Feeling Upset? Look At Some Meat 155
Meshach writes "A study out of Canada claims that seeing meat actually calms a person down. From the article: 'Contrary to expectations, a McGill University researcher has discovered that seeing meat makes people significantly less aggressive. Frank Kachanoff, who studies evolution at the university’s department of psychology, had initially thought the presence of meat would provoke bloodlust, believing the response would have helped our primate ancestors hunt. But in fact, his research showed the reverse is true.'" I can see all the "Make Steak, Not War!" protest signs already.
Go tell that to PETA (Score:3, Funny)
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Re:Go tell that to PETA (Score:5, Funny)
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Yeah, such preference might have made evolutionary sense for most of time our species exists (plus those leading to us...), when meat was much more scarce.
Now...it seems like a lot of people still fall into that instinct, of course. Daily, many times a day... (similar with alcohol probably; out of three fruits: fresh, fermented and rotten - two are better. Which means beings with some preference towards alcohol might have slight evolutionary advantage, thanks to additional calories now and then. But now eff
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But some random fermented fruit would most likely give more energy than its alcohol content "burns", don't you think?
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Alcohole is metabolized in the liver and requires you to expand energy in order to dispose of the poison and turn it into the harmless fats
Not that I'm here to fight, but that still may be a net energy gain.
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Hence why he said it's being stored as fat. I thought he was making a joke.
Alcohol consumption raises the levels of cortisol in your system - which makes you store more fat around the belly area; it also reduces testosterone levels, making it harder to build muscle. Artificial sweeteners have been linked to cortisol levels too since at least some of them are broken down by the liver.
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Alcohol itself is not stored as fat. Only a small percentage of it would actually directly turn into fat. It's the fact that alcohol energy takes precedence over other sources of energy that causes fat to be stored.
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My mouth you insensitive somethingorother.
ironically (Score:2, Interesting)
think : its no different than eating potatoes all the time. same and same. but, we are conditioned by the society to think that we are actually eating well, because, well, we are eating meat. this is reminiscent of the earlier centuries in which meat was hard to find, and therefore considered a r
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Re:ironically (Score:5, Informative)
You cannot taste the difference between different kinds of meat? beef pork lamb etc...!?
Let alone the difference between a flank steak and a porterhouse?
Really? Wow!
I can tell you that there is an obvious difference in the flavor of the meat on the two sides of a porterhouse steak.
Is there a test for tastebuds? I think you may be missing something.
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I know plenty of people who claim this and it's for the same two or three reasons every time.
1: They smoke, and have done so for so long that they cannot taste much of anything.
2: They are the people who drown everything in salt, pepper or some other spice so that the natural flavor or the dish gets overwhelmed no matter what they are eating
3: Bad cooking, they grew up with a bad cook and never learned how to do it on their own so now they just ignore the flavor of what they eat without thinking about it
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Yup, sorry, that proves it unity100.
There is definitely something wrong with you if all of that tastes the same to you.
Really, I'm not trying to be an ass here, I would ask a doctor if there is something that can be done.
I don't care if you ever like meat or not but think about all the rest of the flavors you are missing if you cannot distinguish such huge differences in flavors.
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Yup, sorry, that proves it unity100. There is definitely something wrong with you if all of that tastes the same to you.
Really, I'm not trying to be an ass here, I would ask a doctor if there is something that can be done.
I don't care if you ever like meat or not but think about all the rest of the flavors you are missing if you cannot distinguish such huge differences in flavors.
Seeing a doctor is probably a bit extreme unless you are wealthy. I probably can't discriminate a whole lot better than Unity can. I can differentiate between well prepared (steak vs pork vs chicken vs fish), but not (chicken vs turkey) or (ham vs bacon) or (salmon vs cod), let alone different sides of the same porterhouse.
Also, those distinctions are minuscule compared to (steak vs ground beef), (chicken vs scrambled eggs), or (tuna vs bubble gum). Just to provide some perspective, meat differentiation isn
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but if you label hot brown liquid "coffee" and make the room smell like coffee, people will generally think it is coffee?
