Philosoraptor

I would say that those were likely contributing factors? ;) Cooking does make plants/vegetables and meat easier to digest (less energy required)...and coordinated hunting would increase success?

Coordinated hunting uses strategy. That's why it impacts brain development. As for making food easier to digest, the main thing is that it reduced chewing. A primate spends most of its waking life chewing. Once early humans ate less and chewed less often, it freed up a large amount of energy to be put to brain development.

But actually, I think that it's more likely that breeding and raising plants is the main thing that enabled societies to become smarter and more successful. It required the following acts of intellect: figuring out a calendar, figuring out selective breeding, matching select items against time of year, etc. Plus, every successful society to exist had a starch-intensive diet. I would attribute the raising of plants more to furthering society after the initial stage that could be accredited to hunting than hunting itself accomplished. With domesticating animals, I think it required less observation because the main control was the personalities- ones which lashed out least were kept and bred longer. But with plants, more careful observation and experimentation of methods of propagation (air layering, cuttings, etc) had to be made.

All of which are likely correct. However, from a metabolic perspective, an increase in the consumption in meat enabled pre-human ancestors and humans to spend less time eating (because meat is more dense when it comes to calories) which freed up time to do all you described; provided the proteins necessary (or at the very least, a more abundant source) to grow a larger brain; and was a much better source of B-12, which the brain requires (as do all cells in the human body). As for a starch, yes this is a staple in our diets because it is broken down into glucose - which our brain uses as energy....but it is not 'built' from.

I've gotta argue against a couple of claims there. Firstly, some primates do eat meat, this is true- but they do not eat it to the extent that humans do, and our earliest ancestors were herbivorous. So at some point, they evolved to the point where they could eat meat, and obviously they didn't have meat to get there. We have very long colons, digestive tracts, relatively flat teeth, and an inability to survive well solely on meat. I am not aware of any evidence that pre-humans ate meat to the extent humans do to lead to early humanity, or attribute it heavily to that, as nothing about our digestion points to meat being a particularly good idea, especially when we don't digest it *well*. I'm speaking of early humanity when I accredit hunting, not pre-humanity. Secondly, your claim that meat is more calorie dense. It depends on which vegetation you compare it to. There are 1,537 calories in a pound of black beans. There are only 1,137 calories in a pound of meat. And that's 15% fat 85% lean meat of today, not the leaner meat of early domesticated or wild animals. As opposed to 404 calories in a pound of bananas. Although fruit back then- it's hard to know what kinds of calories it would have. It might have been more calorie dense, because it would have been picked at ripeness, not picked weeks early, put in an ethylene gas chamber to force ripening for transport, etc. lol. BUT today's fruits are freaks of breeding, same as the animals. They're sweeter today than they were (or so we're told), so more sugar now than then.

(PART 2) I think by "calorie dense" you may've been predominantly referring to resource availability. As in, "There's a lot more on a large animal than on a plant you come across foraging." I would see more sense in that. One claim I take particular issue with is the B12 claim. B12 is the product of bacterial fermentation. It does not "come from meat." It comes from bacteria breeding on plants, which animals eat, and it remains in their bodies. It's most likely people did not wash off produce in early humanity, so they were not washing off the B12 from the produce, so logically your body should have comparable levels of B12 as compared to wildlife, or at least sufficient levels.

We do digest meat quite well - digestive enzymes called lipase and proteases. What we don't do well is digest the fibrous tissues of plants. Strict herbivores have to spend most of their waking hours eating and also have a digestive system (or process) that better enables them to digest and exact nutrients from this diet (ex. Rabbits eat some of their own droppings (2x digestion) and many others regurgitate their meals and have multiple stomachs (fermentation)). Our teeth would be considered those of an omnivore. As for B12, you're correct - there are other sources of it, but meat is the best source....most people don't like eating dirt and in the amounts required that would give them an equivalent dose of B12. I do agree that there are many problems with our food and how it's produced - meat, fruits, veggies, grains, etc....and that 'this' is the problem - not our diet.

