From: altar@beaufort.sfu.ca (Ted Wayn Altar)
Subject: Re: Little Tyke the Veggy Lion
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 17:45:39 GMT


Abhay (abulsari@aton.abo.fi) writes:

>The story shows one of the blind beliefs that science
>has generated. There are probably hundreds of them in
>the non-physical sciences, and a few in the physical
>sciences as well. Newton's law was the gospel till the
>theory of relativity was understood and found to be
>genuine.

There is the wry remark that if you get two nutritionists on the
same panel, you'll get 3 opinions!  ;-)  :-)  ;-)

Now, anomalies are actually the very stuff of science, as Thomas
Kuhn and others has well-argued.  Good creative science doesn't
discount anomalies prematurely but seeks them out.  The liability
of THEORY BLINDNESS does occur in what Kuhn calls "normal
science", but we must remember that science is a pluralist,
collective enterprise and we should not judge science-as-a-whole-
over-time simply by the stubborn theory blindness that can occur
in the short run among some or even many scientists.  A certain
conservativeness is necessary to ensure that knowledge builds by
cumulatively advancing upon the achievements of the past.

Notwithstanding, I think your point is well taken.  Yes, our
knowledge about human nutrition is incomplete and advice from
mainstream nutritionists have not always shown themselves
judicious or correct in retrospect.  And yes, our knowledge of
non-human animal nutrition is even more incomplete, except maybe
for the nutrition of the white laboratory rat.  ;-(

The phenomena of Little Tyke does pose a question for science.  I
do agree that it would be rash and prejudicial to automatically
and immediately discount the story as a mere hoax.  After all,
the Westbeau's were for many years really quite desperate about
trying to feed some meat products to Little Tyke, they sought
rather than avoided expert advice, they tried all manner of
tricks to get Little Tyke to eat meat, and they were shy of
publicity.  All counter-indications that they were deliberate
hoaxers.

In fact, nothing extraordinary need be postulated to explain
Little Tyke's apparent ability to survive without an obvious
flesh source of taurine.  As I mentioned, we don't really know
how much taurine from insect matter Little Tyke might have been
consuming, nor do we really know the full individual range of
need for taurine in all lions.  After all, RDA levels are always
more than what the greater majority of individuals actually need
biologically, so as to have a built in safety factor for some of
those unusual individuals whose biological need would be much
greater than normal.  Well, there are also unusual individuals
whose dietary need is less than average.

Permit me to say that I do think that the science of nutrition
has made some remarkable advances in recent times and that blind
beliefs are to be found everywhere, not just in science.  In
fact, I think more blind beliefs are to be found outside of
science then within it.

Should we not always be wary of falling into the general anti-
science and anti-intellectualism that is paradoxically present in
Western culture?  Indeed, along with this anti-intellectualism we
have the opposite of an excessive admiration for science that
becomes the quasi-religious attitude of "SCIENTISM".  I think
that a balance of healthy and informed skepticism along with
humility and open-mindedness has to here be constantly sought and
renewed.

Certainly, we need to be fair-minded and weary of our own
prejudices and tendency to self-justify one's own beliefs as
"scientific" but those of one's opponents as "non-scientific" or
due to "scientific blindness".  But as it has always been, the
greater blindness lies in the human heart, especially when it
comes to considering the needs of others, particularly the needs
of the suffering animals that we would wontonly eat as food and
uncaring treat as mere "material resource".

                                             ted


Newsgroups: rec.food.veg