Paging Dr. Vegetarian

I lived and worked in a largely vegetarian activist environment during the later 1970s.  I remember vegetarians arguing that meat eaters had a different and distinctive body/breath odor than vegetarians. I believe I *may* have seen some documentation since then relating to ketones that *may* back that up - although note the emphasis on "may."

In any event, one commenter noted, "Also, unlike smoking, which harms many people (some are super sensitive to smoke that if they smelled the residue off a doctor's coat they can have an asthma attack), being a vegetarian or not only affects the doctor's health."

Give me 900 million dollars a year to run a "Meat Control" campaign (which is about what "Tobacco Control" currently gets) that reaches into kindergartens and MTV with the message that "Corpse-Eaters Stink!" and "Meat Smells Kill Babies!" and "Karnivores Kill!" and suchlike, and I can guarantee you that after 20 years we'd have vegetarians demanding "meat-free" doctors.

See www.TheTruthIsALie.com and read Lie #2 for a sense of how extreme the antismoking movement has become in this regard.  Or read my Aftercomments to Dr. Kabat's article on "ThirdHand Smoke" at: www.cupblog.org/?p=493

Finally, for anyone who says "My meat eating isn't hurting you." take a quick look at this five second video of a Burger King smokestack in Doylestown PA: www.smokersclubinc.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4415

Third Hand Meat is just as real, and just as ridiculous, as Third Hand Smoke.  Careful Carnivores... they WILL come knocking at YOUR door someday.

Michael J. McFadden,

Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"

"But now let's have a look at the Big Mac" Is this really necessary? How many times do I need to tell you "NO ONE DOUBTS THAT THE MCDONALD'S DIET IS NOT HEALTHY!" All I'm saying is that meat can be part of a healthy diet. If you're not addressing that then you're wasting your breath agreeing with something I've already stated repeatedly. The fact that people buy 550 million Big Macs per years does not change this fact. It simply means that there's no shortage of people who aren't concerned with pursuing a healthy diet. "Yeah but the QP has a lot more saturated fat." Not that it matters since neither the burger nor the fries are good food choices. Point was that the terms 'meatless' and 'unhealthy' aren't mutually exclusive and that you were wrong in saying that a burger would blow the 10 quota. "As far as heart disease in WWII..." and calorie restricted diets also supposedly decrease heart disease. By such means resumption of normal caloric intake postwar could also result in a parallel increase in heart disease. Like I said too many confounding variables to make a valid conclusion. And naturally even if meat were solely the cause it still wouldn't have any bearing on any of the points I've made. "6 12 large potatoes will more than cover it as well as supplying at least some of the micronutrient requirements" "SOME" of the micronutrients. Not "ALL". Where exactly does this apply to anything? You presented the potato to counter the challenge to produce one class of plant food that provides all essential nutrients. How does mentioning the fact that it's a decent yet nevertheless incomplete source of nutrition fit into this discussion? "...but your diet is far from average" The validity of my arguments has nothing to do with their prevalence in practice. "I would still propose that the average veg diet is healthier than the average meatcontaining one" I don't ever recall contesting this fact. It's been reconfirmed overandover again that vegetarians as a group in general are more healthconscious than the majority of the population. The average person rarely considers the food they shovel into their mouths and lack the knowledge to make good food choices. It's pretty much required that a vegetarian considers every novel thing they put in their mouth to avoid animal products and acquire basic knowledge of nutrition in the process of learning to eat right as a veg. "The industrial livestock industry is the progenitor of global environmental problems of mammoth proportions." Yet in "Livestock's Long Shadow" the UN investigators did not even suggest reducing meat consumption to solve the problem. They cited major contributing factors to be 1. Geographic separation of the cattle and their feed crops disrupting the cycle that would normally restore nutrientdepleted soil which results in topsoil erosion and burning of oldgrowth forests for new cropland both of which release fixedcarbon and disrupt the carbon cycle 2. Intensive unsustainable farming practiced by commercial ops and thirdworlders to produce crops for both animal and man. 3. Unsustainable grazing practices. 4. Lack of incentive to motivate farmers to prioritize stewardship over maximized production. Long story short reduction of meat consumption would only delay the adverse outcome as would total abolition of meat consumption. Farming practices in general need to be revamped. This is another case where the 'animal' portion of an industry is being singledout by people who want to use it to sell their ethics. It is the biggest contributor to the problem in the agricultural industry without a doubt but getting rid of it without making drastic changes in the other segments will eventually yield the same result. "The conditions animals suffer in factory farms and during slaughter requires us to willingly suspend our humanity" And for omnivores who find factory farming reprehensible there are more ethicalnaturalhumane alternatives. How something is produced has nothing to do with whether it should be produced unless there are no other options. "But judging by the many highly successful vegan athletes..." There's more to health than one's ability to perform physical activity optimally. I'm pretty sure I already said I had no doubt that responsible veganism wouldn't overtly harm anyone. "Also remember that science does not and cannot prove or disprove everything. Sometimes a little intuition observation simple logic or deduction saves the day " I find it ironic that the majority of your list of alternatives to the scientific methods are the specific terms used to describe the elements that make up the foundation of said method. The remaining term intuition is a personality trait essential to be successful as a scientist. Without it you're just an overeducated lab tech. "AS the ADA reports...appropriately planned vegetarian diets...are healthful" Note the term "appropriately planned". Oh? You think I'm nitpicking? Here's what the ADA says "The variability of dietary practices among vegetarians makes individual assessment of dietary adequacy essential." So they're basically saying every vegetarian should consult with a dietitian to determine an appropriate diet. If that's not enough read the position paper and see how many times they emphasize planningand a study where the average vegans they sampled had brittler bones than omnivoresa fact that was easily remedied by making certain that vegans consumed enough calcium. Why you agree with them at all is beyond meespecially considering their publicized eating plan pretty much requires you to not be vegetarian. According to the ADA's 'Step up to Nutrition and Health' pamphlet "A healthy eating plan Includes lean meats poultry fish beans eggs and nuts." "a vegetarian diet is associated with a lower risk of death from ischemic heart disease" Observe the definition of vegetarian for the associated statement " A vegetarian diet is defined as one that does not include meat including fowl or seafood or products containing those foods." Meaning that these diets included both eggs and dairywhich you consider unhealthy. Even my diet isn't optimal by their standards.