Works in our office. They also have carpet cleaner powder in canisters and label it 'creamer'. Only the best for our employees!
ehhhhh (Score:2)
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You just cant accept that you are wrong on this one can you.
Whatever, I have better things to do than argue colors with a blind man.
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i cant start even telling that, that limits the things that can be differentiated, TO FOUR.
and if this is what you are advertising meat to me over, really, dont bother.
Re:ironically (Score:4, Informative)
WTF, have you HAD lamb? Lamb taste nothing like beef ( I won't even argue on grain vs grass fed, but blind fold me and I'll tell you the difference ).
If your saying you can grind up lamb, pork, beef and hide them inside stews with enormous amounts of spices, after perhaps you boiled the crap out of it, then yeah.. you win.. you can't tell the difference. But guess what, I can do the same thing with vegetables, fish, chicken, old leather shoes.... I can over cook and improperly pair bell peppers in a dish and you won't be able to tell what's a piece of pepper and what's a chunk of celery. All that'll remain is some sort of celouse like material.
Let's talk about what doesn't dominate a food it's put into. Fish? Dominate. Root vegetables? Dominate. Gourds? My god, try and sneak a little pumpkin into something.
Moot point really being taste are such an individual trait. Also I think environment plays a huge role in this. What you were fed as a child, what you choose to eat later in life, what meal your mom made you after your dad left home. My only suggestion to this whole argument is don't take such polarizing stand on something so non-determinable...
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WTF, have you HAD lamb?
No. In America, we've got Cow + Pig + chicken + fish. We've also got Turkey and Corn. Sheep get raised a lot more for wool than for eating, here, I guess *shrugs*
Actually - mostly "lamb" is actually "goat" (Score:2)
Sheep are valuable for wool, and are rarely killed for meat(lamb) when goats are available.
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Then the question is .. can you tell Lamb from Kid? I guess it proves our point that the meat is interchangeable if you can change the species and they keep calling it lamb. 8I
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I can tell the difference between kid and goat as well as between lamb and mutton(sheep).
The difference between goat and sheep of any age is so huge I can't imagine that anyone couldn't tell the difference.
The butcher shops around Chicago that sell goat usually also sell lamb, and even just to look at them they are obviously different, let alone the smell or flavor.
You veggies seem to need be so sure that everyone else is wrong and you present your "common knowledge" as firsthand knowledge.
Those of us that
"lamb" is actually not commonly consumed here (Score:2)
How about you just stop pretending you know anything about meat and we'll go on not caring what you do or don't eat?
Well, we could start by admitting you know nothing about me. I'm not a vegetarian, and I don't see anyone else this far down the thread who says that they are either. Why don't you look at some meat and calm down. :P
I eat meat in some form in pretty much every meal, and have my whole life, though the meat selection is largely beef, some chicken and a little pork from time to time. However I live in a small town, on the West Coast, and I'm not certain what a butcher's shop even looks like. I eat fast food, t
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I live in N. America as well. While my lamb may not come from America ( I prefer the taste of kiwi lamb ) I still eat it regularly in the US. I almost always have a pack of frozen baby-lamb chops in the freezer waiting for mild summer day to grill them on my rooftop in NYC and serve them with a little dill, garlic, oil and grilled lemons....
No one ever says to me "Wow, is this beef of some kind?"....
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Interesting. I feel the same about seafood. It all has the same underlying "came from the sea" flavor, and dominates any food it is put into.
But I can tell the difference between a ribeye and a strip. I can tell the difference between different strips.
Yes geekprime, some people have difficulty distinguishing flavors. If no one ever made me learn the difference between purple and blue, I might just think they were different shades of the same thing.
