h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Water cannot be destroyed (unless you use electrolysis...) so I have to say that "they drink a lot of water too, not all of which ends up back in the natural water cycle." is pretty much a false statement. it ends up in the water cylce eventually, whether that is through eventual consumption or rotting of the carcasses

Now one for the other side the straw can either be burnt (possibly in incinerators to generate electricity) or it can be composted to eventually add nutrients to the ground.

I wasnt actually suggesting the water was destroyed, I kind of just meant to say it doesnt always make it back into the water cycle in an uncontaminated manner. Sorry for poor clarity...let debate continue....

In fact, lets not worry about drinking supply for moment, as it is liable to detract attention from main debate. I guess there are actuall environmental forums other thin this one somewhere nearby..

Can I add again that cattle farming destroys the environment by chopping down of forests to provide temporary grazing, the grazing land is quickly worn out and becomes desert this is the main reason for the logging of the amazon.
Also water course are often pollutted from slurry run off from intensive farming not to mention the amount of methane that is produced by cattle, methane is a much more 'effective' greenhouse gas than co2.

Z.

Well, when the straws comes out of the cow again it can also give nutrients to the earth. And you can even get pure water out of this stuff. A guy has invented a machine that can do that. But it will probably first be when we have water shortage that we will begin doing that.

How come nobody cuts down trees for having fields then? And somebody here said something about the amount of meat people eat has increased in the last 50 years. Could you show me the source you have for this?

At risk of straying further from origional point of this thread:

Climate Change Due to Greenhouse Effect:
CO2 and CH4 are both a problem. To say CH4 is much more effective is a bit vague:
Fact: molelecule for molecule CH4 is indeed a more effective greenouse gas (for more info, check out Kyoto Protocol web page and find out all about Global Warming Potentials).

Complications:
1/ CO2 lasts a lot longer in the atmoshpere than CH4
(CO2 approx. 50-200 years; CH4 approx. 10 years)
This means CO2 contribution is longer lasting.
2/ When methane does decompose, one of the molecules that can be produced is water. H20 is also a green house gas, so despite no longer being present, it may have a longer effective harm period than complication 1 seems to imply.
3/ The atmosphere has a tendency to move around quite a lot, and the different layers all have widely different compositions, making it very hard to predict whats bad, and whats ok. For example, before humans released loads of CO2 into atmoshpere, there was loads of CO2 in the atmosphere. IN terms of of amounts of atmospheric methane and carbon dioxide present before industrial revolution, compared to the amounts now, emmisions of methane have a larger percentage increase.

But one has to remember that CO2 accounts for the majority (over 90 percent in 1990, hopefully getting lower) of 5 major greenhouse gases being emmited.

Simplications, and return to discussion:

COws farting and being fed by crops that are grown in fields that were once forests produces both CO2 and CH4, and they are both bad news for certain wavelengths of energy trying vainly to leave the planet. So make a little difference, and dont eat cow.

Hey vogonpoet. Nice to see you putting down your thing ;-) Good stuff. You might be interested in this thread on global warming: http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/F19585?thread=104339&latest=1

Why thankyou for the moral support Shorn Canary.
What a lovely (and rather daunting - its so big) place this is

(the above is a planet and web page applicable statement)

Go VP GO!

Thanx for the more pertinent and well put facts!

Z.

I just really want to know if this works at all? I have been a member, oh all of five minutes and havn't worked this out at all yet!

Hi concord,
I'm poping over to say hi, look out for me on your home page as this isn't the best place to say Hi and Welcome properly. But if you got anything to add to this debate hit the reply button and hammer those keys!
Z.

I'm the creator of the H2G2 Vegetarian Society. I was not aware of this post until now. There is a score of reaons for being vegetarian from health to ecology and much more. Rather than attempt to summarize them here I suggest you visit the link "How to win an argument with a meat eater" (admittedly poorly named, but I didn't write it). If you genuinely want to know the pros of going veggie you can find that link on the HVS home page (U144422). My personal reason for becoming a vegetarian was that I believe it is immoral to take the lives of beings that can feel pain and pleasure (and much more depending on the species) when it is completely unnecessary. As my screen name suggests I am an admirer of wolves--which are about the furthest you can get from vegetarians. I don't have a problem with animals (including humans) eating other animals when it is neccessary for survival. But I am priviledged enough to live in a place where I can live without partaking in the animal slaughter industry, and so I do. That's my personal ethical decision. I don't condemn people who disagree with me and if I ever see anyone "pushing" vegetarianism on someone, I'm the first one to tell them to lay off.

Those are my reasons for being a vegetarian. I could talk you blue in the face with other good reasons, but I won't. (OK just one--Foot and Mouth Disease). I do encourage you to visit our links though. You may be surprised at some of the facts--I know I was.

BTW, to all vegetarians who have not yet joined our society, I invite you to come check it out. The website needs to be reorganized a little, but its still navigable. U144422

Oops! Just realized how long this thread is! I was just replying to the first page. I'm sure everything I said has already been said then. Don't know how I missed all this until now, but I guess I've been too busy.

Xanatic, at least I have read 'Dark Nature' (quite a number of times) so I will try and back you up a little! That book makes a very good case for morality/immorality being founded in the laws of nature. It at least gives us a point from where we can talk about morals from a more general/natural point of departure than has traditionally been the case.

That´s good. Everybody ought to read that book. Most people don´t know much about moral.

Actually the first thing I did was look through the guide for the words vegetarian and vegetarianism. And I didn´t find any entries that really gave any good arguments. And as for Food and Mouth, vegetables can also get diseases.

You can't usually get poisoned by plant diseases, though they make them taste or look unpleasant, the irish potatoe blight didn't make the potatoes inedible though it did give them an unpleasant taste and caused them to rot quickly. As opposed to if you eat something with, lets say salmonella, you get and there's no two ways about it.

On the subject of morals you might want to take a look at an entry I've just stuck in the writers workshop, for a bit of a preview before going to pr.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A560404 The Fairtrade movement.

Z.