"it was you who tried to represent the Inuits as a peoples who thrived even though they consumed a diet high in animal flesh" I mainly brought up the Inuits to exemplify a culture that can and does consume raw meat since you were asserting that people don't naturally eat meat because 'most' only find it palatable when cooked. The remainder was an aside which I long ago clearly stated I disagree with in light of better sources. Is there really a point in continuously trying to prove me wrong in a topic I was never arguing for was uncertain of from the very beginning "some say that" and already explicitly stated was incorrect? All Inuitrelated discussion beyond that point was just to point out flaws in the studies you cite. "httpwww.ajcn.orgcgireprint279916" Ah n217much better. This paper actually does support the conclusion you think it does. Congrats! Sadly like I said I'm not asserting otherwise. "I'm glad that you admit you were wrong." I always admit when I'm wrong and I always check my sources when available. "though the use of the other foodstuffs was minimal" You call 150g of pork fat minimal? That's 1350 calories! That's over half of the daily calories. The quote would have been more accurate had it said "People eating nothing but animal fat have all their nutritional needs met"and even that would have been totally wrong yet more accurate. "In case you forgot I had already mentioned that foods whether plant or animalbased with significant protein are acidic by nature." Hmm here's what I sawand it doesn't look like what you are claiming to have said. Plus wasn't it you who took issue with me telling you to remove "animal" from the phrase "animal protein"? 1. "Animal protein's highly acidic nature requires buffering..." 2. "Animalbased proteins are much higher than plantbased proteins in those particular amino acids and thus wreak more havoc on a person's bones" The last time I checked the only thing you admitted was that grains have protein in general not that they are also high in the same amino acids that are considered to be 'bad'. Do you or do you not concur that adherents to the 'avoid acidic foods' philosophy recommend not eating much grain? "Who's trying to extrapolate backwards?" Huh? Did you forget the following statement Mike "Who's trying to draw conclusions from only two of its members? This is additional substantiating evidence to my earlier cited post on Inuits and osteoporosis. Since you feel that presentday Inuits may have strayed from their traditional diet I think we can safely say that 500 years ago these two women would have closely adhered to the Eskimo highanimal protein diet with the resultant deliterious health effects." Isn't that you trying say you can that your n does not equal 2 because you can "add" the results of the modern study to the 'two ladies' from 500 years ago? You have n2 oldschool Inuits and a pile of modern Inuits that supposedly have much different about their habits and diets. You can't combine them. You have two undoubtedly traditional Inuitsthat's all. Trying to add the modern Inuits to make an assumption about the traditional Inuits is backwards extrapolating. "Kalama what do you think of when someone says "plantbased diet?" Most people interpret that phrase to mean a vegetarian or nearvegetarian diet." My perception of the term "plantbased" has always been accurate. Why you're suddenly concluding I have ever thought it meant anything other than vegetarian or nearvegetarian is beyond me. Furthermore it has no relevance to that particular line of discourse. Let's recap Mike "Since humans can and do develop atherosclerosis this is a strong indication that we fare best on a vegetarian diet." note you said 'vegetarian' not 'plantbased' Kalama Atherosclerosis can and does develop in herbivores that consume no meat. Thus you can't soundly conclude that atherosclerosis 'proves' we are herbivorous Mike "Funny then that a lowfat PLANTBASED diet is the one that has caused proven regression of atherosclerotic plaques...while a MEATBASED diet caused the plaque formation in the first place" Kalama You can't use MEATBASED diets to prove all diets CONTAINING meat are bad. I eat a little meat. Have you proven that being herbivorous is better than my diet? Mike Don't you know what PLANTBASED means?and most people eat meatbased diets. See suddenly off track at this pointwhat's your point? So you insisted