Again, I must take issue.
1. Plant proteins are more quickly integrated into the body than animal proteins, which have a lengthier and more energy-consuming process of breaking down and reconstituting.
2. Our digestive tracts are far better geared for plant tissues than meat. You never hear about people with 5 lbs of bananas rotting in their colons. In fact, our lengthy intestinal tract far more resembles an herbivore than a carnivore (specifically though, frugivores), but all you need to take into account for the best proof is longevity, for which rates of heart disease, cancer, osteoporosis, type 2 diabetes, and arthritis are all substantially lower in people with plant based diets. The statistical range of people on plant-based diets is 3-6 years worth of a longer lifespan.
3. Meat is not the best source of B12; claims that people on plant-based diets are deficient actually neglect that most people are B12 deficient regardless, and due to factory farming/feeding processes, farm animals are usually removed from the proper amounts of B12, and must get it from a supplement (at which point, a person may as well do the same).
4. Our diet is absolutely the problem. Carcinogenic compounds form on animal flesh when it is cooked. There is no separation of how our food is prepared and the problems they create for us, and in the case of meat, the thing itself is objectively well below the ideals of health. I'd like to recommend this IQ2 debate for your viewing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCcJq56ZMJg

I will definitely have a look :) As for your arguments:
1) A good example against this would be that our stomachs have more heme-iron receptors than they do non-heme; non-heme iron which comes from plants is not in a form that is usable by our bodies or is readily absorbed...and absorption is increased by vitamin C (we all know this) but also in the presence of meat.
2) The 'rotting' as you describe it of meat in our intestines, is actual a natural and beneficial process - bacteria in our intestines break-down and cleave proteins for us, so that we may absorb them...a symbiotic relationship we have with them, where we feed them and they help us with digestion.
3) I imagine our meat supply does not supply the B12 it once did or should; feeding animals antibiotics would effect their microbiomes and therefore, would effect the amount of B12 they could/should/ought to contain.
4) Browning/burning meat cause carcinogenic compounds to form. Some vegetables also form carcinogenic compounds when cooked and new research has indicated that the consumption of too much antioxidants actually increases the incidence of cancer, while under a certain threshold is beneficial. Antioxidants are present in plants sources; if we were to increase our consumption, to replace meat, then we would likely surpass this threshold.
One other point I'd like to add....if everyone became vegan, or got a lot more of their calories from plant sources....how much more land would need to be cleared and farmed to meet this demand? How much wildlife would be effected by this mass clearing and the side effects of commercial farming? Organisms living on a plant based diet, eat a lot more.

"....if everyone became vegan, or got a lot more of their calories from plant sources....how much more land would need to be cleared and farmed to meet this demand?" -This is the most simply countered argument in the debate I linked you.

Long answer short, most of the existing farmland we have now is for raising plants to feed to the livestock. It takes 10 lbs of produce to put 1 lb of meat on livestock, so the consumption of animals is actually 11-fold destructive... the resources to raise their food, and the space to raise them. Not raising them for food would actually result in more available space. As for the claim that organisms living on a plant based diet eat a lot more... Take horses for instance... or cows... Most of what they eat is grass and grain. These are not calorie dense at all, plus the animals weigh a ton. Of course they eat a lot more under those parameters. Humans, however, do not need to eat more calories in plants just because they're not eating meat. They have the same caloric needs, they just get the calories from different sources. I mentioned earlier that black beans exceed the calorie density of meat. I would not need to eat 200g worth of black beans, for instance, to displace 100g of meat.

Or rather, I would not need to eat 500 calories in black beans, for instance, to replace 250 calories in meat. I should have used a caloric example in the first place.

It's nice to have a conversation and/or respectful debate like this. All too often today, people get excessively rude or just shy away from discussing what their thoughts are all together.

Sadly, I think so. That is why I won't ever be vegan

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