Facts about Global Warming

Very recent study indicated that rate of ice melt shocks warming experts !

NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally warned that "at this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions."

Many people are aware that global warming has serious implications for all life on our planet. Animal farming, the burning of fossil fuels by factories, power stations, cars and other forms of transport release huge amounts of gases such as carbon dioxide and methane. These gases create a “green house” effect by trapping the Sun’s heat and warming our planet and atmosphere. However, few people know of the immediate effect that this is having on our Earth. Did you know that from September 3 to 9, 2007, (in just 6 days) 69,000 square miles of Arctic ice melted and disappeared? That’s a piece of ice the size of the state of Florida, USA. The American space agency, NASA, recently revealed satellite images showing that this summer alone, 552 billion tons of ice had melted from the Greenland ice sheet.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with US former Vice-President Al Gore, is bringing attention to this critical situation. On Tuesday, January 15, IPCC Chairman, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, announced at a press conference the urgency of the matter and stated that “lifestyle changes” are one thing that can halt climate change. His message was loud and clear: Don’t eat meat, ride a bike, and be a frugal shopper -- that’s how you can help put the brake on global warming.

Rising sea level and loss of habitats

Scientists are extremely worried because the melting ice is causing a faster rate of global warming as well as immediate changes in climate and weather systems. The reason is because the sea ice acts as a mirror, reflecting about 80% of the Sun’s heat energy back into space. If you take away this mirror, the Sun’s heat will be absorbed directly into the oceans, raising the water temperature more, which in turn melts more ice and causes more warming of the Earth and the seas.

Robert Correll, a scientist who chairs the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, said, “If there is no ice, the ocean is going to continue to heat, and that is going to accelerate the global warming process.” In fact, according to research from University of Washington’s Michael Steele, summer surface temperatures of the Arctic Ocean are the highest ever in recorded history, with some places being 8 degrees Fahrenheit above normal.

The melting of the polar ice caps and the consequent warming of the Earth’s seas could have very serious ramifications according to John Atcheson, a geologist who has headed various government agencies. According to his research, 400,000 million tons of methane gas are trapped in ice structures beneath the ocean floors, which might be released into the atmosphere if the water’s temperature increases by a few degrees. This could be disastrous because methane is 20 times stronger than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas. So, if this massive amount of trapped methane were to be released in to the atmosphere, it would likely cause run-away global warming with devastating consequences for our planet.

Effects on the  Ocean                     

The effects of global warming on the sea’s temperatures have lead to the occurrence of “dead zones” in the ocean. These are massive areas of water that have no life due to oxygen deprivation and the release of poisonous hydrogen sulfide gas (H2S). According to reports from the United Nations, over 200 of these dead zones now exist. One that emerged in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Oregon, USA, in the last year has increased four times in size. Jane Lubchenco, a professor of marine biology at Oregon State University said that there is nearly a complete absence of oxygen in this area. When the oxygen disappears a new bacteria takes over and produces hydrogen sulfide gas, which is lethal to most marine and terrestrial life. The two main reasons for the lower levels of oxygen in the water are both related to global warming: (1) As the water gets warmer it has less ability to absorb oxygen; (2) The disruption of the water currents and weather prevents oxygen being transported to the area. Some scientists say that this could be a sign of things to come for the Earth’s oceans.

 

We can reverse this!

The good news is that, it’s not too late to turn things around. One of the top experts on global warming and the head of NASA’s climate research, Dr. James Hansen, wrote in a recent letter: “We have not passed a point of no return. We can still roll things back in time but it is going to require a quick turn in direction.” Various governments and organizations have been taking action and trying to find further solutions. Most recently in Bali, Indonesia, an international conference brought together diplomats representing nations around the world who came together to try and find ways to save the planet.

However, as Dr. Hansen often likes to remind people, the answer is for every person to take personal responsibility for their actions. Hence, changes to our lifestyle are significant. That means taking public transport more and walking or using a bicycle, using bio-fuels instead of fossil fuels, using energy-efficient appliances and unplugging when not in use and buying only what we really need. These are all small steps that every individual can take to save this beautiful planet. The most important change, as emphasized by IPCC Chairman Dr. Pachauri, is to stop eating meat.

 

Vegetarian Diet, the Most Effective Way to Stop Global Warming

There are numerous ways that are commonly known to reduce carbon dioxide emissions: reducing fossil fuel usage; engaging in renewable energies such as solar or wind power; reducing, reusing and recycling everyday items; driving a fuel-efficient or alternative energy car; using energy-saving electronics, and others. Yet the most powerful way to stop global warming is to adopt a vegetarian diet!

The United Nations’ report on livestock and the environment published in 2006 revealed that, “The livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental crisis, at every scale from local to global.” Almost a fifth (20 percent) of carbon emissions come from livestock - that’s more emissions than from all of the world’s transportation combined!

