Why do we need to eat meat?!
Why do we need to eat meat?
Answers:
Eating meat is a personal choice. You don't need to eat it.
"We continue to maintain diets full of animal proteins because that is what we have always done. Our taste buds have been trained to prefer meat and dairy over fruits and vegetables. If we can retrain our bodies to enjoy plant food sources, we can eliminate meat and dairy from our diets and reap the benefits of better health."
we have canine teeth in our mouth. we are supposed to, those are for eatting meat
protein
To get all the protein you need in your diet.
Which is why I'm not a vegetarian.
Plus, I'm really good at cooking healthy dishes with meat.
We do not NEED to eat meat. People have thrived for years on a meatless diet. It is a matter of choice. We can get protein from other sources, but I do like the animals.
no one NEEDS to eat meat.....If everyone NEEDED to eat meat then all the vegetarians would die out!
For the protein.
Because you can't have any pudding if you don't eat your meat.
it got up out of the trees.. and allowed us to be at the top of the food chain
We don't have to but, there are innumerable health benefits of eating meat, red meat contains very high quantities of iron, when compared with plant origin foods. 100 grams of Liver contains 6000 mcgm of iron as against 325 mcgm in 100-gram carrots. Meat also serves as the main source for the intake of vitamin B12. The phosphorus content present in meat gets much more easily absorbed than that present in cereals and legumes. Though meat is rich in nutrients, but, there are certain things that meat lacks in. It doesn't contain any kind of fiber, which helps to keep your digestive system in order. Also it is very high in saturated fats, thus it is recommended to eat meat, but in moderate quantities.
Preserved meats should be avoided, they are very high in terms of fats, salts, nitrites and nitrates that are often held responsible for causing cancer.
Meat is a convenient source of protein, some minerals, and vitamins, especially vitamins of the B group, there are one or two easy to obtain from meat and more difficult to replenish in other ways.
Protein from meat is high quality. It provides all the amino acids we don't make ourselves and we need to build our own body.
From the minerals meat provides, iron is the most important. We need iron to build our blood -red cells- and it is easier for us to use the iron from meat than from vegetable sources. There are other minerals though. Vegetarians need more salt than those who eat meat, for instance.
But as good as meat is, you don't need it. You can get the same nutrients from other sources.
We don't.
Who says we have to? I for one haven't eaten meat for four years and I feel a lot healthier and don't get sick as much as I used to. Some people have answered saying "It gives us protein" so can foods that don't contain meat such as brown rice and peanut butter.
well, actually, you dont HAVE to eat meat. but seeing as its the easiest way to get protein and iron and B12 WITHOUT having to take supplements and do all kinds of complicated protein balancing like vegetarians do, why not do it? you're not doing anything your body wasnt designed to do and isnt well-equipped for when you eat meat-----in spite of what the militant vegetarians would have you believe.
WE DON'T. I'll say this for the millionth time - those who say we "need" meat, go say it to the 500 million people in India.
You DO NOT have to eat meat. Most Americans eat entirely too much meat, dairy and eggs and you can survive just fine without it. I have been vegetarian for 14 years and I am super healthy and it is easy. I just eat a balanced diet that includes lots of nuts, (peanut butter, trail mix, walnuts on salads), whole grains (whole wheat toast and cereals), soy foods (soy milk, veggie burgers, tofu) and tons of fruits and vegetables.
As for the canine teeth comments, they are just silly. Gorillas eat a largely vegetarian diet (About 67% of their diet is fruit, 17% is leaves, seeds and stems and 3% is termites and caterpillars.) And have you ever seen their canine teeth?? - they make our pathetic little stubby canine teeth look laughable.
We do not need to eat meat, and why are you asking this in the vegetarian section of Yahoo Answers?
to live
We don't. Everything our bodies need can be obtained from non-animal sources, even protein. Plus, we don't need as much protein as we are made to believe we do. Most of us, even vegetarians, actually ingest too much protein. And we actually need less protein as we age. The time in our life when we have the greatest need for protein is during infancy, where we double our weight within the first 6 months of our lives (or something like that). The food designed for infants is breast milk, which is very low in protein (less than 2%?).
