I was responding to an illogical assertion you made in -this thread- regarding binocular vision and how -you claim- it represents evidence of a species being a predator. I demonstrated that non-predators, i.e. frugivores, can possess this trait too.
you did not demonstrate that those "frugivores" are indeed frugivores.
I 'can comment' on the obvious fact that there are species that possess binocular vision yet are not predator's because I can see this to be the case merely by observing it in nature.
i observe people eating meat, dogs eating vegetables, harris hawks eating plums, blackbirds eating quail, great tits eating their own offspring, turkey vultures eating banana's. you may well not be looking hard enough.
Fruit bats are 'actually' frugivores, hence the name, -fruit- bat. Do you see? If you were to draw up a -scientific- definition for terms such as frugivore, herbivore, insectivore, carnivore, omnivore, etc, based as it would have to be upon physiological/biochemical commonalities, this is where the fruit bat would be placed, in the category - frugivore. The same as humans as it happens. All arguments claiming that humans 'are' omnivores are based on nothing more substantial than a basic obfuscation/misrepresentation of the terms 'do' and 'be'. Just because human -do- something that does not mean that they -are- something as meat-eaters falsely imply.
ok....i give in, i will tell my friend with a private collection of fruit bats and one of my previous employers who owned a zoo that they were wrong, their bats were merely storing the wide variety of food in their mouths only to spit it out later!
you seem to think we are as we are. we are merely a very brief snapshot in time, in evolution. the reason many animals eat a variety is due to their evolutionary ancestors. turkey vultures evolved from a stork like species which ate large amount of soft fruit, hence they will still eat fruit although their main diet is carrion, yet they are classed as carnivores. pigs are omnivores yet their ancestors were vicious predators with a carnivorous diet. apes hunt and kill yet supposedly the idea to kill and eat another animals flesh is cultural. yet many species have not come into contact for millions of years, which if your argument stands in any way means we evolved from our ape-like ancestors having been culturally trained to eat meat, erego humans evolved as omnivores.
In an unscientific, not based upon rigid, testable definitions, sense, maybe. But not in reality. Is a rabbit an 'omnivore' because it can occasionally be observed eating slugs? No, it is a biological herbivore. Again, if you draw up a scientific definition based upon physiology/biochemistry, take detailed measurements of surface areas, quantified bodily secretions, etc, it becomes quite clear that they are NOT omnivores. That they can occassionally be observed eating slugs, does not change this fact.
you seem to love labels. obsessed with them possibly. no animal is born and gets told "your a vegetarian son, do not under any circumstance eat anything else, even if your dying through starvation"
no....animals are born, they try to survive, whether that means eating something new so be it. they do not stick to their labels we gave them, they simply exist. just because someone points out something an animal frequently eats does not make it the animals sole diet!
It is evolutionary fantasy that dinosaurs 'evolved' into birds, there is simply no evidence that any species can increase its genome. In what way is T-rex 'related' to the hummingbird? Found some feint similarity in their genomes have we? Similarity is no more evidence of common ancestry than it is of common design.
evolution has been PROVED. you really do need to learn that. people with more understanding of genetics, DNA, RNA, mutations etc etc than you or me have PROVEN that evolution happens. pull your head out your arse and smell the coffee for once.
Only once did I offer a little quip about you being an evolutionist and how you didn't mean to use the word 'design' as a result. Which threads have I failed to back up any arguments in? I think you are indulging in mendacious fantasising here, bhawk. Guilty of a little psychological projection are we?
again its dragging other threads in to this, i wont join in your game of taking digs at each other.
I have studied comparative anatomy and it quite clearly shows that human are NOT omnivores.
http://home.earthlink.net/~mr.kerchak/VEGAN.html
You need only examine the chemical composition of human breast milk to get a pretty clear indication of what the biologically correct diet for our species should constitute.
again with evolution we have many remnants of a different diet which USED to sustain us! you dont seem to catch the drift.
http://www.parentingscience.com/calories-in-breast-milk.html
It's chemical profile being most similar to that of fruit, which should be the main constituent part of the human diet. In particular, note the protein content, a mere 1.3 grams per 100 grams. Meat (and all concentrate protein sources, milk, eggs, beans, nuts, etc) contains far TOO MUCH protein for our inherant assimilative biochemistry and putrefies in the small intestine (causing the offensive odours -flatulence, excrement, arm-pit odours- of concentrate protein eating humans) as a result. Prolonged abstinence from ALL concentrate sources of protein including 'good', i.e. high, sources of plant protein, such as a beans, lentils, nuts, seeds, etc, results in permanent cessation of ALL offensive bodily odours.
