I can't say that I completely agree with this theory, though I am a vegetarian. If you buy organic animal products, there is usually much less carbon dioxide emission than w/conventional products. But I don't believe that abolishing all livestock is the way to go at all. That's nonsense...every animal was put on this earth for a reason. It is most certainly possible to raise animals without harming the environment. People did it for thousands of years before commercial farming came in. But considering that sustainable farming is not practiced widely, I have to agree that it's best to become vegetarian.

Cat, most livestock wasn't put on earth in the form it's in today - cows would never have occurred in nature because they're only suited to the purposes we've selectively bred them for. While I can see your logic applying to hunted animals (although I'm an atheist), I don't see it as that clear in livestock.

It isn't really an issue of harming the environment, at least for me - I recognize that you can raise animals in limited numbers without damaging the land you're using. The problem is that it requires much more arable land - many more calories - to feed that animal than simply to produce those calories with vegetable matter. I am vegetarian for that reason, although I would except some hunted food (deer overpopulation is an issue around here) and some local seafood.

The next question is really: Which is better, environmentally speaking? Organically supplied meat or conventional vegetarian meat products?

What do you mean cows would never have occurred in nature? What, do you think that humans invented cows? Yeah, right. All we did was pen them up, stick them in cages, and milk 'em and kill 'em, not create them. We aren't gods.

Were they the same as they are now? Probably not, but they most certainly were around.

Ben, it's not really that straightforward. Not all grazing animals graze on farmable land. That's why herding is traditional in a lot of climates where agriculture isn't a viable method of food production, as with some cultures in Africa, Mongolia, and ringing the Arctic. It's not a straight tradeoff between animals or farmland, where if you stop raising animals suddenly the land will give rise to bountiful crops in their place. In many places, animals make otherwise unavailable food calories available to people.

I completely disagree that humans farmed animals for thousands of years without harming the environment. This is what's known as the "noble savage" myth. Too many environmentalists believe this fairytale.

Humans have always changed - arguably harmed - the environment.

Some breeds of cow farmed today - the Charroley (sp?) with its double-muscling springs to mind above all others - are grossly different from anything nature has ever produced without tremendous meddling on our part.

That aside, I would like to propose a compromise for those who still enjoy a steak - eat less meat. You don't have to become vegetarian or vegan to reduce your animal-related impact. My doctor tells me a couple of serves a week will keep me in protein and iron. Meanwhile, you'll finally be able to fit the recommended amount of vegies into your diet. And see if you don't also broaden your culinary horizons...

B

Nameless, it actually is as simple as I posit. Very, very few slaughtered animals get more than 10% of their calories from unfarmable land - they get 90% or more from feed grain grown on farmable land. If we raised the animals we actually could on unfarmable land, I wouldn't have a problem with it - the problem I have is with the farmable land taken up to grow feed for the animals.

Cameron, when were cows first identified?

Cameron: Read the following (a decent summary of the domestication of cattle from Aurochs):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurochs

"Domestication of the aurochs began in the southern Caucasus and northern Mesopotamia from about the 6th millennium BC, while genetic evidence suggests that aurochs were independently domesticated in northern Africa and in India. Domestication caused dramatic changes to the physiology of the creatures, to the extent that domestic cattle must now be regarded as a separate species"

If you are interested in artifical selection and domestication the camel is also a very interesting story.