Industrialized animal-based agriculture is “astonishingly” the main cause of environmental destruction and greenhouse gas emissions.

Raising animals for food is one of the largest sources of carbon dioxide and the single largest source of both methane and nitrous oxide emissions. The livestock sector accounts for 9 percent of carbon dioxide, 65 percent of nitrous oxide and 37 percent of methane produced from human-related activities. Both methane (20 times) and nitrous oxide (296 times) are considerably more potent greenhouse gases than carbon dioxide. Livestock also generates 64 percent of human-related ammonia, which contributes to acid rain.  

It is also a major source of land and water damage and pollution. Livestock currently use 30 percent of the Earth’s land surface, and even more land and water is used to grow the feed for livestock. According to Mr. Steinfeld, the senior author of the Food and Agriculture Organization report, Livestock’s Long Shadow–Environmental Issues and Options, livestock is the “major driver of deforestation … some 70 percent of former forests in the Amazon have been turned over to grazing.” In addition, animal-based agriculture causes land degradation. About 20 percent of pastures are degraded through overgrazing, compaction and erosion. It is also responsible for vast water consumption and pollution. In the USA alone, trillions of gallons of irrigation water is used to grow crops to feed animals annually. This is about 85 percent of the USA’s fresh water resources. Animals also generate excessive amounts of biological waste for the ecosystem to take.

Water consumption in generating one kilo of food in US
animal-based agriculture

Besides the damages to the environment and ecosystem, it is not hard to calculate that animal-based agriculture is the least energy-efficient practice; it takes enormous energy to convert livestock to meat on people’s dining table. Producing one kilogram of meat causes carbon dioxide emissions equivalent to 36.4 kilos. It is calculated that to produce one calorie of protein takes only two calories of fossil fuel for soybean, three calories for corn and wheat, but it takes 54 calories of petroleum energy for beef protein!

It means it takes 27 times as much fossil fuel energy to make a hamburger as it takes to make a soy burger!

In combination of energy cost, water consumption, land usage, environmental pollution, ecosystem disruption, it is not surprising to learn that one meat-based diet could feed 15 plant-based diets or more.

Last year, researchers from the Department of Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago, Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin, also disclosed the connections between food production and environmental problems. They quantified the greenhouse gas consequences of red meat, fish, poultry, milk and eggs, and compared those numbers to a vegan diet. They found that switching from the standard American diet to a plant-based diet could result in preventing an extra ton and a half of greenhouse emissions per person per year. By contrast, switching from a standard sedan like a Toyota Camry to a hybrid Toyota Prius saves about one ton of CO₂ emissions.

 

 

The choice is right in your kitchen: Even if one chooses to close their eyes to the ethical cruelty in animal-based agriculture, the urgency of stopping climate change and how to do it is clear. And it’s not just the vegetarians or environmentalists who are saying it; now the head of an international body, Dr. Pachauri, has announced to the world that the effects of meat-eating are detrimental to our planet and that we should stop eating meat in order to turn things around. Yet it comes down to people’s choice. We’re all responsible for a cooler, cleaner and healthier Earth. So simply start in your kitchen: choose a vegetarian diet and help reverse climate change.

 

Health Benefits of Vegetarian Diet

Why go vegetarian?

Better question to ask:  Why not go vegetarian?

 

Studies of human evolution have shown that our ancestors were vegetarian by nature. The structure of the human body is not suited for eating meat. This was demonstrated in an essay on comparative anatomy by Dr. G. S. Huntingen of Columbia University. He pointed out that carnivores have short small and large intestines. Their large intestine is characteristically very straight and smooth. In contrast, vegetarian animals have both a long small intestine and a long large intestine. Because of the low fiber content and high protein density of meat, the intestines do not require a long time to absorb nutrients; thus, the intestines of carnivores are shorter in length than those of vegetarian animals.

Humans, like other naturally vegetarian animals, have both a long small and large intestine. Together, our intestines are approximately twenty-eight feet (eight and a half meters) in length. The small intestine is folded back on itself many times, and its walls are convoluted, not smooth. Because they are longer than those found in carnivores, the meat we eat stays in our intestines for a longer period of time. Consequently, the meat can putrefy and create toxins. These toxins have been implicated as a cause of colon cancer, and they also increase the burden on the liver, which has the function of getting rid of toxins. This can cause cirrhosis and even cancer of the liver.

Meat contains a lot of urokinase protein and urea, which add to the burden on the kidneys, and can destroy kidney function. There are fourteen grams of urokinase protein in every pound of steak. If living cells are put into liquid urokinase protein, their metabolic function will degenerate. Furthermore, meat lacks cellulose or fiber, and lack of fiber can easily create constipation. It is known that constipation can cause rectal cancer or piles.

The cholesterol and saturated fats in flesh also create cardiovascular disorders. Cardiovascular disorders are the number one leading cause of death in the United States, and now in Formosa.

