Are humans designed to eat meat?

[Envy]

Pack up, how?

 

[FortyTwo]

FortyTwo, we seem to have the same taste in men .

I'm glad I have a poster of him. It's the only hot guy poster I can sneak in because it's logical for me to have it there, as everyone I'm friends with knows I love Big Bang Theory.

Oh, off-topic, right! Anyways, I think that it's silly to deny that humans have evolved to handle meat in some form or another, and in some cases, to rely on it for a large part of nutrition. Of course, that doesn't mean we're adapted today to handle it that great, or that we should eat it at all. But to deny that history doesn't make sense to me.

 

[Josh James xVx]

Humans evolved to think, to choose and to use tools to improve our lives.

Vegetarianism is a logical extension of this basic "design".

Hunting and meat eating may have aided in our physical evolution. There's lots of compelling concrete evidence for this. That doesn't mean we have to, though. Our ancestors certainly didn't cram billions of animals into factory farms, among other things. That's a whole new ballpark.

 

[Kittendumpling]

Clearly humans can eat meat, and have been eating meat for thousands and thousands of years, and have been thriving quite well on that diet. Archeological evidence suggests it wasn't until the later stone age and iron age that caries became a problem, perhaps due to eating more carbohydrate rich and processed foods. The people in the early stone age had bigger bones as well. (Of course, they also got a lot more exercise back in those days. Okay, and on average only lived until they got to be around 25-40 years, but that was likely due to all the fighting with sabre tooth tigers, wolves, bears, and dinosaurs.)

Also, God (the Christian one, the others are obviously fake) said that we could eat meat after The Flood. And God rejectred Cain's vegetable sacrifice, but praised Abel's lamb sacrifice. Also, God-fearing good old boys such as the benevolent General Franco of Spain strongly discouraged vegetarianism and denied vegetarian restaurants to do business.

Also, meat has the essential B12 vitamin which is not found naturally in plant foods. And fish has long chained omega 3s and vitamin D. So it would seem eating meat is natural, especially the paleo diet.

Also, animals kill and eat each other, so how can it be wrong for humans, who are animals, to kill and eat other animals? Isn't that only natural?

So what is the vegetarian response to this?

(Disclaimer: These opinions are not my own; I'm just trying to encourage discussion of a topic that may be of interest to many new vegetarians and the vegetarian-curious!)

My response to this is that it's not about what we're evolved to do, it's about what is ethical.