Hey Stefan:

>Methinks that especially with cattle you would make the same experience
>as the african man did with the cow elephant.

Perhaps.  You know, there are plenty of stories of people who have been
kicked by tempermental dairy cattle who have been milked for years.

However, as a whole, dairy cattle have been used for many years with what I
would judge to be insignificant danger.

Here's a question:  which is more dangerous --- trying to milk a
medium-sized animal, or trying to steal honey from a wild bee-hive?

I honestly think that there have probably been many instances where humans
have ended up on the wrong side of the stinger when trying to get honey.
And while this certainly may have discouraged many primitives from messing
with bees, I don't think that it made the honey itself undesirable as a
food.

>Well, containers
>like buckets or pots were invented by humans several thousand years ago.
>That leaves not much time for genetical adaptation.

When I speak of adaptation, I really don't mean genetical adaptation.
Instead, I simply mean the adaptation we have made to advance beekeeping,
dairy farming, etc. that allows us to obtain food from these animals with
relative ease.

My question is; who says that humans need genetic adaptation to drink milk
other than human?

>And then remember that science says we lose the enzyme to digest milk
>in our very youth. Therefore I think we adults can't even digest human
>milk properly.


In your defense, it does seem that a small percentage of humans do not
digest even raw milk.  However, a great many people seem to do very well
digesting it (myself included).  In fact even some of the most primitive
peoples have used dairy cattle as a foundation of their day-to-day diet (the
Masai tribe of Africa).


>I see the point. OTOH harvesting honey is a common behavior watched in
>nature (like stealing eggs) while milking other mammals has never been
>seen.

Stefan, let's be honest here.  I'd like to see you try and steal honey from
a wild hive.  There are, however, other animals (bears in particular) that
have better tools to do this (thick skin, fur, claws).

>It needed the manipulating human mind to invent this. So there
>is no chance that humans inherited a genetical adaptation for milk of
>foreign species - we must have developed it ourself.
>In summary I think our chances to have a genetical adaptation for non-
>human milk are very small. And they certainly do not justify the tons
>of milk and dairy that are consumed today.


Stefan, let me clarify.  My point does not even lay claim to a "genetic
adaptation" to other species' milk.  I'm just saying, it is a natural food
that we now have great access* to due to increased knowledge of how to raise
and milk the animals.  Was there ever a need for a genetic adaptation with
milk or other foods that might have been "discovered?"

Doesn't the same go for honey?  Who is to say that we are genetically
adapted to eating bee barf?  Furthermore, both milk and honey would seem to
be pretty rare if we reduced ourselves to the primitive tools used by our
ancestors.  However, just as with milk, we now have abundant access* to
honey because we have a greater knowledge of how to "farm" honeybees.

I think there are several cases where we now do things that we wouldn't be
able to do as primitive humans (make raw meat pate, juice celery, farm
honeybees, milk animals, etc.).  However, I don't think that this justifies
the assumption that we therefore should not consume those foods.

If you had solid evidence that consuming raw milk products, unheated honey,
etc. were detrimental to our short and long-term health, then that would be
a horse of a different color.  While I completely respect your outlook on
the feasability of milking large animals in the wild, I simply do not share
your opinion of whether or not milk should be consumed.

>Best unmilky regards and I hope you enjoy your time in Utah, the country
>of the Marlboro Man ;-)


Thanks Stefan.  I leave tomorrow.


Regards,

Ben



* -- obviously I do not refer to the commercial dairy/honey farms which
often denature these natural foods through the use of heat and chemicals.