Post Race!

This should help Witis see the light:

http://videosift.com/video/Troy-McCl...rs-in-MEAT-YOU

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Originally Posted by homer13j

Just be glad you're not Mississippi.

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It's like we're always competing for last place.

My mother once told me that all the other states should be thankful for Mississippi so that we are never in last place for anything.

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Originally Posted by Witis

Humans aren't the fastest or the strongest creatures on the planet, nor do they have any obvious weaponry on display like wolverine's claws, fearsome protruding teeth, tusks, horns, or poisonous fangs. Basically they look like they have evolved to operate in quite a civilised rather than savage manner.

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I strongly believe you're trolling us here for amusement but I'm not mad. However there are people that actually believe nonsense like this.

Evolution doesn't care about building civilizations, it only cares about the propagation of genes, preferably ones that give the creature that owns it the best chance of survival. It doesn't care how we do it, only that its done. We don't have fangs and horns not because we were meant to be civilized but because we don't need them. Snakes don't have the means to fashion weapons to hunt or defend themselves which is why they have venom. We evolved a higher level of intelligence and appendages that allow us to influence our environment in a way that hooves or wings cannot. This allows us to fashion tools which make up for our lack of horns and tusks.

You know its funny, all these tree hugging types don't even realize that if their ancestors shared their silly sentiments, humans would never have even made it to the stone age. Good thing they were too busying figuring out how to tame their harsh environment so their children could survive to cry about eating those poor helpless cows.

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Originally Posted by Witis

Humans are supposed to be intelligent enough to discriminate between the innocent, including cows, and the guilty, including fish and snakes.

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http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instanc...x/52718322.jpg

Well I don't think even a tree hugger would say something this silly :lol:

Innocent and guilty animals....I rest my case your honor!

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

They don't need shade for the reasons we need shade. We use shade as relief from the sun, but lots of light doesn't penetrate all that far into water, and heat gets absorbed pretty quickly. What shade does for the fish is keeps the water cooler, which is what keeps the fish cooler. There is also a certain amount of protection from predators, but that often depends on how the vegetation is arranged. In the ocean, the fish can always move around, and the heating from the sun has a different impact.

On the other hand, underwater vegetation does provide cover for lots of fish, so they do use it, though it isn't quite the same thing.

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Hmmm, it is still difficult to envision fish that have evolved to live in desert waters needing cool water and a large amount of shade to survive, and if a particular species does need cooler water to survive then there are always points in the stream or river where there are natural rock walls to provide permanent shade and deeper pools as any vegetation is likely to recede as will the size of the water flow in really hot summers. Although I do agree that if the cows kill all of the river bank vegetation then it likely puts extra stress on the system.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

A single cow is unlikely to kill a tree. They don't eat them, and they don't kick them into kindling, or anything like that. Lots of cows in an area can trample the banks to the point that the roots of the tree get damaged, or the cows could rub against them until they wear off the bark, but neither of those is all that common. What the cows tend to do is wipe out any new shoots and any brush. A mature tree can take it, young trees die, so as the old trees die from whatever reason, they are not replaced by new trees, and the result is a barrent stream bank.

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Are you saying that the cows actually eat the small branches rather than just the leaves and flowers and kill the smaller trees? That sounds a bit of a strange thing for a cow to do, perhaps if they are starving, but I don't imagine cows would typically kill plants and trees rather than just grazing on them.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

You are right that there are animals in the desert. In our deserts, the largest animal is generally the antelope. There are places with some elk, places with deer, and places with bighorn sheep. In all cases, the numbers of animals are VERY rare. While crossing 60 miles of desert, I saw about 5 antelope. I also saw several hundred cows. That's roughly the ratio you find on grazing areas. So, while there are other animals, their density is around 1-3% that of grazing cows, and possibly even less. If cow populations were reduced to that of antelope, no rancher could afford it. After all, a cow is several times the size of an antelope, sheep, or deer. Only elk are in the same size range, and I didn't see any of them in the desert. I'm not even sure they live out where I was, though they do live in desert-like areas with more elevation.

As for cows using the same watering holes, I believe they do tend to, yet the damage they do ends up being widespread due to their density on the land. This can be seen within a couple years by fencing off the banks.