that people were herbivorous then used the fact that a PLANTBASED not necessarily veg diet is better than a MEATBASED diet to prove your point? Then you complained that I didn't know what plantbased meant and that most people consume meatbased diets in order to refute my claim that no matter how bad a meatbased diet is you can't prove that we're herbivorous by repeatedly proving that people who eat the "McDonald's Diet" is bad? Apples to apples buddy. You gotta compare apples to apples that's all there is to it. If you don't do that you can't prove anything. The funny thing is that despite your 'plantbased definition' rant you were using PLANTBASED evidence to justify a claim about being VEGETARIAN despite the terms not being totally synonymous. "I think it's time you took a reality check. Your example tilapia is a very low fat meat" Here let's put things in perspective for you Mike Quinoa says "Give me an example of a lowfat meatcontaining diet" Kalama says "How's this diet which includes gratuitous portions of tilapia?" Mike Quinoa says "NO FAIR! TILAPIA'S LOWFAT! ONLY BURGERS COUNT!!!" In explicit terms I gave tilapia as an example because it's easy to fit into a lowfat regimen without resorting to portion control. There are no shortage of options that can fit into the 10 fat scheme. As I already stated salmon which is not lowfat and poultry which can be lowfat are both easy to fit into this dietary structure. "Scarf down a single burger patty and you've blown your daily 10 fat allotment....While it's not impossible to get this amount of fat from plant sources most people in reality just don't consume that many nuts or avocados." Bzzzt! Wrong! A single burger from McDonald's contains 80 fat caloriesheck even a Quarter Pounder stays under 200. In addition a medium french fries 100 vegan is equivalent in fat to the Quarter Pounder. Anyhow are you dense? Have you not figured out that one of my overarching themes is that there are things that are bad in both the meat and nonmeat camps? Perhaps it's you who requires a reality check. If you can't fathom average Joe vegetarian going over 200 fat calories per day then you really need to look at common foods. One SINGLE serving of peanut butter would violate the 10. One SINGLE serving of slivered almonds plus a 'heart healthy' portion of oatmeal would violate this. Half an avocado plus one serving of Edensoy original soymilk would violate this. One serving of Thai tofu curry would violate this. These are single meal combos that hit the 10. There are bound to be thousands of common combinations that vegetarians actually consume that would violate a 10 fat quota so don't act like it's only 'normal' to exceed that amount on a meatcontaining diet. "While it's true that calories were scarce for most in Nazioccupied countries it was the dearth of animalderived calories that reduced cardiac events" You do realize that no matter how many times you repeat this it's not true without supporting evidence. You just need to accept the fact that there are too many confounding variables to soundly make this claim. On what basis can you toss out all the other variables which there were no shortage of and claim "meat did it". Learn to recognize when an example is logically unsound and drop it already. "A person today could follow a lowcal but highmeat diet and would in most cases be on the road to heart disease" Could they? Not that I disagree in the majority of scenarios but is there such a study that shows meatbased restricted calorie diets cause heart disease? If your time is so limited I suggest that in the future you restrict your comments to topics that are actually being debated instead of wasting it attacking things I'm not asserting defending etc. I also suggest you focus on not repeatedly bringing up evidence that eating meat at every day for every meal is bad because I've never said otherwise and have never suggested this is what humans evolved to do. What I have said is that there is no evolutionary history to suggest that man is indubitably herbivorous. I have also said that I'm not aware of any evidence that a healthy by my standards diet containing meat is any worse than a vegetarian diet overall. You have yet to actually refute these specific claims. No matter how much you prove we aren't carnivorous or omnivores with a carnivorous bias you aren't proving we are naturally or best off herbivores.

