"Immersion in the life of the world, a willingness to be inhabited by and to speak for others, including those beyond the realm of the human, these are the practices not just of the bodhisattva but of the writer." --Jane Hirshfield

Thursday, September 13, 2007

The Easy Way to Slow Global Warming...


...is to eat less meat, according to a study cited by the Associated Press.

Eating less meat could help slow global warming by reducing the number of livestock and thereby decreasing the amount of methane flatulence from the animals, scientists said on Thursday.

Disturbing, isn't it, that we warehouse so many animals in feedlots that their flatulence, their farting, has an effect on our climate. And there really is no need to eat as much meat as most of us do, we're just responding to an age-old craving for protein from the days when we were protein-starved. Now, overeating is the problem.

Powles and his co-authors estimate that reducing meat consumption would reduce the numbers of people with heart disease and cancer. One study has estimated that the risk of colorectal cancer drops by about a third for every 100 grams of red meat that is cut out of your diet.

"As a society, we are overconsuming protein," Brewster said. "If we ate less red meat, it would also help stop the obesity epidemic."

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