Re: Maybe for You (Score:2)
If you have no tastebuds. Each type of meat has a distinct taste, definitely different from other types of meat. There is a massive difference between say Lamb and Bison, Moose and Rabbit, Venison and Chicken, Turkey and Beef. If you can't taste any difference between them, then either you are completely without with the required tastebuds to make the distinction, or you are letting a moral stand against being a carnivore cloud your judgment. You may choose to be a vegetarian, but its not natural to our spe
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The difference between a drawing and art
The difference between a great meal and mcdonalds.
Both may be lost on YOU but that does not mean that no one else can tell and appreciate that difference.
How sad for you that you can't.
Have a nice life anyway!
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I disagree. Unless you consider vegetables as equal to non-meat and state that there is more variety of taste in the former.
Various meats taste quite differently. And I am not even talking about the cooked kind. Various sushi taste quite differently. Heck the same fish has a different taste based upon where it grew up and how old it is. Same applies for oysters. Even going into boiled, fired, fried, baked, salted, and smoked changes based upon age, feed, location, cooking medium, and type of prepwork
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I was raised a vegetarian and I was the last holdout when we all decided to actually start eating meat. I see where you are coming from.
But you are absolutely, completely wrong. Meat is an expansive world full of an incredible range of complex flavors.
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No. Spices and sauces are the primary "give taste" factor (except for the connoisseur differences in quality behind grades of the base food), regardless if it's a meat dish or vegetable.
there (Score:2)
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Personally, I prefer the PETA angel ...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/12/03/peta_angel/ [theregister.co.uk]
Or if you the anti-python ad...
http://www.peta-sucks.com/smf/index.php?topic=34648.0 [peta-sucks.com]
Re:Go tell that to PETA (Score:4, Funny)
It would explain why those PETA folks are always so pissed off.
I'd rather look at mammaries (Score:3, Funny)
(which of course are not meat, but skin-covered fat.) Much more calming.
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Strange. I find them exciting.
I guess we are all different.
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In other mammals breasts only exist for one purpose: Feeding the baby. Once the baby is grown, they shrivel and all-but-disappear.
It is only in humans that permanent breasts have developed, as a way to entice men ("Yes dummy I'm a woman - you can tell by my chest.").
Calming? (Score:2)
"If a woman shares with me her breasts, I tend to leap at them. RAWR! Because they might go away..."
-- Lewis Black
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That udderly fascinating...
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I'm more of a leg/rump man, big hooters were never that big a deal for me, when I was young they were usually bound up in armor plated bras, so that they even looked pointy! A sleek, fit, athletic young woman is what I would consider the (ideal).
As to looking at meat being calming, a dry-aged steak, on a plate with a potato and a bottle of 57 sauce will calm me down right away!
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Now see, that topless girl just does nothing for me.
Yes of course I think she's cute and even attractive, but until she starts playing with her vibrator, she's just another naked animal. Not particularly exciting.
Hmmm (Score:5, Interesting)
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It does. I am never pleased to find a piece of meat in my broccoli with tofu. It has happened, and I usually don't get calmed down until they refund my money, take the food back, and provide a new meal.
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Funny)
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Strange, I once found a piece of broccoli and tofu in my meat, and had the same reaction.
beef curtains (Score:1)
beef curtains always makes me feel better
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Came for the inevitable pr0n/"I'm thinking Arby's!" post, leaving somewhat satisfied and somewhat,... distracted.
This isn't a dirty thing. (Score:4, Funny)
I'm sure there won't be any dirty jokes made about this at all.
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Straight women find naked men picking up towels "horrifying"...that doesn't make one bit of sense to me but I'll try to remember it. I mean, I could watch naked women pick up towels aaaalll daaay loooong :D
But right, don't pick up a towel when naked around women, got it.
(insert Wayne's World time warp effect here)
(~10 years later, married)
*stepping out of shower while wife brushes teeth*
"Honey I need you to get out of the bathroom for a second so I can...do something. You don't want to see me do this, trust
What about vegetables? (Score:5, Funny)
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damn (Score:3, Funny)
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Relax. Here, to help you calm down take a look at my meat.
Does that lady on the street seem upset? (Score:3, Funny)
Show her your meat!
