Raj, thanks for mentioning this! I was super curious about this and learned that they color farmed salmon with astaxanthin. There's a palette of pink/orange hues (like palettes for painting walls!!!). Salmon factories choose the hue, which is (according to Claude) the most expensive component of growing salmon but the companies I guess invest on this because the color is what sells the salmon as fresh. I can't believe it!!! 🙄 Now what do I do with this information? Let's ruin people's salmon meals.
That's because "you are what you eat". Fish, fowl, beef/pork... *humans* -- we're all the same in that regard. Wild salmon eat krill, which gives them the characteristic red-pink hue (and the all-important nutrients). Factory-farmed fish, chickens, pigs, and and and, eat omega6-rich grain (not a good thing); and we, in turn, eat *them*. But not a word about that in this article.
Thank you for this article. Kuznets curves are an important tool in several major areas, especially environmentalism, and there is a need to apply them to animal welfare.
That said, the balance of evidence on EKC is rather ambiguous. For some environmental impacts, some researchers have found evidence of Kuznets curves. For other impacts, the evidence is weak or nonexistent.
The biggest theoretical issue with the EKC is empirical results are usually determined from cross-sectional data, but they are employed to make temporal claims. The two are often very different. In my work on urban scaling, I frequently find the same problem whereby scaling research also conflates cross-sectional and temporal data.
Optimistically, I think there is a good case to be made that increasing wealth creates the conditions for better welfare standards, and in the long run, less animal meat consumption overall. But realizing those conditions requires the hard and contentious work of policy change and cultural values, for which increasing wealth alone is no substitute.
Has there been a comprehensive study comparing the long-term health implications of consuming animals raised intensively with those raised more naturally?
By the latter, I mean native or mixed breeds of:
1) Sheep and goats tended by nomadic shepherds;
2) Chickens roaming freely on agro-farms;
3) Cattle regularly allowed to graze freely; and
4) Similarly raised pigs and other birds
Provided, of course, that they live in reasonably healthy, non-polluted conditions.
Animals raised with more space, natural movement, varied diet, and lower production pressures may not only have better welfare but could also produce meat and eggs with different nutritional profiles.
I wonder, therefore, whether we are missing a larger question:
Does how an animal lives materially affect the long-term health of the human who eats it?
It might. The role of stress hormones is particularly intriguing, although the evidence linking animal stress biomarkers to human health remains far from conclusive.
Fish may be a different case altogether, given the additional variable of marine pollution.
"In June 1973, chestnut colt Secretariat ran the Belmont Stakes so fast that no horse has matched him since. Fifty years later, billions of dollars have been poured into breeding and training, yet Secretariat’s record still stands.
This is the paradox of the thoroughbred: breeders have spent centuries trying to create a faster horse, but in doing so, they may have bred away the very genetic diversity that would allow the horse to keep improving, or even to remain robust . . .
. . . In nature, [genetic] diversity is maintained by competing selection pressures that balance one trait against another. A wild horse does not just need to be fast. Its bones need to last. It needs to be resistant to disease. Even a domesticated working horse would, before intensive breeding began, face natural constraints on its traits."
I was asking a theoretical question. You refused to engage in the question and went back to the answer you wanted in the first place — “don’t be cruel.” An understandable position for sure.
Great question Indrajeet and I would love to see this research too! Could be a strong argument against factory farming.
I know Edacious is moving in this direction measuring nutrient density differences for one product type from different sources.
A study on this topic needs to have a) very long timelines, and b) huge sample size to filter out other factors driving health outcome differences (e.g. I imagine that consumers who consume free-roaming chicken would often have different health care access, occupations, etc.)
The comment is based on my observation that people living closer to nature are tougher - at least less prone to season-change illnesses and lifestyle diseases.
Such as those who work on farms, nomadic shepherds and cattle rearers, forest dwellers, and the like.
People from the older generation particularly caught my eye - not as big as the present generation, but definitely tougher.
But then, such people are/were also less stress-prone. Maybe because they don't/didn't overthink! Be as it may, this makes your point of having a sufficiently large and diversified sample size for the study particularly relevant.
Blind taste tests tens not to find taste differences between small humane farmed eggs and factory farmed eggs, IIRC. But the difference in treatment and freshness is easy to spot in cooking :)
Epidemic diseases likely will eventually knock these out. Imagine pig Ebola like illness in a high rise of pigs. They would have to burn the place. Nature thrives on diversity of life, single species are just not part of nature.
Reminds me of the fact that farmed salmon needs additive color since they don't develop that beautiful pink hue in their water pens
Raj, thanks for mentioning this! I was super curious about this and learned that they color farmed salmon with astaxanthin. There's a palette of pink/orange hues (like palettes for painting walls!!!). Salmon factories choose the hue, which is (according to Claude) the most expensive component of growing salmon but the companies I guess invest on this because the color is what sells the salmon as fresh. I can't believe it!!! 🙄 Now what do I do with this information? Let's ruin people's salmon meals.
