Bread And Wine

Recently I had pulled out an old book from the collection-o'-books at home. It's got the Title - "On Being The Right Size" - authored by J.B.S.Haldane, a noted biologist, socialist and philosopher... The book is actually a collection of essays by the author from different sources (like newspapers, magazines, manifestos etc. where he actually published them) and I have to say, these essays have left me very impressed. Of course, as a biology student back at school (so what if I turned out to be an engineer; having parents specialising in the field of bio I guess I always had a liking for the subject ;) ), I knew a bit about Mr. Haldane's works, but its only recently that I had an actual insight into his philosophical nature too ! Although I had previously read the title essay "On being the right size" - which, by the way, clearly and lucidly explains why Godzilla and Hollywood's horror movie giant bugs can't simply exist, so as to obey the laws of nature (physics, chem, bio included); I did not find rest of the essays so "interesting" at that time,  as obviously I was back at school then and much too taken up by detective novels to care about scientific philosophy. But now... well... I have "grown up" for one thing :) and then secondly I have too much free time nowadays to just " Think" !!!

Anyway, that's the "epilogue" for many of my future posts in this blog, i.e., so as to say, I'll be taking cue and reference from the above personality's essays... well... that is, the things which came up to my "free mind" after reading those essays !

Now as my title says - "Bread and Wine"... In one of Haldane's essays "God Makers", which by the way is about something totally different, he mentioned a line from The Bible, particularly from "The Last Supper", where Jesus tells his disciples that the bread  that is in front of them is his flesh and the wine is his blood. 

Well, a thorough examination of the statement would let us see that the words have some amount of truth in them. How? Of course whatever we eat- bread, for instance, after digestion and assimilation in our body, is used up by our body cells to build themselves and carry on with their metabolic activities. That means, of course, that we are eating our bread to create our body - in other words "to become ourselves". now again wine or the water in it (if not the alcohol) is again used up by our body in its metabolic functions and well... since our body is more than 70% water I can safely say to build up our body again. So whatever Jesus said was at least partially and philosophically true....

But my point is a bit different, rather I infer bread and water { well since I am a teetotaler, I won't mention wine ;) } "becoming us" in a different way... 

Basically, whatever we eat and drink (as long as they are accepted by our bodies and form the basic ingredients of the building blocks of our body like carbohydrates, proteins, fats etc. etc.) are to some extent becoming our bodies.. the apparent lifeless molecules are gaining "life" in us, by becoming us. So what I mean is, whatever we eat, as long as it is acceptable to our body, is our food. That food irrespective of the source (plants/animals) are ultimately going to become a part of our body. That food is ultimately going to be us...!!! So then I ask why the argument about being a vegetarian and non-vegetarian :) !!!

Veggies please pardon and let me explain a bit further. 

A lot of people nowadays are vociferously campaigning for vegetarianism. Their manifesto seems to be "Convert the whole bloody world into Vegetarians". Basically my following say is against the lopsided and meaningless philosophy of these people. 

What I recommend is - "Let the Vegetarians stay as they are and who they are and likewise let the non-vegetarian people stay as they are and who they are". What I mean is, let's not convert (or try to convert) these people into either. Scientifically seeing, both these ways of life, or eating, are good in their own ways. 

Veggies get more energy from the food chain for the same amount of food the non-veggies get. 

The non-veggies get many good items such as essential vitamins and omega fatty acids form their food apart from their food being more easily assimilable (animal proteins need not be converted to form human proteins and can be directly absorbed in the intestines, as  against plant proteins which need to be broken down into their constituent amino acids before being formed into human proteins, hence requiring a bit more energy). But then again non-veggies aren't exactly carnivores and they do eat a lot of plant products too !! 

And the fact is that the "convert the world into veggies" funda or philosophy is Environmentally wrong and surely a way to world destruction ! 

Why..? Here's how. 