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Ah ok, I think I might understand the problem now. The ranchers get loads of cattle that are used to grazing on lush vegetation and then move them to the desert. If they let such a large number of cattle graze anywhere near the running water the cattle naturally feel like they are in starvation conditions and head straight for the only green vegetation available and eat everything living on the river banks until they kill it.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

From cattle tanks. The use of cattle tanks and the fencing of streams moves cows away from the banks of the streams and puts them somewhere that can be used as sacrificial land. You can generally tell where a cattle tank is, too, if you have any elevation to view from, because the area around the tank is pounded into dust with nothing but flies living in it.

I agree that fencing has all the attributes you mention. Get the cows off the land and you wouldn't need any fencing.

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True, although I can't blame the cows for behaving like they are in starvation conditions when they are forced to live in the desert, and that means that if a rancher is going to have cattle in the desert they probably do need to fence off the stream banks to protect the wildlife that lives there.

Your view of a desert might be based on caricatures. Deserts have a lack of precipitation, but heat is optional. The high desert country in southern Idaho does get mighty hot during the summers, but is seriously cold in the winters. There is also abundant grass, it just has a strange lifestyle. We have a period in the spring called the green-up, which is when everything is growing fast. Much of the grass then turns brown and apparently lifeless. This is still forage for cows, the grass has just stopped growing for the year and is effectively dormant. So, it isn't starvation conditions. The cows fatten up fairly well, though they require much more area than would cows in a lush environment.

Still, you have it pretty nearly right. I have no idea what a cow tastes (they will readily eat some poisonous plants and do themselves in, so who knows how things taste to them), but I would think that the lush green vegetation along a stream might be more pleasing than the drier vegetation out on the plains. Wading around in the water is fun for humans as well as cows, so it's not quite clear what the motivation is there, either.

As for the fish, they aren't so much concerned about sunburn. The issue is that the lack of vegetation allows the water to be heated by the sun until it becomes lethally hot for the fish. If the fish are adapted to a desert stream with lots of riparian vegetation, and all that vegetation goes away, then the average and maximum temperatures of the stream will increase. There is no hiding in the shade that will help with that, so they just die.

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Originally Posted by Niya

Well I don't think even a tree hugger would say something this silly :lol:

Innocent and guilty animals....I rest my case your honor!

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That's what makes him Bambi. It's the Witis way.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

We can solve the human population problem easily: Provide education and career opportunities for women. Birth rates are at or below replacement level in every country where this is done.

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The Chinese one child policy, first implemented in 1979, has worked as "Demographers estimate that the policy averted 200 million births between 1979 and 2009" (Wiki). However, many families murdered females in preference for males: ""Sex-selected abortion, abandonment, and infanticide are illegal in China. Nevertheless, the US State Department,[67] the Parliament of the United Kingdom,[68] and the human rights organization Amnesty International[69] have all declared that China's family planning programs contribute to infanticide" (Wiki). As a result many have suggested that the one child policy is the underlying cause for the sex imbalance in China: "According to a report by the National Population and Family Planning Commission, there will be 30 million more men than women in 2020, potentially leading to social instability" (Wiki). It is also said to induce little emperor syndrome. Therefore it is probably not the sort of policy to emulate in anything other than a dire emergency.

By comparison "After the Korean War ended in 1953, the South Korean government suggested citizens each have one or two children to boost economic prosperity, which resulted in significantly lowered birth rates and a larger number of only children to the country" (Wiki).

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Originally Posted by homer13j

This should help Witis see the light:

http://videosift.com/video/Troy-McCl...rs-in-MEAT-YOU

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Yes that makes the point nicely homer13j. :cry:

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Originally Posted by Witis

Humans aren't the fastest or the strongest creatures on the planet, nor do they have any obvious weaponry on display like wolverine's claws, fearsome protruding teeth, tusks, horns, or poisonous fangs. Basically they look like they have evolved to operate in quite a civilised rather than savage manner.

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Originally Posted by Niya

I strongly believe you're trolling us here for amusement but I'm not mad. However there are people that actually believe nonsense like this.