This is very simple for protein silly. Without meat we would be really skinny. I know vegetarians and they are unhealthy there skin is really pale and they don't look good at all.
We don't "need" to eat meat. . . .people choose to eat it. There are plenty of other sources of protein, including grains, beans, and nuts.
Non-meat sources of protein are a far more efficient use of natural resources than raising animals for meat.
I saw the first answer about canines, and can't not write this:
We are NOT anatomically designed for eating flesh. So many otherwise intelligent people say that since we have canines, our teeth are made for tearing flesh. OMG, who are we kidding??? Look at the canines of man, and look at the canines of meat eating animals, there's a HUGE difference. They have fangs, while our canines are puny. There's also a huge difference between the molars of carnivores, and the molars of herbivores (us!). Ours are designed to grind grain and vegetation, theirs are designed to continue tearing flesh. Meat eating animals have claws to tear flesh, we have delicate fingers to pick and peel vegetation. Their jaws only move up and down, while herbivores' jaws move side to side as well, so that we can grind grain and vegetation. Their digestive juices are SUPER STRONG, much more powerful than ours, so that they can digest raw and rotting flesh. Our digestive juices are not designed for that, they're not as strong. Their digestive tracts are much shorter than ours, that way they can eliminate rotting flesh much more quickly. Basically, their digestive tracts and juices and teeth and jaws are designed to eat entirely different things. Can we go out and gnosh on raw flesh and not wind up on the toilet all night? Try it.
NOW do you STILL think we're anatomically meant for eating flesh???
As for any nutritional need for consuming animals or animal products, there is none. Every plant food (veggies, fruits, grains, nuts, seeds, etc) has protein in it, even fruit. As long as we eat a variety every day, we get all 9 essential amino acids. Of the 26 amino acids, we need at least these 9 for good health. Our bodies produce the rest, so ingesting them isn't necessary. In other words, we get the protein we need just fine from plant sources. If we take a multi vitamin and B12 vitamin (if the multi doesn't have 100% RDA of B12), we're fine, really. Besides, only 9% of our caloric intake needs to come from protein, and since everything has protein, we're FINE. Really.
Eating meat makes you live longer. You can survive on a strictly vegetarian diet, but it is harder to thrive. You also have to find a way to supply your body with all of the protein and other healthy benefits of meat. Our bodies are designed to digest meat. Meat, like almost everything these days, still needs to be eaten in moderation. There are always healthy choices available for meat.
We don't.
Next.
some of the answers above are so stupifyingly ignorant thats its not worth trying to respond
We don't. The meat industry just likes you to think you do.
If a vegetarian diet is very carefully planned, and that may require either fortified foods or supplements, it can be AS healthy as a good meat eating diet. I think there are a couple of benefits, but they come from eating a wide range of fruit and veg and being health conscious as vegans have to be, not omitting meat, and thus those benefits can be go without actually going veggie. Needless to say a uncarefully planned vegetarian, or especially vegan, diet can lack many essential nutrients and be very bad for your health.
There are many benefits to a diet containing meat. Many vegetarians claim that meat is unhealthy. This is a blatant fallacy.
It is well established that eating meat improves the quality of nutrition, strengthens the immune system, promotes normal growth and development, is beneficial for day-to-day health, energy and well-being, and helps ensure optimal learning and academic performance.
A long term study found that children who eat more meat are less likely to have deficiencies than those who eat little or no meat. Kids who don’t eat meat ― and especially if they restrict other foods, as many girls are doing ― are more likely to feel tired, apathetic, unable to concentrate, are sick more often, more frequently depressed, and are the most likely to be malnourished and have stunted growth. Meat and other animal-source foods are the building blocks of healthy growth that have made America’s and Europe's youngsters the tallest, strongest and healthiest in the world.