Now as I mentioned before, the non-veggies aren't carnivores and they do eat a lot of plant products. Now I believe and rather hope, that at least 90% of the world non-veggies don't kill wild animals or endangered animals for food; almost all their non-veg food items come from farm animals (like poultry and cattle) which are domesticated and grown just like we farm plants for food. True.. many people here will say people also kill whales and other endangered sea creatures which is harmful to the environment. I wouldn't say they are wrong. That's why I said 90%. Now these farm animals do consume grasslands and emit global warming methane and CO2 gases without doubt. That's one big factor against them. 

But then lets see what kind of effects would the Environment have if the world non-veggies are turned into veggies: 

a. Getting people to get rid of their meat eating habits would mean requiring more plant products; more plant products mean more plants and hence more fresh air or lets say more O2 and less CO2... well... so far so good.

b. Food habits of vegetarian people mean they eat not only cereals and pulses but also a lot of vegetables and fruits, all of which require fertile and empty tracts of land for their growth. 

c. As consumption of vegetable products would increase, it is then more than obvious that more land would be required for cultivation. More land would mean more deforestation (cutting down forest trees and clearing large part of forest lands) and/or reclamation of wetlands (means draining of wetlands and turning them into cultivable land). As it is, the world is slowly losing vast tracts of forest land (good example is the slow but steady degradation of the amazon river basin) for food cultivation due to an increasing population - so the consequences of the whole world turning veggies is easily imaginable. 

d. Next we need fertile soil to grow more and better food. And as already population pressure has increased the use of chemical fertilisers on farmlands, so it is obvious that the world non-veggies turning veggies would mean an increase in the consumption of chemical fertilisers. Some people supporting industrialisation would say that's good cos it'll lead to better business for the chemical industries and hence a nation's growth... Well... good enough, but my next points would prove them wrong somewhat.

e. More consumption of fertilisers means, of course, increased application of these fertilisers (mostly nitrates and phosphates) on the same patch of land year after year to achieve a sustainable plant (crop) growth. This would have two side-effects though. One is the increase in the salinity of the soil hence rendering the piece of soil unable to sustain plant growth after a period of time and the next is the process of increased eutrophication (a process wherein due to leaching of these fertilisers into water sources a rapid growth of water plants occur and causes the aquatic animals living in the water source to die of reduced space and air).

f. Thus a chain of bad effects would be started... destruction of land and water sources due to the above causes would lead to a further increase in the destruction of forests, for want of cultivable land, plus along with the destruction of wetlands and other such fresh water sources by chemical fertilisers would combinedly lead to destruction of the habitats of wild animals, who would die out as a result - a thing, ironically, the pro-vegtarianisms were trying to prevent in the first place !!

Having said that, I would ask what's wrong with some people eating animals (and animal products)..? Yes we are civilised and we are humans (hence should be humane) in this modern period of time. But then again as I heard this statement somewhere - "We humans don't have bicuspids and canines for nothing"! (meaning we do have canines and bicuspids for something !!) Those are two types of teeth in our mouth by-the-way, whose primary function in carnivores is to bite and tear into the tough flesh of other animals and yes they have the same functions in humans too. Plant eating animals (cows, buffaloes, sheep, goat etc. etc.) don't have these teeth. So as humans have been farming and eating plant food for atleast thousands of years, we ought to have lost these teeth to nature long ago like the herbivores !! So if nature intended us to use them, why not do so ?! And anyway, Non-veggies as I said earlier, 90% of them atleast, eat farm "grown" animals otherwise fish products mostly from fisheries (developed either on land or sometimes in a specific part of the sea/sea coast) where the fish are again "grown" like plants ! 

So there we go... I would plead as a conclusion to those "Convert the whole bloody world into veggies" propagandists to "Look Before you leap" and if you really want to do something to waste or make use of your time, please do exert your influence on the governments of certain countries (India among them no doubt) and if possible go out to the people themselves and give stress on and spread the idea of  family planning. 

Because population explosion in many countries is the biggest threat to the fellow creatures living on this planet than people eating meat. 

And I believe it is best to leave the meat eaters to themselves and likewise to leave the plant eaters to themselves.. they are somewhat balanced now (not taking into account the population increase).. and it is best for the survival of this planet to let the balance be retained.