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Originally Posted by Playlife  I think the reason why we humans have so varied dietary needs is that we just simply live in so various places. There's practically no local plants for Eskimos to eat, so they do need to eat meat. I've wondered that perhaps they(and a lot of other people too) live in "wrong place"? A human can't survive in such extremes if they don't do something "unnatural" - like clothe themselves, make fire, build houses from concrete and with central heating. 
If a lion can't survive in Northern Europe, it doesn't go there. Lions are where they can just live off the Earth. They just hunt where there is food for them. Same with Gazelles and Elephants and other plant eating animals - they live where there is food for them.
Even if humans ate only plants, even then I think there would be vast differences between one and the other. Plant food doesn't just grow for them, they(humans) grow it. Tomatoes wouldn't even grow in Nordic countries, but people build greenhouses(which animals incidentally don't.  ). In a way, humans have distanced themselves from Nature. Instead of letting nature nourish them, they use nature to grow food for themselves, by themselves(even if nature didn't really intend it this way). Different people in different places grow different food, hence the need for different diets.
That's all just a pondering. Not even a theory!! |
I disagree. I think it IS a theory. Christians call it "original sin." The act of separating ourselves from God in his wisdom separated us from the rest of his creation.
Provided you believe such things, we could no more go back to being "natural" as you define it, than we could live underwater - speaking in terms of the "species" of course.
Other animals adapt to suit their environment. What makes Humans unique is we adapt our environments to suit us. This includes the food we eat.
As a species - an animal species - we are ominvores. We have the ability to consume and digest both plant and animal proteins. A lion could no more live off a salad diet than a gazelle could eat and digest a steak.
There are other omnivores out there: Bears, skunks, racoons and some birds are just a few of them. Being an omnivore allows these species to succeed and flourish through opportunity. They can pretty much eat anything that comes along.
When we talk about ethics, we assume that animals don't have "ethics" because they don't have a "choice". But we, in our infinite wisdom and superiority DO have a choice and therefore some responsibility to all our relations to make choices that are good for not just us, but them as well - even if they are self-limiting.
Where we stumble is in making certain assumptions about how things are "supposed" to be. We look at the world from the perspective of a Human. Ok. That makes sense to a degree - we ARE human. But if we are going to assign ourselves the responsibility of being the stewards of this world and all of our relatives in it, then we have to stop thinking like humans.
If anyone figures out how to do that, let me know.