Mahesh wrote:
> I read somewhere that lemurs (found in Madagascar) may be our earliest
> ancestors. Insects are part of their diet.
>

All early Primates were insectivores.  Tree shrews and Tarsiers are
considered good examples as all they ever eat are insects.  All Primates
eat prodigious amounts of meat in the form of insects.  Field studies
have shown that fruit eating Primates actually choose fruit based on
insect contamination.  The fruit with worm holes being preferred.  Often
the worm will be eaten and the rest of the fruit discarded!  Of course
every film you have ever seen of a monkey or ape showed them eating bugs.
This activity is called grooming and takes up to several hours per day.
If you were to run naked through a rain forest and then eat the bugs
clinging to your body at the end of the day you would have little room
left for additional food.  As all fruits are seasonal, this is an
important component to all Primate diets and zookeepers have found that
most Primates are incapable of reproduction unless this requirement is
met.  Of course those primates who inhabit the savannah (Hominids)where
there are no trees must eat more meat or die of starvation.

Hitler first wrote of being a vegetarian in 1911 and extolled the
benifits of his diet to many including Goebbels who quoted him in his
"Hitler's Secret Conversations" as stating that after the war he he
intended to tackle the problem of meat eating in the general population.
My source is again "The Heretic's Feast: A History of Vegetarianism"(pgs
304-309) by Colin Spencer.  Mr. Spencer has published several books on
vegetarian dieting though presumably he does not eschew all animal
protein as his most popular book is "The Gay Kama Sutra".

Ray Audette
Author "NeanderThin:A Caveman's Guide to Nutrition"
http://www.sofdesign.com/neander