Isn't it interesting the experiment, that when you put a rabbit next to a baby,...?

Question

the baby won't start salivating unlike other animals that need to eat other animals. Does that make you think humans aren't meant to eat meat?

Answer 1

It might mean that people are better able to control their body's reflexes...I don't salivate over rabbits, either.

Answer 2

Mmmm, rabbit stew. It's delicious, especially if you are the one that killed the rabbit.

Nah, I don't think the experiment proves anything.

Answer 3

I find it more interesting that people (like you for example) would grasp at straws to "prove" what is essentially a flawed conclusion :that people aren't meant to eat meat. If that were the case, then mankind would have ceased to exist as people have been consuming meat since they were hominids sucking on bone marrows from scavenged dead animals while living in caves. The species would have died out long ago or perhaps not developed into the species as it exists today, Homo Sapiens. Get this into your head: Humans are OMNIVORES. We can eat both plant and animal sourced foods. Most often cooked (a product of our being civilized"), sometimes raw. We have the biological make up to eat and digest either or both. (You have a gall bladder which produces copious amounts of bile used almost exclusively for meat digestion. Herbivores either do not produce bile or have very small underdeveloped gall bladders). It is a simple matter of making a lifestyle choice to be a vegetarian.

A baby does not salivate at the sight of vegetables either. A human being will salivate when hungry period. That is the biological process that takes place when our body needs nutrients. Our stomachs produce acid in anticipation of the food that it will break down for digestion. That is the feeling of hunger.

I suggest you find more "interesting" topics about food consumption and leave the science to those more qualified. You are better off questioning the morality of the animal factory farming industry.

So does it make me think that humans aren't meant to eat meat? No, obviously not. But it makes me think people will delude themselves into making ridiculous and patently false conclusions.

Answer 4

No I dont think that. What do you think we have "canine" teeth for? The only animals that have those are meat eaters. Also our eyes are in the front of our head like other carnivores, not on the side of the head like plant eaters.

Answer 5

But we do have canine teeth. They're also called incisors.

Answer 6

Hi, people! :)

Yes, I find it very interesting, not as a conclusive prove, but maybe as an important indication.

Some people here wrote about human canine teeth; let me say that as far as I know, elephants have canine teeth too, as well as many —if not all— herbivores do.

More about the "canine teeth argument" (I quote): "Human teeth today clearly support a frugivorous diet; we have no elongated snout and large canines as the omnivores do[…]" (http://ecologos.org/meat-eating.htm )

Also, I think there is some stage in human development, when a baby or child would put anything into his/her moth, although it would not be for eating it, but for developing capabilities related to chewing.

About someone mentioned an example using iron, well, normally, no human would desire to eat, i. e., an iron bar, so, our body has the capability to take nutrients, but it is not meant to take from any source.

And, yes, probably babies would desire to eat a tomato, or an orange, or many other fruits and foods, but probably babies normally won't find appealing to feed from as described in the following quote:

PLUTARCH

"Can you really ask what reason Pythagoras had for abstinence from flesh? For my part I rather wonder both by what accident and in what state of mind the first man touched his mouth to gore and brought his lips to the flesh of a dead creature, set forth tables of dead, stale bodies, and ventured to call food and nourishment the parts that has a little before bellowed and cried, moved and lived. How could eyes endure the slaughter when throats were slit and hides flayed and limbs torn from limb"

How could his nose endure the stench? How was it that the pollution did not turn away his taste, which made contact with sores of others and sucked juices and serums from mortal wounds? It is certainly not lions or wolves that we eat out of self-defense; on the contrary, we ignore these and slaughter harmless, tame creatures without stings or teeth to harm us. For the sake of a little flesh we deprive them of sun, of light, of the duration of life to which they are entitled by birth and being."

He then delivered this challenge to flesh-eaters: "If you declare that you are naturally designed for such a diet, then first kill for yourself what you want to eat. Do it, however, only through your own resources, unaided by cleaver or cudgel or any kind of ax.".

