this post was submitted on 29 Mar 2025
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The Climate Crisis
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If livestock was restricted to non-arable land and not fed any arable crops : it would be a net positive, no?
No. Without addressing water sources, if livestock only produced carbon dioxide they might come close to net neutral, but the methane they produce is a huge component of their effect on the climate; that methane simply wouldn't be a factor if the land were left fallow. They also engineer the land, preventing the growth of forest and creation of peat in areas where it would naturally occur.
The methane cycle is from the ruminates eating the grass, which is to say the microbes processing grass. The grass is going to grow with or without ruminates eating it, and microbes will process the grass all the same in a stomach or out on the grassland. I.e. the methane load is a function of the plant growth and not of the animals.
Is that not correct?
No, removing livestock will generally lead to increased vegetation and biodiversity, longer growth and more photosynthesis. There would be an increase in plant litter leading to increased microbial activity - releasing some carbon as CO2, and sequestering most of the rest in the soil.
Methane production would occur in anaerobic conditions (e.g. waterlogged or more compacted soil,) but nowhere near as efficiently as it does in the rumen of livestock.
Clearly the microbes in a ruminant's gut are not the same as the ones in the litter layer on top of the topsoil. For one thing, one would be aerobic and one would be anaerobic. I would not expect them to necessarily have the same byproducts.
The effort you are spending trying hard to find loopholes that allow you to continue consuming animals could be better spent changing your behaviour.
I find optimal health on a ASF diet for medical reasons. That is a requirement in my life, sorry, it's not going to change.
I'm happy to talk about environmental stewardship and what would be the best way to maintain the planet.
Microbes exist outside of animals... that's how they get into animals after all
Even in a Aerobic context biomass creates methane https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-5-937-2008
The natural cycle of nature will include methane, with or without ruminants
ASF diet as in "the carnivore diet"? what are you even doing here
fine, whatever, do what you want, burden the environment as much as a handful of other people, commit wanton and careless cruelty and violence, whatever, but seriously, why are you here trying to pick holes in well-established research? you're not going to change your behaviour either way, you just seem to want to have some kind of justification for your behaviour. if you feel guilty, you're not going to fix it like this. and if you don't, what is motivating you??
I care about the climate, that's why I'm here.
Look at the communities I moderate, I also care about health.
I'm going to give you some honest feedback. You are a jerk, I know you wear the title as a badge of honor - but you are absolutely a top tier jerk. Every conversation you start about food is abusive, and in bad faith. It doesn't further your goals.
You're denying well established science to try to justify your lifestyle. It's time to start being honest with yourself.
My health comes first. Trying to stay healthy and have a sustainable planet should be achievable
I'm sorry but while it might be your first priority, your health condition is irrelevant to the science. The overwhelming majority of the planet's population can get all the nutrients they need from non-animal sources. Dedicating so much land to the raising of livestock is extremely destructive and utterly unnecessarily.
Something like 94% of westerns have sub-optimal metabolic health, 850m (nearly a billion) people have full blown type 2 diabetes... the environmental impact of treating all of these diet based problems is huge, absolutely massive. The USA alone spends 1 billion dollars a day on type 2 diabetes complications.
India leads the world in type 2 diabetes (30%), India also has the highest adherence to PBF diets (at 40%ish)
It is impossible to get type 2 diabetes eating a ASF diet, moving the world to even more carbohydrate heavy foods is going to increase these problems, not reduce them.
We have to be able to be healthy, AND save the planet at the same time.
But I can see we are not having productive discussions, if you would like to help me work with my diet (not changing it) and improve the planet, I'm all ears and eager to do my part. I.e. sustainable ruminants, regenerative agriculture, not using external fertilizer, buying locally, etc
And now we're back to equivocating and straight-up bullshit. The idea that the treatment of diet-based health problems has an environmental impact at anywhere near the level of rearing livestock is so laughable, that it's hard to believe that you're not just trolling now.
"It is impossible to get type 2 diabetes eating a ASF diet."
You mean a zero-carb diet?! I've clearly taken you far more seriously than you deserve - more fool me.
I'd love to engage in productive discussion, but you're clearly being disingenuous and I'm not prepared to waste anymore time with you.
Type 2 diabetes can be considered a form of carbohydrate intolerance. If you don't eat dietary sugar, you don't have elevated blood sugars (under most circumstances outside of very rare thyroid and glandular issues)
This is why ketogenic and zero carb diets can be used to treat (and in some cases) reverse type 2 diabetes.
A diet hat has no carbohydrates, will not spike blood glucose levels, and it will be (nearly) impossible to developed type 2 diabetes.
All of this is true, you can choose not to take me seriously, but the science is correct.
I wish to join your crusade against the scourge of type-2 diabetes. Let's get the whole planet on a keto diet - it's the only way to stamp out what is clearly the biggest threat to civilisation! I'm not sure how we're going to rear all the livestock needed ... perhaps we focus on eating 'long pig' for a generation or two.
People can do vegetarian keto, or even vegan keto
https://www.dietdoctor.com/low-carb/keto/vegetarian
Not everyone needs to do keto, only those who are intolerant of their current carbohydrate load. Some people tolerate carbohydrates well, so its a option for those who don't. My point two posts above is as we increase carbohydrate load we will see higher rates of type 2 diabetes in the general population.
But yes, fixing the scourge of type-2 diabetes and metabolic dysfunction is a top priority.
No comrade - forsake this heresy! Never forget that "It is impossible to get type 2 diabetes eating a ASF diet." To save the planet and eliminate type-2 diabetes and metabolic dysfunction we must convert all available land to the raising of livestock. It is the only way!
Sure, but only non-airable pasture land, and don't forget the oceans can also be productive.
It is impossible to get T2D eating ASF, glad you remembered that.
If we don't act soon, literally the entirety of the world's GDP will be spent on treating type-2 diabetes! It will be totally unavoidable!
For real though, I have to work now. Go tell your jokes to someone else.
Did you actually read that paper? It's talking about hundreds of nanograms of methane produced per gram of plant matter. The rumen produces about 20,000,000ng of methane per gram of grass.
I did, but I didn't see the anaerobic figure of production