And body odor indeed proves your point! :rofl:
Would you care to offer us a 'PEER-REVIEWED paper', based upon physiology/biochemistry that 'proves' that we are an omnivore or would you instead prefer that we are left to seek them out for ourselves, saving yourself the time and energy expenditure that would be wasted in the futile search for that which does not exist? Sorry to 'bring another thread' into this discussion, but you seem to have a recuring habit of doing this. Claiming that there is evidence in some authoritive journal or another but failing to reference said material. In fact, in my travels, I have come across many debators that use this tactic, a few buzz-words here and there - 'Peer-review', 'scientific method', etc. Yet, they always fail, when pressed, to present any such evidence.
to be quite honest i am working 16 hours a day at present and cant be arsed with your petty digs. you have the google machine in front of you, you can make enquiries.
why do i have to spoon feed you? that lump on top of your shoulders aint merely for decoration. use it.
the fact i dont want to spoon feed ignorant people is in no way an argument as to the credibility of what i say, again use it!
Simple, cultural tradition. They, like any other group of people pass their acquired cultural customs on to the next generation, teaching (brainwashing - albeit unconsciously) their offspring the same self-destructive culturally driven behaviour that they themselves were first indoctrinated in by their own parents, stretching back eons.
and apes have cultural traditions? if our cultural tradition of eating meat goes as far back as to the point were we were similar to chimpanzees (which hunt and eat their prey) then we evolved with this meat eating tradition, the first homo sapiens will have eaten meat.......therefore being omnivores. Also what about when we were rarer than mountain gorilla's? do you think we would have avoided meat which can keep for a long time? do you think the fact neanderthals were vegetarian?
the earliest human remains often are in caves littered with charred animal bones. sort of speaks for itself really.
There is an extensive amount of collated epidemiological evidence showing meat to be responsible for a fair amount of ill-health in humans, despite that 'fact' that we 'are omnivores' and are 'meant to eat it' or so they say:
Try heart disease for a start:
http://ecologos.org/meat-heart-death.htm
Or colon cancer:
http://ecologos.org/meatcan.htm
Or ill-health in the Masai:
http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/95/1/26
Or quantification of the medical costs of meat-consumption:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8610089?dopt=Abstract
The medical costs attributable to meat consumption.
Barnard ND, Nicholson A, Howard JL.
Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, Washington, DC 20016, USA.
OBJECTIVE. To estimate the medical costs that are attributable to the health effects of meat consumption. METHODS. The prevalence of hypertension, heart disease, cancer, diabetes, gallstones, obesity, and foodborne illness among omnivores and vegetarians are compared in studies that have controlled for other lifestyle factors, and the corresponding attributable medical costs are calculated in 1992 dollars. RESULTS. Direct health care costs attributable to meat consumption are estimated to be +2.8-8.5 billion for hypertension, +9.5 billion for heart disease, +0-16.5 billion for cancer, +14.0-17.1 billion for diabetes, +0.2-2.4 billion for gallbladder disease, +1.9 billion for obesity-related musculoskeletal disorders, and +0.2-5.5 billion for foodborne illness. The total direct medical costs attributable to meat consumption for 1992 are estimated at +28.6-61.4 billion. CONCLUSION. Health care costs attributable to meat consumption are quantifiable and substantial.
Publication Types:
Comparative Study
Review
PMID: 8610089 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
and with us having a life span "naturally" around 30 ish (thats from memory so dont quote me) when we extend our lifespan everything can become toxic to the body, anything in large enough quantities can kill, as we live unnaturally long our bodies will inevitably become laden with crap from our diet, whatever our diet! you leave out so many variables, its ridiculous.
Living in our correct ecological system, i.e. the tropics, we would have year round access to our correct diet, i.e. predominantly fruit, supplemented with young leaves. The only reason many humans do not have access to it is that some idiot had the wise idea to colonise the planet and this in turn necessitated eating different diets and resultant ill-health that accompanies them. Why would we need to 'make up for' the lack of meat? Is this another bogus protein 'argument'. There is no reason to 'make up for' the absence of degenerative diseases that a diet free of non-food items such as a meat contains.
THE TROPICS!!! WITH FRUIT. as far as scientists are aware the first homosapiens were a coastal folk, travelling approx. 1 mile per year as we colonized new land, and for a LONG time we stuck to only the coast and also small lakes within walking distance of the coast.
Now as anyone who hunts knows, animals need to drink, lakes are perfect hunting ground. the coast is great for nesting bird species, for fish etc
In summary: I think the 'argument' in favour of eating meat can, purely on health grounds, be seen for what it is - 'frail, delerious and stupendously ignorant.'
you have proven yourself ignorant and to be honest i really cant be arsed with your arguments any more. you seem to love trying to get one over on me, any more replys from you will be ignored as its more than tiresome and i have much better things to do with my time than spoon feeding you.
