today we're going to talk about climate change. more specifically we're going to talk about why i think vegetarians contribute more to global warming than people who eat meat.
This discussion will not be so broad as to indirect contributions of vegetarians through the need for more agricultural processing to be done for them. Instead, it will focus directly on the production of GHG's, or greenhouse gasses.
While much hyped in the media, what exactly constitutes a GHG? In short, a GHG is a gaseous emission that, one present in the Earth's atmosphere, contributes to what is known as the 'greenhouse effect', or the warming of the Earth through the trapping of certain types of radiation such as infrared.
Thus we can easily deduce that in order to be considered a GHG, a gaseous substance must be emitted directly into the atmosphere. It now becomes important to determine which gas or gasses are considered to belong to this group.
A large number of gasses can be considered culprits here, but the Big Three that make up most GHG emissions are, in order of volume, Carbon Dioxide, Methane, and Nitrous Oxide.
Now consider the following: human beings expel Carbon Dioxide after an inhalation. Therefore, we can deduce that all people are contributing to GHG emissions through the act of exhalation. We can further deduce that people who have dental work done are often given Nitrous Oxide to dull any pain. Therefore, we can surmise that people who have dental work done are far guiltier than those people who simply exhale.
This, of course, leaves Methane gas, the second most abundant GHG, left to consider. By examining this gas we will be able to show how vegetarians contribute more to global warming than non vegetarians.
Methane gas is a composite gas of what we commonly call Flatulence. This gas is produced in the body when foods are digested in the gastrointestinal tract and is expelled through the anus in a, sometimes audible, burst. Not all foods will produce methane when digested. It is this distinction that is important for this discussion.
What foods do in fact cause the Flatule Effect? Common foods that contribute to methane gas formation and expulsion in the human body are broccoli, brussels sprouts, asparagus, carrots, apricots, raisins, cauliflower, radishes, bananas, prunes, eggplant, bran, nuts and legumes, cabbage, celery, cucumbers, kohlrabi, rutabaga, turnip, garlic, leeks, fennel, sunflower seeds, poppy seeds, beans, peas, mushrooms, onions, artichokes, pears, wheat, cheese, apples, corn, and potatoes to name a few.
It is important to note the lack of any meats present in the aforementioned brief list of Flatule Effect producing foods.
We can now deduce that, pound for pound, vegetarians must consume greater amounts of food in the list to ingest the same amount of nutrients taken in by an omnivorous diet. A comparison would simply be that a vegetarian must eat more beans during one meal in order to gain the same nutritional benefits as someone who included a ten ounce Rib Eye steak in their meal.
Thus we can infer that because vegetarians must consume greater quantities of flatulence producing foods, that during digestion they will in fact produce a higher volume of methane gas needing to be expelled than a meat eater. This larger volume of gas then exits the body by way of an odorous discharge and enters the atmosphere. Once this has occurred, the methane expelled from the vegetarians' body is now considered a composite gas of GHG emissions.
Simplified, we see that:
VD = +FPF = +MGP = +GHG
where VD = Vegetarian Diet, +FPF = Increased Consumption of Flatulence Producing Foods, +MGP = Increased Methane Gas Production, +GHG = Increased levels of Greenhouse Gas Emissions.
Conclusively, it can be argued that, while vegetarians claim to have better diets than their meat eating counterparts, they are contributing to the slow death of the world by farting more than the rest of us.