"The sulfurcontaining amino acids cysteine and methionine though have the most dramatic effect on bone resorption" Yes as I've already mentioned I'm aware of this theory and as I've already said Meat products are not the only things that produce acidic substances in the blood. Most flatout say "meat and grains" when you ask for the foods that are the most acidicand I don't see any lack of grains in most vegan diets. If you were to derive equivalent amounts of protein from either meat or grains you'd see there's no shortage of methionine and cysteine in comparison. And naturally if you eat meat as I've been implying one should meat wouldn't even be your primary source of these amino acids. Granted on the Western diet the primary source of these amino acids would be meat and as such would yield an excessive intake of met and cysalong with excessive protein intake in general. "Right after? I made the post before your comment not after." Bzzzt! Wrong! I first mentioned heme iron receptors in this context in the preceding major post. Although in the interim I learned an alternative function they have and can no longer consider them a solid exemplar. "Funny then that a lowfat plantbased diet is the one that has caused proven regression of atherosclerotic plaques...while a meatbased diet caused the plaque formation in the first place." Pay attention to the phrase "meatBASED diet"this implies that meat forms the backbone of the diet. Again you're stuck comparing a veg diet to the "McDonald's diet". How can you not get that this is not comparing apples to apples? You insinuate that you MUST be herbivorous to avoid atherosclerosis but you haven't provided any evidence that a diet that "contains" but is not "based" on meat is any worse. For example my diet is vegetableBASED. Over 95 of my weekly calories come from nonanimal sources. Do you honestly think that the evidence you refer to applies to my diet? "the absence of meat was the main factor" If you say so captain. Just go read any firsthand accounts of the Nazi occupation of France and you'll find that there were no shortage of people who were just plain undernourished. On top of that fresh fruit and vegetables were also in short supply. Kind of hard to eat too much fat when there's not much to eat in the first place. PS. Can you really not think of luxury foods that don't contain animal prodsthere's no shortageand the prime ingredient in such things sugar was also lacking in Nazioccupied countries. "Who's trying to draw conclusions from only two of its members?...I think we can safely say that 500 years ago these two women would have closely adhered to the Eskimo highanimal protein diet with the resultant deliterious health effects." If modern Inuits don't adhere to the traditional diet then that data can't be extrapolated to the old Inuits. Hence n2. It's like extrapolating from modern Americans to colonists arriving in 1492. Not a conclusive assumption at all. Of course if you'd been keeping up you wouldn't have wasted your time trying to disprove something I've already amended my opinion on in light of more reliable information. "May be may not be. I don't read minds. If you say your choice is ethical I accept that but don't expect me to be clairvoyant." You'd do well to remember that the next time you try to put words in my mouth. Funny how you conveniently opted to clairvoyantly 'translate' my original response instead of just 'accepting' it. Now that you've provided a fictitious source I'll be expecting good sources to justify your statements from here on out. In the interest of saving time I was giving you the benefit of the doubtbut while it's understandable if one makes erroneous conclusions based on incomplete researchit's unacceptable to confidently present BS as fact when it's obvious that it's BS.

