From: alexpace@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Alex L. Pace)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Pollution and Cows
Date: 28 Jan 1993 09:34:10 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin
NNTP-Posting-Host: donald.cc.utexas.edu

In article <C1H5vB.22v@wpg.com> russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence) writes:

>> Is ammonia an acid?

>Do your homework, Alex.  I'm sure you can find plenty of texts in 
>your school library that will explain the mechanisms underlying 
>phenomena like acid rain, desertification, etc.  One source that 

Please explain this, How would a base like ammonia become an acid?  What
does it react with?  The texts that I've ready about acid rain all point to
Sulfer Dixoxide as the culprit.  As I understand It the SuO2 reacts with
H2O to yield H2SO4, sulfuric acid.  I may be wrong but at least I've posted
a posibility...why do you think ammonia is acidic?

>nitric acid from the atmosphere.  

Upps looks like I replied too soon, now its nitric acid?  Is this from the
ammonia nitrate?  How does it get into the air anyway?  Ammonia Nitrate
fertilizer is usually distributed in pellet form so I'm unclear on how it
gets into the atmosphere.  Sulfer Dioxide on the other hand is a gas and is
released as an industrial waste.

>Incidently, I'm sure that the standard EB text article on "methane"
>would explain that this gas is produced by anaerobic decay of
>plant material, rather than aerobic decay.

Once again, anaerobic decay occurs in the belly of the nitrogen fixing
micro organisms.  The nitrogen cycle is hard at work in the cow pasture,
the testbook I have teaching the nitrogen cycle features a picture of a
cow, the cow shits and the microbes break it down anaerobicly, the nitrogen
is put into the soil and the gas released.  The grass uses the nitrogen
compound to help it grow and absorbs it.  The cow eats the grass and shits
it back out and the cycle repeats itself.  Does anyone else remember this
from biology study?  Am I in left field here?

>> Thats exactly the point! most of the petrol is used in producing grain.  It
>> doenst significantly increase the total amount if you use that grain for
>> producing cows.
>
>Think about it, Alex.  If a country needs to produce three times 
>as much grain to feed cattle and humans (rather than humans 
>alone), then it's obvious that three times as much gas and 
>fertilizer and herbicide will also be required.  Perhaps even 
>more, since higher levels of productivity may be difficult to 
>achieve without using more intensive methods.  

In case you didnt understand what I was getting at, I was claiming that the
additional input to get meat from grain was small compared to the initial
input to get the grain in the first place.  In other words, the opportunity
cost of recieving meat from grain is smaller than the opportunity cost in
achieving the grain in the first place.  

Semi-New contention:
I propose that since most cows, at least in Texas, eat Hay; the cost of
growing grain for human consumption is much more than the cost of grain for
cattle consumption.  As I mentioned previously, Hay doesnt require
pesticide or even to be planted for that matter, it merely needs to be
mowed and baled.  It may be that hay is even good for the environment if
you consider oxygen release.  Such being the case I propose that the 30%
consumed by people is at least as great a hazard, maybe more of one, than
the 70% for cattle.  Human grain is often hybrid and the resultant 2nd
generation grain sterile so that holding supplies back is not an option,
many cuttings of the same plant have been cloned and the seed from the
first generation is used.


>>>Again, 70% of the grain produced in the US in 1990 was consumed
>>>by cattle.  Did this grain require replanting, Alex?

The Hay didnt require replanting, Hay is almost 100% of the non grazing
diet of cows in east texas.

>> It seems that you are taking the position that grain is bad for the
>> environment (ie methane release, petrol use, and ammonia) and that
>> livestock is bad because it perpetrates grain production.  Doesnt it occur
>> to you that if people dont eat livestock then they'll have to eat grain and
>> this grain must be produced anyway?  
>
>As I explained previously, it takes roughly 200kilos of grain to 
>support a vegan for a year.  It takes far more grain to support
>"carnivores" like yourself.

If I'm a carnivore I'm also a herbabore....Ha!  I'm an omnivore!
Question: If america stopped eating meat, you say 70% of the grain would be
freed up, how much of THAT grain would we need to support ourselves? All of
it? 90% of it? Without meat we'll all surely have to eat more grain?  If
cows can eat substandard grain such as hay, will all of this have to be
replaced by more expensive and environmentally damaging grain that is fit
for humans?  If you are going to convince people not to eat meat, your
gonna have to offer them something more appatizing than Hay.


>> I dont see where you get any net
>> environmental gain because the beef if fairly benign and the grain will
>> still be produced?  
>
>What makes you think that the grain would still be produced?

This puzzles me, on one had you say that we will have this huge surplus of
grain and on the other you hint that it might not be produced at all?

>> Isnt it clear that it doesnt matter if a person farts
>> or a cow fart that the methane is still there?  

>This doesn't make much sense, Alex.  Would the methane still
>be there if the cow were non-existent and the human didn't fart
>at all?

I didnt know you were advocating extinction for the cow?  And what is this
about humans not farting at all?  If we have no cow, we'll all have to eat
more beans.  Perhaps if we had a nuclear war then no living organisms would
emit methane, but there would be a surge of it as all the living things
that were not incinerated, slowly rot and release it.

>As I pointed out previously, you appear to be rationalizing
>your responses in order to justify the practice of livestock
>farming.

As I pointed out previously, you appear to be using pseudo facts to
rationalize a moral decision.  						  

>Russell Lawrence, WP Group, New Orleans (504) 443-5000

alex the omnivore