(Some “QUOTES BY FAMOUS VEGETARIANS”: http://www.angelfire.com/stars3/larika0/... )

Anyway, let's not forget that people starving, in the struggle for survive in this sadly cruel human world, actually may eat even mud…

Before deciding or taking for granted, please consider reading:

- The Human "Omnivore": a mythological beast: http://ecologos.org/omni.htm

- The Comparative Anatomy of Eating: http://ecologos.org/anatomy.htm

- Humans are NOT Omnivores: http://ecologos.org/mcardle.htm

Thanks!

(P.S.: Sorry about my basic English.)

[An addition to my answer. :) ]

Hi, everyone!! :)

First, I think I should say I'm a vegetarian, and that I'm very concerned with (or about) these issues.

Well: Thanks to exsft's contribution, it gives me the opportunity to try to go deeper in a complex issue. Let's see some other points please…

exsft>I find it more interesting that people (like you for example) would grasp at straws to "prove" what is essentially a flawed conclusion :that people aren't meant to eat meat. If that were the case, then mankind would have ceased to exist as people have been consuming meat since they were hominids sucking on bone marrows from scavenged dead animals while living in caves. The species would have died out long ago or perhaps not developed into the species as it exists today, Homo Sapiens. Get this into your head: Humans are OMNIVORES. We can eat both plant and animal sourced foods. Most often cooked (a product of our being civilized"), sometimes raw. We have the biological make up to eat and digest either or both. (You have a gall bladder which produces copious amounts of bile used almost exclusively for meat digestion. Herbivores either do not produce bile or have very small underdeveloped gall bladders). It is a simple matter of making a lifestyle choice to be a vegetarian.

rb_gem1>> Well, I was very very inclined to believe humans are omnivores, and maybe that is the most massive and common assumption or opinion; even this essay (http://www.vrg.org/nutshell/omni.htm ) says so, but I'm “always” searching, so when I found this (http://ecologos.org/mcardle.htm ) that criticizes the former which is one of the articles whose URLs I've already expressed in this page, I begun thinking that a different possibility may also be valid; please, refer to them for more information.

Quoting some more or less isolated portions (maybe my quotations are not the best ones):

[…]

“JM has made the all-to-common and fatal error in his totally unscientific and unsupportable claims by confusing Nature and culture; a grievous error which most grade school children would not make.  Humans are clearly not natural "omnivores".  Some are cultural "omnivores", and indeed must rely on cultural artifacts to raise, kill, butcher, cook, disguise with seasonings, cut up, and finally consume their animal prey.  Again, the false definition rests on the phrase "capable of consuming"; however, humans have no natural capability to do so.  If they did, they would.  Thus, relying on an absurd false definition, JM inevitably and inescapably comes to a false conclusion.”

[…]

“JM> Our closest relatives among the apes are the chimpanzees (i.e., anatomically, behaviorally, genetically, and evolutionarily), who frequently kill and eat other mammals (including other primates).

    "Frequently" turns out to be a self-serving distortion, apparently for the sake of his pre-conceived and false conclusion, and for a "primatologist", it must be intentional.  Chimp hunting and flesh-eating is rare, ~1.4% of their diet, not practiced among all adults, as would be required by a true nutritional need, and is clearly cultural[http://ecologos.org/chimphunt.htm ], since flesh is used to gain sexual favors --humorously-similar to human dating.”

[…]

>A baby does not salivate at the sight of vegetables either. A human being will salivate when hungry period. That is the biological process that takes place when our body needs nutrients. Our stomachs produce acid in anticipation of the food that it will break down for digestion. That is the feeling of hunger.

>>I think “A human will salivate when hungry[…]”, AND because of thinking of or perceiving  food.

>I suggest you find more "interesting" topics about food consumption and leave the science to those more qualified. You are better off questioning the morality of the animal factory farming industry.

>>I agree, but certainly, there should be (or I wish so) some place and some time for every questioning.

>So does it make me think that humans aren't meant to eat meat? No, obviously not. But it makes me think people will delude themselves into making ridiculous and patently false conclusions.

>>Yes, probably there is some degree of delusion in many if not the thinks we humans think we know.