Meat is an important source of quality nutrients, heme iron, protein, zinc and B-complex vitamins. It provides high-quality protein important for kids’ healthy growth and development.
The iron in meat (heme iron) is of high quality and well absorbed by the body, unlike nonheme iron from plants which is not well absorbed. More than 90 percent of iron consumed may be wasted when taken without some heme iron from animal sources. Substances found to inhibit nonheme iron absorption include phytates in cereals, nuts and legumes, and polyphenolics in vegetables. Symptoms of iron deficiency include fatigue, headache, irritability and decreased work performance. For young children, it can lead to impairment in general intelligence, language, motor performance and school readiness. Girls especially need iron after puberty due to blood losses, or if pregnant. Yet studies show 75 percent of teenage girls get less iron than recommended.
Meat, poultry and eggs are also good sources of absorbable zinc, a trace mineral vital for strengthening the immune system and normal growth. Deficiencies link to decreased attention, poorer problem solving and short-term memory, weakened immune system, and the inability to fight infection. While nuts and legumes contain zinc, plant fibre contains phytates that bind it into a nonabsorbable compound.
Found almost exclusively in animal products, Vitamin B12 is necessary for forming new cells. A deficiency can cause anaemia and permanent nerve damage and paralysis. The Vitimin B12 in plants isn't even bioavailable, meaning our body can't use it.
Why not buy food supplements to replace missing vitamins and minerals? Some people believe they can fill those gaps with pills, but they may be fooling themselves. Research consistently shows that real foods in a balanced diet are far superior to trying to make up deficiencies with supplements.
Lets not forget either that protein, while it is found in plants, is better quality in animal products.
Some people claim that meat is unhealthy because it contains saturated fat. So does margarine and olive oil, and they're vegan suitable (in fact the hydrogenated fats in Marge can be very bad, but that's another story). Besides, any excess calories in your diet, any excess sugar, starch or carbohydrates are stored in your body for later use. This is done by turning them into saturated fats.
Cholesterol too. Your body on average creates four to five times more cholesterol than the average person consumes, and compensates by creating more when less is consumed. Cholesterol isn't evil, it is essential; it makes up the waterproof linings of all our cells and without it we would die. Too much can be bad, but as with saturated fats there are more healthy ways of disposing of it, like regular exercise. Anyway, it isn't so much how much cholesterol you eat, but how well yur body handles it. A person who eats loads of dietary cholesterol and leads an unhealthy lifestyle can still have low cholesterol, and vice versa. Most people's bodies are able to take a large amount of cholesterol without getting atherosclerosis. For this reason that eating meat gives you heart disease is very misleading, and for the most part untrue. Of course, if you do have a problem eating loads isn't a good idea, but for most people there is nothing at all to worry about.
Yes, there are things in meat that there is some evidence can cause cancer in some people, but there are as many in plants too. Soy especially has some very potent carcinogens. Processing of soy protein results in the formation of toxic lysinoalanine and highly carcinogenic nitrosamines.
Soy phytoestrogens disrupt endocrine function and have the potential to cause infertility and to promote breast cancer in adult women. Also they are potent antithyroid agents that cause hypothyroidism and may cause thyroid cancer. In infants, consumption of soy formula has been linked to autoimmune thyroid disease.
Soy is bad for numerous other reasons, but that isn't the point, I'm just using it as a quick example relating to cancer not being exclusive to some animal products. The evidence that claims meat does cause cancer is patchy anyway.
Some people also claim that we aren't designed by evolution, to eat meat. They claim that our digestive system is quite long and that we produce amylase, a starch splitting catabolic enzyme, akin to herbivores and unlike carnivores. Apparently this clearly shows that we were designed to eat plants. Such people should go and look up 'omnivore' in a dictionary. They have also been known to cite other reasons we are like herbivores and unlike carnivores: that we suck water instead of lapping it, and that we perspire through our skin, such things have nothing at all to do with whether or not we were designed to eat meat, and nothing to do with how our body handles food. I might as well say that because we, like most carnivores and unlike most herbivores, have eyes that face forwards, we must be carnivorous. Of course, that's not true for precisely the same reason.
