On Wed, 7 Oct 1998 23:09:17 -0500, Robert A. McGlohon, Jr. <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>Amadeus,
>
>        Isn't that like pointing to a 90-year-old smoker as proof that cigarettes
>aren't bad for you?  ..
Robert,
I didn't say that *no* smoker could reach 90 years, but the table
claimed that (all) humans "need"ed animal protein.

It's just that I don't like that wrong "facts" are used to proof or propagate
something, like in the table Don published comparing the anatomy of
a man a sheep and a dog.
I think *if* one is attempting to make camparisons (that of course
should suggest something) then at least the facts in it should be true.
How justified it was to compare exacely a shee
p / wolf / man
and not a man  / chimp / cat is another story.
To mention that humans needed animal protein *is* incorrect, because there
are examples of the opposite and thats the only thing I'm saying.

I'm not as far as to attemt an anatomical comparison myself, because i
still didn't see the exact measures of the anatomical details myself, btw.

>  Unless you are simply interested in playing word games, or
>promoting an agenda, the suggestion that "humans [don't] 'need' animal
>protein" is akin to suggesting that humans aren't omnivores, but herbivores
>who developed an unfortunate bad habit (hunting).  I think history is
>against you on this.
Who said or implied "bad"?
I'm of the opinion than humans are formerly fruitarians (that implies a
2% insect part in my terms) which have slowly (<1 mio years) changed to
a kind of omnivore by including more an
imal parts, as well as
diverse other plant materials besides fruit - seeds, onions, whole plants.
To make my point.

>        To me, the biggest attraction of Ray's diet -- the focus of this list,
>remember? -- as opposed to Atkins or Protein Power etc., is its
>philosophical underpinnings.  ...... (1) assuming that man has a
>Nature (in the same way I assume that an objective reality underlies the
>world I perceive through my senses); and (2)assuming that what I can divine
>of this Nature -- at the very least -- is an appropriate starting point for
>evaluating appropriate behavior (in this case, proper diet).  These
>assumptions and this approach seems to me to be central to Neanderthin and
>to have potential application in a wide variety of human endeavors.

I do agree with your point of view, that looking at our anchesters
behaviour and diet has it's advantages how you expre
ssed it nicely.
May it be from Ray Audette or whomever (I myself am concerned with archeology
related topics since I'm a child).

But the conclusions Ray (and obciously some others) draw on the facts, and
which facts are allowed to be considered are still rather different from mine.

For example with diet: I think it's far to easy to leave everything to just
"eat meat". I think much more of a focus should be placed on the ancient plant
matters - *they* were the biggest part of the diet in ancient times, weren't they?

I also do admire the peacefullness and harmony with nature in which
even hunting people are or were living.
Like for example australian aboriginals or the several native american people.

If I try to translate that behaviour to modern times, then in my own personal
humble opinion (please nobody should feel flamed or whatever) i find it an
absolute unacceptable implementation to
rely on mass-produced fabric meats.
That is IMHO the exactely opposite of a hunting man living from the land.
It's an agricultural perversion, causing exactely the cruelties on the
landscape, the soil and the ecosystem the "agriculturalists" are condemned for.
If i personally had desires for meat I'd make shure to know a hunter where i could
get my stuff from.
That would be just my own implementation of a paleolithic way of living
- and not buying porks legs from an industry.
That's *not* paleolithic living.
Not from a viewpoint of nutrition not from health and not from philisophy.

>-- but your posts leave
>the impression that, contrary to evaluating behavior (diet) through the
>prism of Nature, your are evaluating Nature (meat eating) through the prism
>of diet (vegetarianism or quasi-vegetarianism).
It's strange, in the moment people get to know that I don't eat meats
many feel so
mehow offended by this - maybe by rejecting something they like,
maybe by feeling some own diffuse "guilt" issue - I don't know.
Then often i have to change the topic to vegetarianism although I_don't_want_to.
Please accept that i don't want to talk anybody into vegetarianism - I'm not
even supposing or propagating it. I opt for a low meat (only optionally no meat)
nutrition with the focus on: what -and how- did our anchestors *actually* eat
(and not some extinct neanderthals while in the darkest ice-age deserts).

>Robert
I thank you for your thoughtful response.
I apologize for the inconveniences and glitches caused by my english.

Amadeus