Source(s):

>Our teeth are perfectly suited for tearing into animal flesh. Just because modern conveniences affords us the luxury of not having to bite into raw flesh, it doesn't mean we can't. Anybody who watches the Discovery Channels's "Man vs. the Wild" can clearly see that the main character constantly eats raw, living meat. He has bitten, eaten and suvived raw freshly caught fish, snakes, insects, small mammals. Once he even scavenged on raw zebra flesh left by lions. He just literally bit into and ripped the meat out of the carcass. Vegetarians always harp about how modern conveniences blind omnivores into the realities of the meat industry. Well, modern mostly Western vegetarians are blinded from the realities of survival facing the rest of teh world by the luxury of choices that they can make. There are no supermarkets or Trader Joe's or orgnic stores with shelves of beautifully arranged and sorted fresh produce in the forest, desert or the tundra.

>>Please, consider the possibility that, sadly, there may be things that one watches in the Discovery Channel (I love that channel, but years ago I can't afford having a paid TV system) which simply cannot be regarded as true, as it seems to be the much more recent following case (at least, look at the images and its explanations): http://white-history.com/nefer.htm

About our ancestors eating meat, I personally believe that human body developed some tolerance to that habit, but I go on quoting:

[…]

“In general, this error is based on the accidental, or perhaps intentional, confusing of the verbs "to be" and "to do".  If the human "is" a natural omnivore, then we should have ALL the physical and biochemical equipment that is NECESSARY to run down, kill with our bare hands, tear asunder, eat, and properly digest, RAW animal prey, just as ALL natural omnivores, or carnivores, do.”

[…]

“The "Paleolithic argument" runs something like this: The proto-human was indeed a frugivore (eating primarily fruit, such as modern chimps) 50 million years ago (MYA) to 2 MYA, when the "appearance of stone tools and cultures at this time" coincided with "increased meat-eating"[W1].  Well, that's the end of the argument, as its fatal flaw is revealed: the fact is that "increased meat-eating" occurred ONLY because of tool use, and since tools, including fire, are a product of culture,

Answer 7

Babies barf and sh*t without rational thought.  Kind of like this question.... Salivating by a bunny?  Good Lord.

Mankind evolved as gatherers.  You can say what you will about your teeth and such, but they are designed for an omnivorous diet, PERIOD.

Answer 8

Yes, it's very relevant in my opinion.  But I would like to state the full saying:

"If you put a baby in a crib with an apple and a rabbit and the baby eats the rabbit and plays with the apple, i'll buy you a new car."

Obviously the baby would be more inclined to eat the shiny apple and play with the cute fuzzy animal.  To me this further indicates that humans are more interested in plant foods from a young age and that eating meat is a learned trait and not instinct.  

Once eating meat is learned, people become addicted either through habit or modern society telling them that meat must be the base of their diet.

Great question...I find it very interesting from a biological standpoint.

For the people who suggest we have "canine" teeth...yes that is their classification.  BUT, When we look at our teeth compared to other omnivorous animals, we see that we aren't actually meant to tear flesh, but rather to chew vegetation or meat products.  We cannot kill with our teeth which makes us far different from other omnivores on the planet.  Our teeth are meant for grinding and not biting/tearing.

Answer 9

this is an extremely good point and it does prove a lot. but i wouldn't suggest using this as an agument because there are a lot of flaws with it.

Answer 10

This is absurd. If you put a salad next to the baby it won't drool over it either. You're obviously not a scientist/scholar.

Does that make you think humans aren't meant to eat meat?

No, it doesn't. Humans are "meant" to consume nutrients. The source is simply choice. Take iron for example. Iron can be consumed through eating green leafy veges or products that are fortified with iron. Cereal that is fortified with iron literally has iron filings in it. Iron is iron and the body uses it, unconcerned with the source. Same as any other nutrient.

Kris---our incisors are canine teeth. You are mistaken. We have varities of teeth to accomodate our varied, omnivore diet.

Answer 11

nope

Answer 12

some babies do eat cats n other countrys