The fact is Humans are omnivores, with the ability to eat nearly everything. By preference, prehistoric people ate a high-protein, high-mineral diet based on meat and animal sources, whenever available. Their foods came mainly from three of the five food groups: meat, vegetables and fruits. As a result, big game mammoth hunters were tall and strong with massive bones. They grew six inches taller than their farming descendants in Europe, who ate mostly plant foods, and only in recent times regained most of this height upon again eating more meat, eggs and dairy foods. We are adapted to eat meat, and it is just as natural as eating plants.
Some also claim that the digestion of meat releases harmful byproducts into our system. This is true, however such are our adaptations to eating meat that our bodies are quite able to dispose of said products without any adverse effects.
So, in summary: it isn't healthier to avoid meat. You can be healthy without meat, but likely not as healthy as if you did, assuming you kept things like the wide range of fruit and veg that a veggie diet usually entails. Too much meat can be bad, but normal amounts are no problem at all. Any health benefits that come from a veggie diet come from a wide range of fruit and veg, and being health conscious, as veggies often are; that doesn't require you to not eat meat."
I don't think a vegeterian diet benefits anyone in any way better than a better meat eating diet could at all. If you have no ethical qualms, it's quite pointless. PETA will tell you otherwise, but they have very strong ethical opinions, and mould their 'evidence' around it. There is, for example, some evidence that vegans live longer and are at less risk from cancer and heart disease; however those studies show only a very marginal and insignificant difference and none of those studies have yet managed to identify meat as the only variable. Veggies are less likely to smoke, drink or eat junk food, and eat a wider range of fruit and veg, making the test results inaccurate and unreliable.
@ Akiroula
"We continue to maintain diets full of animal proteins because that is what we have always done. Our taste buds have been trained to prefer meat and dairy over fruits and vegetables. If we can retrain our bodies to enjoy plant food sources, we can eliminate meat and dairy from our diets and reap the benefits of better health."
You make meat eating sound unnaural, although no doubt you meant to.
Our taste buds haven't been *trained* by the weight of our society to like meat, they prefer meat because that is what human's naturally prefer.
Look at toddlers, as a general rule they absolutely HATE their greens, but they quite like meat. They have not been exposed to a society that tells them meat is excellent and greens are rubbish, and pretty much their sole social influences at this point are their parents, who usually endeavour to make them eat fruit and veg.
Children like what their taste buds tell them are good, not what society does.
@ Dolores
No sensible vegans can contest that we were deigned to eat meat. Even most *vegan* scientists agree that human's are designed to eat meat, that is not in question.
That we do not have claws, talons, or incisors to hunt proves nothing. When early hominids ate meat they scavenged it, as vultures do, using their fingers to get the sinews and meat other animals couldn't. It was only after that that they began to hunt the meat themselves, and only much later they began to cook it. It is interesting that even now if someone was brought up eating raw meat he would have no problem with it.
The last few million years of human evolution have revolved completely around tools. We used advanced stone tools long before we began to hunt our own meat, and as such there was no need for evolution to bestow us with large claws or teeth to kill prey.
Simple research into human biology reveals how we are meant to eat meat. For one thing, our body produces hydrochloric acid and meat splitting enzymes that herbivores don't produce and are solely used for the digestion of meat. There are adaptations to our teeth (not incisors, rather the size of the jaw), stomach and intestines which have made a human being very adept at meat digestion. There is nothing wrong with the way our body digests meat, and we are so adept at eating it no scientists are of any doubt we've evolved to eat it.
