side of the Shift. I guess we could call this a "belief system" but I think it is really a "guidance system" - the motivation which directs human action beyond just the survival imperative and redefines our relationship with Nature and each other which has been amiss and caused so much peril. We have viewed Nature as a mere object of utility and so, with organic ignorance and greed, have nearly destroyed the golden goose on which we depend. We would not have done this if our values or believe system or whatever we call it had embraced Nature as our partner and companion in our struggle for survival and happiness. This is at the heart of the matter and very relevant, in my view, and so is essential in a discussion of successfully navigating the Paradigm Shift - the change in the three E's.Aside from belief systems, my examination of the ecological facts tells me that the animal-based human diet is a very practical and primary cause of the degradation of Nature which is the source of our life support - one of the major concerns we have in all the change taking place that Peak Prosperity is helping us negotiate realistically. It is wrong human ecology born of wrong values /wrong relationship with our fellow beings, with Nature, that has gotten us into the trouble we're in and the human diet with supporting agriculture is the main part of human ecology which has caused the trouble - this is an ecological fact, not based on a belief system, which discovered not as a practicing vegetarian but in an objective exploration of the reality. Energy has empowered us to eat meat on the scale that is destroying our life support system, the Environment. A human ecology which includes meat eating on a massive scale is the main reason these two E's are a factor in the change that is taking place.
Good point Robie. My sense is that the New Paradigm will still allow us to eat the optimal diet for the human body and the environment year round by storage of locally grown food in season, out of season local production in some latitudes and climates with artificially enhanced growing conditions, and some importation of food using transportation powered by carbon-neutral biofuels rationed for this purpose or zero-carbon electricity. It will be more expensive, you'll probably need more of it Old foggy chilly England, but healthy food /good health will be more valued in the New Paradigm, just as will the wealth of happiness. At least that's the story I'm envisioning because vision affects reality and I sense we can hold onto to the boons of our labor-saving technology and considerable energy empowerment even with the energy contraction to Renewables through efficiency, practicality and higher quality of life values. Although we cannot do as much importation in the New Paradigm, I think we'll be able to do enough to maintain a diet that is optimal to our health and the Planet's.If the meat supply in the UK works anything like that of the US, then the carbon footprint of most meat eaters is going to be pretty big even in the no-local-veggie winter season since the winter fodder and at least some of the meat will already have been or will be transported from distant lands, requiring a lot of energy and environmental destruction. I guess some farmers can get by without this winter carbon footprint, but I don't think it is a solution for the masses.
I'm lucky to be in Virginia, a mid-Atlantic state at about the latitude of Rome (but next to a colder sea), with a six-month growing season expandable several months by hoop and greenhouse gardening, with veggie survival in dormancy and eatable out of the garden the other winter months. And I expect that in the New Paradigm some out of season fruits and veggies will come up from sunny Florida by electric train, giving those farmers a good living as all farmers will have in the New Paradigm.
Pioneer, too-long bound to the typewriter, and never to be a poor scurvy dog of the old empire under any Paradigm.
Hi Doug, it is an interesting coincidence that I just viewed this evening the documentary "Eating" by Mike Anderson - worth watching for maintianing health and for your veggie friend's appreciation of his diet. It made a strong case for the plant-based diet to maintain good health even for people who exercise regularly. Although they can better maintain their health the heart disease and cancer creeps in sooner or later for many, as statistics show. I guess the only way your veggie friend can justify the diet is if he goes back to meat, gets heart disease and then dies, or reverses it with a return to the veggie diet - not an easy way to prove its value. It occurs to me we have diverged from the three Es here, but then the H of health is critical to everything else, and it does affect the Economy in the massive costs of disease treatment, disability and death.
Creating farm ponds is one of those skills taken for granted among certain folks, but hard to find good how-to information for those just getting into it. Can anyone recommend any good resources out there?
I know this is a long time after these comments were made, but I ran into this conversation and have to share my views on Salatin's discussion about herbivores. I saw Joel a couple weeks ago and had a conversation with him in which he made the simple statement that annual plantings degrade soil and perennial plantings build soil. In my permaculture backyard garden I grow annuals intermixed in polyculture with perennials, and I never till the soil, so I'm building soil in that case. But "sustainable agriculture" at a large scale, has to till soil. Everytime soil is tilled, it is oxygenated, and there is a burst of bacterial activity and the carbon escapes as CO2 and the soil is degraded. It can be renewed to some degree with cover crops that are disked in (with nitrogen-fixing legumes as part of the cover crops to replenish nitrogen). But basically there is no such thing as "sustainable agriculture". It's not sustainable without external inputs. And it degrades soil.
The only way to have "sustainable agriculture" is to have perennials, and there are two main approaches for those: Tree and bush crops ("Food Forests" with nut and fruit trees) and large herbivore grazing systems on perennial forage - pasture or browse. 1/3 of the world is grasslands, and they co-evolved with large herbivires, as Joel said. In the absence of herbivores, those grasslands are becoming desertified and are a major contribution to global warming. Alan Savory is trying to reverse that process by bringing back herbivores to the grasslands worldwide. Feeding the world sustainably can not be done without resorting to meat from those herbivores that have to be returned to the grasslands. Sure some vegetarians can survive on nuts from trees for their protein source. But beans and grains are not on the planet's "sustainability" diet, in my humble opinion.
By the way, chickens are not on my list for "planet sustainability". They require grain inputs, unless they are raised as a small flock living primarily on kitchen scraps and waste streams. Commercial poultry or egg production is unsustainable because it's dependent on grain inputs, and grain agriculture is unsustainable.
So it seems to me that the "fair" thing to do is to eat according to what is sustainable for humans living on the planet, in addition to following one's personal spiritual values. That means large herbivores, which are the only way we can utilize the protein created by pastures and browse. The nitrogen for feeding those pastures and browse has to, of course, come from nitrogen fixers planted in polyculture with the grasses or bushes.
The arguments against the Paleo diet having to do with hear disease aren't really addressing the real Paleo diet. Meat was eaten by Paleohumans that was grass-fed, and high in omegas and lean in unhealthy fats. It was also eaten only after a successful hunt (no freezers) so it wasn't a daily occurence.
-Permaculturally yours -
I'd say you don't want to put in a farm pond unless you've had a lot of training in permaculture (or equivalent) and experience with others who have learned already. Design of where and how is important, or you could create more erosion and destruction than benefit. Water design/management is one of the more difficult aspects of permaculture, in my opinion. Bill Mollison's Permaculture: A Designer's Handbook is the basic "textbook" of permaculture and has some good information on ponds which will be enough to tell you what you dont know and why you'd want to take courses and/or work with someone who has experience in helping you design and build farm ponds to modify your environment.