I would find the existence of vegan cultures to be substantial evidence, if they existed. I do find the existence of lactovegetarian cultures compelling; that is part of why I think milk is a pretty sufficient meat replacement for some people. But AFAICT there aren’t any vegan cultures. There are vegan traditions making up a minority of certain cultures (although there are allegations that it’s more aspirational than obeyed, and because I think it only takes small amounts of meat to gain the nutritional benefits they count as omnivore for my purposes), and there are cultures that can’t afford meat and start eating it once they do (and their health improves with it, although of course wealth can improve health lots of ways).
But the existence of successful lactovegetarian cultures doesn’t make lactovegetarianism a health choice for members of east Asian, sub-Saharan African, or Native American cultures[1] whose members are overwhelmingly lactose intolerant. It doesn’t even make it a healthy choice for northern Europeans with lactose intolerance, even though they’re an anomaly in their culture.
There is some interesting work being done now on genetic differences between vegetarians and omnivores. I don’t put a lot of credence in any one finding at this point, but it makes sense that cultures would adapt their genetics around what food was available to them, and those adaptations would affect the optimal diet of their descendants. It would be weird if that didn’t happen.
FDD, if you want to quantify and make a case for your belief that people who struggle to eat well on a vegan diet are vanishingly rare, I would welcome that, and have laid out what evidence I would find most convincing.
genetics is of course more complicated than this. Continents are not good places to draw genetic lines, there are cultures within those groups that have high rates of lactose tolerance, although off the top of my head they’re all pastoralists and so decidedly not vegetarian.
I would find the existence of vegan cultures to be substantial evidence, if they existed. I do find the existence of lactovegetarian cultures compelling; that is part of why I think milk is a pretty sufficient meat replacement for some people. But AFAICT there aren’t any vegan cultures. There are vegan traditions making up a minority of certain cultures (although there are allegations that it’s more aspirational than obeyed, and because I think it only takes small amounts of meat to gain the nutritional benefits they count as omnivore for my purposes), and there are cultures that can’t afford meat and start eating it once they do (and their health improves with it, although of course wealth can improve health lots of ways).
But the existence of successful lactovegetarian cultures doesn’t make lactovegetarianism a health choice for members of east Asian, sub-Saharan African, or Native American cultures[1] whose members are overwhelmingly lactose intolerant. It doesn’t even make it a healthy choice for northern Europeans with lactose intolerance, even though they’re an anomaly in their culture.
There is some interesting work being done now on genetic differences between vegetarians and omnivores. I don’t put a lot of credence in any one finding at this point, but it makes sense that cultures would adapt their genetics around what food was available to them, and those adaptations would affect the optimal diet of their descendants. It would be weird if that didn’t happen.
FDD, if you want to quantify and make a case for your belief that people who struggle to eat well on a vegan diet are vanishingly rare, I would welcome that, and have laid out what evidence I would find most convincing.
genetics is of course more complicated than this. Continents are not good places to draw genetic lines, there are cultures within those groups that have high rates of lactose tolerance, although off the top of my head they’re all pastoralists and so decidedly not vegetarian.