In contrast, there are many reasons we aren't naturally herbivores. We cannot naturally get all the nutrients we need without animal products naturally. Vitamin B12 cannot be got, even now, without animal products or supplements, and a lack of it can cause anaemia and impending death. 60% of vegans even now have some level of B12 deficiency, as opposed to no meat eaters, which says something about how well adapted we are to a vegan diet.
All other nutriets can be got natually. That owes to that vegtables can now be sold all year round, even out of season, and can be flown into the country from all over the world. In bygone times people could only eat the relatively small range of plants that grew in their ecosytem, and only when they were in season. Thus many more nutrients would have been unavailable and still more unavaillable for most of he year. Until very recently it would have been impossible for a vegan human to live naturally without dying very quickly.
Now, meat makes up for all these lost nutrients very nicely, and it really shows how we aren't naturally vegans, as until very recently it was impossible to live like that.
As for the tooth argument, again, lions have huge fangs because they use them to hunt. Gorrilas have uge canines because they use them for self defence. We don't use our mouth for killing things, as the Lion's and Gorrila's canines were designed to do, and our canines are made for the much simpler task of eating. Huge fangs actually getin the way when eating.
Also, we have molars, like herbivores, because we are omnivores. That we are also able to eat plants doesn't mean we aren't made to eat meat.
"Their digestive juices are SUPER STRONG, much more powerful than ours, so that they can digest raw and rotting flesh. Our digestive juices are not designed for that, they're not as strong. Their digestive tracts are much shorter than ours, that way they can eliminate rotting flesh much more quickly. Basically, their digestive tracts and juices and teeth and jaws are designed to eat entirely different things. Can we go out and gnosh on raw flesh and not wind up on the toilet all night? Try it."
We produce Hydrocholric acid in our gut, as do carnivores. Most herbivores don't. You'll find that the acid isn't used to break down the meat directly, but it provides the optimum PH for the meat splitting enzymes in our stomachs, which are what actually digest the meat. Carnivores produce meat splitting enzymes; herbivores don't. We produce meat splitting ezymes, go figure.
True, carnivores have shorter digestive tracts than us and other plant eaters, but this not, as you incorrectly assert, to due with limiting the expoure to meat.
Herbivores have long intestines because plant matter and cellulose is very difficult to digest; hence why cows have four stomachs and all herbivores have very large apendixes (whereas our is tiny and doesn't do anything). Meat is much easier to digest and as such true carnivores don't need a long intestine.
We, however, aren't carnivores, we are omnivores and like herbivores we need to digest plant matter as well, hence the longer intestinal tract.
Meat isn't toxic, and as such carn/omnivores don't need to limit exposure. While yes, the digestion of meat does produce some harmful chemicals, it is a tribute to how well we are designed to eat meat that they can be easily disposed of without any adverse effects.
Now, also consider almost all mammalian carnivores belong to one order, carnivora, the order that contains cats, dogs, bears, badgers etc. We however are primates. It is not therefore unlikely that we are going to be much more like primates than most carnivores and in fact quite unlike carnivores in some ways because we've had 60 million years of evolving apart from them. On the other hand most carnivores are closely related and thus similarities aren't hard to come by.
Go look at a pig, another omnivore, and you'll find they have as many differences from most carnivores as we do.
Now, the reason we can't eat raw meat is that we are unused to it. There are number of societies in the world, albeit ever decreasing, where raw meat is a staple part of the diet. They don't keel over and sit on the bog for hours when they eat it because, if brought up thus from childhood, the human body is perfectly able to eat raw meat.
In fact, I have eaten raw meat, and I felt fine afterwards, so I speak from personal experience. If raw meat is so bad why is steak tartar still around?
We dont need to eat meat, we can get all the protiens and vitamins we need from vegetables and legumes and stuff. also when you get your protiens from vegetables instead of animals its a lot healthier for you... I've been a vegan for a year and a vegetarian for 4 years and im fine... im actually healthier then when i ate meat.