Kalama This is only a partial response since you've brought up many points that due to work constraints I just don't have the time to address at this moment. By definition any food containing significant protein which would of course include beans grains nuts and seeds contains amino acids. The sulfurcontaining amino acids cysteine and methionine though have the most dramatic effect on bone resorption. Animalbased proteins are much higher than plantbased proteins in those particular amino acids and thus wreak more havoc on a person's bones. Cheese for example is a very acidic food. Epidemiology tells the story. The countries that consume the most dairy suffer from the most osteoporosis and viceversa. "I assume you mean no novel adaptation such as preferred iron uptake via heme iron receptors. Yeah if that isn't a biological mechanism that exists solely for meat consumption I'm not sure what is. How can you say no 'meat adaptation' exists right after I point one out?" What evidence do you have that iron receptors for either heme or nonheme weren't preexisting in humans before the advent of meat consumption? Are the receptors different or just the type of iron they're receiving? Man would need some method of meeting his iron dietary requirements probably long before he began consuming meat and thus some form of iron receptors would have to already be in place. "How can you say no 'meat adaptation' exists right after I point one out?" Right after? I made the post before your comment not after. "Not all meatcontaining diets are highfat highprotein and I've not once suggested we've evolved to handle a highfat highprotein diet." Depends upon how you define "highfat highprotein" and the amount of meat contained in the diet. The meat portion of the diet would certainly be highfat highprotein. Please give an example of a meat that's not highfat and highprotein. "Insisting that human atherosclerosis 'proves' we should be herbivorous is an illogical assumption." Funny then that a lowfat plantbased diet is the one that has caused proven regression of atherosclerotic plaques in the work of such doctors as Dean Ornish Caldwell Esselstyn John McDougall and Michael Klaper while a meatbased diet caused the plaque formation in the first place. "What about the near absence of coffee sugar and pretty much every imaginable luxury food in general? I guess the rationing which kept people from eating excessively couldn't have had anything at all to do with this either? Yep the improved health was indubitably only due to eating less meat right?" Truethe absence of meat was the main factor. The Nazis removed all the livestock which would also remove those countries' access to milk butter and cheese. Not sure how you define "luxury food" but many people in the world would refer to meat in that context so yes that was gone also. "Not to mention the inherent fallacy of even attempting to draw conclusions on an entire population from only two of its members." Who's trying to draw conclusions from only two of its members? This is additional substantiating evidence to my earlier cited post on Inuits and osteoporosis. Since you feel that presentday Inuits may have strayed from their traditional diet I think we can safely say that 500 years ago these two women would have closely adhered to the Eskimo highanimal protein diet with the resultant deliterious health effects. "I'll totally ignore the fact that Kalama's choice to only eat wildcaught fish may be ethical in nature." May be may not be. I don't read minds. If you say your choice is ethical I accept that but don't expect me to be clairvoyant. "Can you name a single class of vegetable that provides all needed nutrients?" Apparently I can and it's not a class but a single vegetable. And I quote "In fact while not recommended it has been proven that humans can survive for long periods of time in excellent health by satisfying their bodys entire nutritional needs with potatoes and water alone." Kon S The value of whole potatoes in human nutrition. J Bio Chem 1928 22 258. Even still according to the ANDI it's leafy greens that are actually at the pinnacle of the nutrition heap.