It's a bummer because I want to support aqua farming (we need as many solutions as we can get). But I just can't get past the coloring piece.
That's because "you are what you eat". Fish, fowl, beef/pork... *humans* -- we're all the same in that regard. Wild salmon eat krill, which gives them the characteristic red-pink hue (and the all-important nutrients). Factory-farmed fish, chickens, pigs, and and and, eat omega6-rich grain (not a good thing); and we, in turn, eat *them*. But not a word about that in this article.
Wow! I did not know
Thank you for this article. Kuznets curves are an important tool in several major areas, especially environmentalism, and there is a need to apply them to animal welfare.
That said, the balance of evidence on EKC is rather ambiguous. For some environmental impacts, some researchers have found evidence of Kuznets curves. For other impacts, the evidence is weak or nonexistent.
The biggest theoretical issue with the EKC is empirical results are usually determined from cross-sectional data, but they are employed to make temporal claims. The two are often very different. In my work on urban scaling, I frequently find the same problem whereby scaling research also conflates cross-sectional and temporal data.
Optimistically, I think there is a good case to be made that increasing wealth creates the conditions for better welfare standards, and in the long run, less animal meat consumption overall. But realizing those conditions requires the hard and contentious work of policy change and cultural values, for which increasing wealth alone is no substitute.
Digressing slightly . . .
Has there been a comprehensive study comparing the long-term health implications of consuming animals raised intensively with those raised more naturally?
By the latter, I mean native or mixed breeds of:
1) Sheep and goats tended by nomadic shepherds;
2) Chickens roaming freely on agro-farms;
3) Cattle regularly allowed to graze freely; and
4) Similarly raised pigs and other birds
Provided, of course, that they live in reasonably healthy, non-polluted conditions.
Animals raised with more space, natural movement, varied diet, and lower production pressures may not only have better welfare but could also produce meat and eggs with different nutritional profiles.
I wonder, therefore, whether we are missing a larger question:
Does how an animal lives materially affect the long-term health of the human who eats it?
It might. The role of stress hormones is particularly intriguing, although the evidence linking animal stress biomarkers to human health remains far from conclusive.
Fish may be a different case altogether, given the additional variable of marine pollution.
Speaking of living closer to nature and natural selection, here is some related text from another piece from Works in Progress at https://www.worksinprogress.news/p/why-horses-have-stopped-getting-faster (not verbatim):
"In June 1973, chestnut colt Secretariat ran the Belmont Stakes so fast that no horse has matched him since. Fifty years later, billions of dollars have been poured into breeding and training, yet Secretariat’s record still stands.
This is the paradox of the thoroughbred: breeders have spent centuries trying to create a faster horse, but in doing so, they may have bred away the very genetic diversity that would allow the horse to keep improving, or even to remain robust . . .
. . . In nature, [genetic] diversity is maintained by competing selection pressures that balance one trait against another. A wild horse does not just need to be fast. Its bones need to last. It needs to be resistant to disease. Even a domesticated working horse would, before intensive breeding began, face natural constraints on its traits."
If stress hormones made meat taste better or more nutritious, could we argue for less humane treatment?
Nope.
Doubt that can be the case.
Stress silently causes / aggravates diseases. Meat from stressed animals is therefore less likely to be more nutritious.
I was asking a theoretical question. You refused to engage in the question and went back to the answer you wanted in the first place — “don’t be cruel.” An understandable position for sure.
Answered your question in the first word of the reply.
Your refusal to understand is not understandable.
Great question Indrajeet and I would love to see this research too! Could be a strong argument against factory farming.
I know Edacious is moving in this direction measuring nutrient density differences for one product type from different sources.
A study on this topic needs to have a) very long timelines, and b) huge sample size to filter out other factors driving health outcome differences (e.g. I imagine that consumers who consume free-roaming chicken would often have different health care access, occupations, etc.)
Agree!
The comment is based on my observation that people living closer to nature are tougher - at least less prone to season-change illnesses and lifestyle diseases.
Such as those who work on farms, nomadic shepherds and cattle rearers, forest dwellers, and the like.
People from the older generation particularly caught my eye - not as big as the present generation, but definitely tougher.
But then, such people are/were also less stress-prone. Maybe because they don't/didn't overthink! Be as it may, this makes your point of having a sufficiently large and diversified sample size for the study particularly relevant.
Our home-raised eggs taste better, hold together better in poaching and soft-boiling, and we think they make fluffier lighter cakes and mousses.
But very hard to prove this!
Blind taste tests tens not to find taste differences between small humane farmed eggs and factory farmed eggs, IIRC. But the difference in treatment and freshness is easy to spot in cooking :)
Yes, that's why I said it was hard to prove : there are a lot of factors going into our tasting of them!
Epidemic diseases likely will eventually knock these out. Imagine pig Ebola like illness in a high rise of pigs. They would have to burn the place. Nature thrives on diversity of life, single species are just not part of nature.
Fascinating reading and well crafted.