Cancer is the second leading cause of death. Experiments indicate that the burning and roasting of flesh creates a chemical element (Methylcholanthrene) which is a powerful carcinogen. Mice given this chemical develop cancers, such as bone tumors, cancer of the blood, cancer of the stomach, etc.

Research has shown that infant mice fed by a female mouse having breast cancer will also develop cancer. When human cancer cells were injected into animals, the animals also developed cancer. If the meat which we eat daily comes from animals that originally have such disorders, and we take them into our body, there is a good chance we will also get the diseases.

Most people assume that meat is clean and safe, that there are inspections done at all butcheries. There are far too many cattle, pigs, poultry, etc. killed for sale every day for each one to actually be examined. It's very difficult to check whether a piece of meat has cancer in it, let alone check every single animal. Currently, the meat industry just cuts off the head when it has a problem, or cuts off the leg which is diseased. Only the bad parts are removed and the rest is sold.

The famous vegetarian, Dr. J. H. Kellogg said, "When we eat vegetarian food, we don't have to worry about what kind of disease the food died of. This makes a joyful meal!"

There is yet another concern. Antibiotics as well as other drugs including steroids and growth hormones are either added to animal feed or injected directly into the animals. It has been reported that people eating these animals will absorb these drugs into their bodies. There is a possibility that antibiotics in meat are diminishing the effectiveness of antibiotics for human use.

There are some people who consider the vegetarian diet not sufficiently nourishing. An American surgical expert, Dr. Miller, practiced medicine for forty years in Formosa. He established a hospital there, where all the meals were vegetarian, for staff members as well as the patients. He said, "The mouse is one kind of animal which can support its life with both a vegetarian and non-vegetarian diet. If two mice are segregated, with one eating flesh and the other vegetarian food, we find that their growth and development are the same, but that the vegetarian mouse lives longer and has greater resistance to disease. Furthermore, when the two mice got sick, the vegetarian mouse recovered quicker." He then added, "The medicine given to us by modern science has improved greatly, but it can only treat illnesses. Food, however, can sustain our health." He pointed out that, "Food from plants is a more direct source of nutrition than meat. People eat animals, but the source of nutrition for the animals we eat is plants. The lives of most animals are short, and animals have nearly all the diseases that mankind has. It is very likely that the diseases of mankind come from eating the flesh of diseased animals. So, why don't people get their nutrition directly from plants?" Dr. Miller suggested that we only need cereals, beans and vegetables to get all the nourishment we need to maintain good health.

Many people have the idea that animal protein is 'superior' to plant protein because the former is considered a complete protein, and the latter is incomplete. The truth is that some plant proteins are complete, and that food combining can create complete proteins out of several incomplete protein foods.

In March 1988 the American Dietetic Association announced that: "It is the position of the ADA that vegetarian diets are healthful and nutritionally adequate when appropriately planned."

It is often falsely believed that meat eaters are stronger than vegetarians, but an experiment conducted by Professor Irving Fisher of Yale University on 32 vegetarians and 15 meat-eaters showed that vegetarians had more endurance than meat eaters. He had people hold out their arms for as long as possible. The outcome from the test was very clear. Among the 15 meat-eaters, only two persons could hold out their arms for fifteen to thirty minutes; however, among the 32 vegetarians, 22 persons held out their arms for fifteen to thirty minutes, 15 persons for over thirty minutes, 9 persons for over one hour, 4 persons for over two hours, and one vegetarian held his arms out for over three hours.

Many long distance track athletes keep a vegetarian diet for the time preceding competitions. Dr. Barbara More, an expert in vegetarian therapy, completed a one hundred and ten mile race in twenty-seven hours and thirty minutes. A woman of fifty-six years of age, she broke all the records held by young men. "I want to be an example to show that people who take a whole vegetarian diet will enjoy a strong body, a clear mind, and a purified life."

Does the vegetarian get enough protein in his diet? The World Health Organization recommends that 4.5% of daily calories be derived from protein. Wheat has 17% of it's calories as protein, broccoli has 45% and rice has 8%. It is very easy to have a protein rich diet without eating meat. With the additional benefit of avoiding the many diseases caused by high fat diets such as heart disease and many cancers, vegetarianism is clearly the superior choice.

The relationship between over consumption of meat, and other animal source foods containing high levels of saturated fats, and heart disease, breast cancer, colon cancer and strokes has been proven. Other diseases which are often prevented and sometimes cured by a low fat vegetarian diet include: kidney stones, prostate cancer, diabetes, peptic ulcers, gallstones, irritable bowel syndrome, arthritis, gum disease, acne, pancreatic cancer, stomach cancer, hypoglycemia, constipation, diverticulosis, hypertension, osteoporosis, ovarian cancer, hemorrhoids, obesity, and asthma.

There is no greater personal health risk than eating meat, aside from smoking.

 

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