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The truth isn't nonsense Niya. =)

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Originally Posted by Niya

Evolution doesn't care about building civilizations, it only cares about the propagation of genes, preferably ones that give the creature that owns it the best chance of survival. It doesn't care how we do it, only that its done.

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You seem to be suggesting that it is survival of the most ruthless rather than the most civilised.

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Originally Posted by Niya

We don't have fangs and horns not because we were meant to be civilized but because we don't need them. Snakes don't have the means to fashion weapons to hunt or defend themselves which is why they have venom. We evolved a higher level of intelligence and appendages that allow us to influence our environment in a way that hooves or wings cannot. This allows us to fashion tools which make up for our lack of horns and tusks.

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Nah, humans are soft and cuddly rather than gigantic monstrosities. You should compare dinosaurs to humans to see the difference.

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Originally Posted by Niya

You know its funny, all these tree hugging types don't even realize that if their ancestors shared their silly sentiments, humans would never have even made it to the stone age. Good thing they were too busying figuring out how to tame their harsh environment so their children could survive to cry about eating those poor helpless cows.

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There is very large difference between ancient hominids like the 6' 3 homo ergaster and modern humans and I am not even sure if they were intelligent enough to speak let alone discuss the merits of which animals to consume.

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Originally Posted by Witis

Humans are supposed to be intelligent enough to discriminate between the innocent, including cows, and the guilty, including fish and snakes.

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Originally Posted by Niya

Well I don't think even a tree hugger would say something this silly :lol:

Innocent and guilty animals....I rest my case your honor!

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Innocent and guilty men, innocent and guilty animals.
Surely you know that you cannot execute innocent men, similarly you should not be able to murder innocent animals. If you want to be able to legally consume a particular animal then you are going to have to construct a better case than the one you have just presented Niya.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

Your view of a desert might be based on caricatures. Deserts have a lack of precipitation, but heat is optional. The high desert country in southern Idaho does get mighty hot during the summers, but is seriously cold in the winters. There is also abundant grass, it just has a strange lifestyle. We have a period in the spring called the green-up, which is when everything is growing fast. Much of the grass then turns brown and apparently lifeless. This is still forage for cows, the grass has just stopped growing for the year and is effectively dormant. So, it isn't starvation conditions. The cows fatten up fairly well, though they require much more area than would cows in a lush environment.

Still, you have it pretty nearly right. I have no idea what a cow tastes (they will readily eat some poisonous plants and do themselves in, so who knows how things taste to them), but I would think that the lush green vegetation along a stream might be more pleasing than the drier vegetation out on the plains. Wading around in the water is fun for humans as well as cows, so it's not quite clear what the motivation is there, either.

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I just don't imagine that the cows would kill off all of the riparian vegetation unless they viewed themselves as in starvation conditions, otherwise they would happily graze their entire enclosure and there would be no serious damage to the flora adjacent to the water.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

As for the fish, they aren't so much concerned about sunburn. The issue is that the lack of vegetation allows the water to be heated by the sun until it becomes lethally hot for the fish. If the fish are adapted to a desert stream with lots of riparian vegetation, and all that vegetation goes away, then the average and maximum temperatures of the stream will increase. There is no hiding in the shade that will help with that, so they just die.

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Boiled fish sounds delish. Although surely the fish will seek out deeper pools and areas shaded by rock walls if they are really effected by the heat?

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

That's what makes him Bambi. It's the Witis way.

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Yep get those innocent animals out of death row. =)

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Originally Posted by Witis

Innocent and guilty men, innocent and guilty animals.
Surely you know that you cannot execute innocent men, similarly you should not be able to murder innocent animals. If you want to be able to legally consume a particular animal then you are going to have to construct a better case than the one you have just presented Niya.

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I legally consume animals all the time. Just today, I ate chicken....

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Originally Posted by Niya

I legally consume animals all the time. Just today, I ate chicken....

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And what is your case against chickens that enables you to feel justified in killing and eating them, what makes you think that you didn't just murder an innocent animal?

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Originally Posted by Witis

And what is your case against chickens that enables you to feel justified in killing and eating them, what makes you think that you didn't just murder an innocent animal?

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Because they taste good. What other reason could there be mate ?

Oh and last I checked, it was perfectly legal to kill, cook and eat chickens.