I previously posted, I thought the source of all similar looking announcements.
It is ScienceDaily. You can subscribe and receive daily blurbs of the latest stuff on many many topics. I try to only post here what is either germane or sure to hit Rob's hot button. See our previous recent exchange.
Science Daily: News & Articles in Science, Health, Environment & Technology
The evolution/meat thing is here:
Meat eating behind evolutionary success of humankind, global population spread, study suggests
This free service provides a daily dose of the latest things across most of the scientific publishing spectrum. Then if interested you can read their whole write up or go to their source. They don't have a dog in any fight and don't care whose ox is gored, they just report what they can find, usually from relatively reliable sources NOT the "National Enquirer" sort of pubs.
Exercise care. You will be entering a science zone where your favorite dogma may be run down by their karma.
Pat
Pat,
I read the article and I have some issues with it:
For one, we don't know that without eating meat man would NOT have survived as a species. I don't like the speculative premise of the "success" of man being attributed to meat eating. Meat eating might have allowed man procreate faster but that doesn't mean that without meat he would have died off or that he would not have expanded his geographical boundaries. This would have happened regardless whether he ate meat or not as that is the natural progression when food in a specific area can no longer support the population of that area.
I would think that when man went to an agrarian society his life and health would have increased,this, not his meat eating, is the main factor establishing the marked difference in his success.
As for the premise that man's brain size increased indirectly because he ate meat is a reach. There are so many variables that could contribute to his brain size increase that to site one condition is simply biased opinion. We could as easily say that man's brain size increased when he started making crude tools to extract roots from the ground or making and maintaining fire.
"Do Primitive Peoples Really Live Longer?"
Posted on August 2, 2006 by Joel Fuhrman
"No. For example, Inuit Greenlanders, who historically have had limited access to fruits and vegetables, have the worst longevity statistics in North America. Research from the past and present
shows that they die on the average about 10 years younger and have a higher rate of cancer than the overall Canadian population.1
"Similar statistics are available for the high meat-consuming Maasai in Kenya.
They eat a diet high in wild hunted meats and have the worst life expectancy in the modern world. Life expectancy is 45 years for women and 42 years for men. African researchers report that, historically, Maasai rarely lived beyond age 60. Adult mortality figures on the Kenyan Maasai show that they have a 50% chance of dying before the age of 59.2
We now know that greatly increasing the consumption of vegetables, legumes, fruits, and raw nuts and seeds (and greatly decreasing the consumption of animal products) offers profound increased longevity potential, due in large part to broad symphony of life-extending phytochemical nutrients that a vegetable-based diet contains. By taking advantage of the year-round availability of high-quality plant foods, we have a unique opportunity to live both healthier and longer than ever before in human history."
1. Iburg KM, Bronnum-Hansen H, Bjerregaard P. Health expectancy in Greenland. Scand J Public Health 2001;29(1):5-12. Choinere R. Mortality among the Baffin Inuit in the mid-80s. Arctive Med Res 1992;51 (2):87-93.
Certainly today a vegetarian diet is a healthier diet. Lower cancer rates, longer life, etc. And there is no question a vegetarian diet is better for the planet. So what is this 'study' affording us? Faster procreation? We don't need that with 6.9 billion people on the planet!
Rob