Keep a copy of TFA for when the cops show up.
Chill dude. It's Thanksgiving. (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course. Why do you need to be "aggressive" when it's Thanksgiving? You've already got your kill and you are about to chow down. You and the rest of your extended family doesn't have to worry about starving for awhile. You can relax a little. This is about "being fat and happy" rather than "fight or flight". Of course "plenty" is going to be relaxing.
Hitler was a vegetarian (Score:5, Funny)
and a teetotaler. Do you need more proof? :)
Re:Hitler was a vegetarian (Score:5, Funny)
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But it never works, the argument never ends with it.
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Yep, it's downhill all the way.
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He also loved dogs and hated cats. Just sayin'...
(otoh - Jesus died a virgin (or so the popular mythology often goes) ... hm, w8, that argument breaks down on /. )
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PS. And how could I forget - he also hated smoking (in fact, it made Nazi Germany the first place with strong anti-tobacco movement)
So Lady Gaga... (Score:3, Funny)
makes sense (Score:2, Insightful)
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Or a fight. Also if it's your meat - you might as well relax ;p (though I'm not sure how that trait would be passed on - unless relaxing helps in survival of serious wounds, somehow...)
Might be not such a useful thing with shelfs in shopped overfilling with the stuff...
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"It makes perfect sense. If you can see meat then the hunt is over."
So THAT is what the hole in the partition is for!
Sounds like a job for... (Score:2, Funny)
In the immortal words of Bruce Willis... (Score:1)
"I am a meat popsicle."
This is clearly a mis-steak! (Score:3, Funny)
I've got a bone to pick with that pork-barrel study, but after we chew the fat together, I won't have a beef with them anymore - unless they're too chicken, in which case something fishy may be going on.
The peasants have no bread, so... (Score:2)
Let them eat steak.
I knew meat was a freemason conspiracy (Score:1)
WHAT THE HELL?! (Score:5, Funny)
I'm gonna go and open Facebook account now.
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You mean Apple sauce is good with the bacon, surely
Yet Another Meaningless Research (Score:2, Insightful)
Basically, the researcher made a completely arbitrary "evolutionary" assumption that the view of meat provoked "blood lust", despite any evidence to that. And then he stood corrected after wasting funds on that largely irrelevant issue. Blood lust didn't help our ancestors hunt, hunger did. It would seem way more logical to most people - except to that researcher, obviously - that the view of meat would calm them, since it meant "dinner's (almost?
Huh. (Score:2)
Is this why I don't get frustrated playing Super Meat Boy?
This actually makes a lot of sense (Score:2)
By the time you turn an animal into meat, you don't need to fight or run any more as long as there isn't to much competition within your group.
I'm sure... (Score:2, Funny)
We're a cooperative species (Score:5, Insightful)
Once you can see MEAT, the hunt is over. Time to calm down and eat. Makes sense to me. We're not jackals, who fight for carrion; or lions who compete for who gets to eat the kill. We're a cooperative species, so once the hunt is done and the meat is out, time to stop producing adrenaline from the hunt and get to the business of sharing the meat out to the group.
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"We're not jackals, who fight for carrion; or lions who compete for who gets to eat the kill."
Well, we don't compete with each other for food in the modern world. Were that situation to change I'd have no problem killing other human competitors to survive, or to eat them if that's the only option.
The taboos against that are for tribal convenience (well, most tribes!) and may be disregarded in extremis.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custom_of_the_Sea [wikipedia.org]
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I am not sure about lions, I know they have some order (for example the male(s) go first).
and I believed they are similar to a wolf pack with a strict pecking order, as any pack of animal is likely to form.
SO I am not certain, but I do not think they fight over it. The important ones might push the less important away, but it is not a fight because both of them know who is the boss.
Wrong images. (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't see the raw meat until after you've caught and killed the animal and are ready to eat. Bloodlust is not appropriate at that point. He needs to redo the experiment with images of prey animals running away.
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But hey, maybe this is why silly things like cow tipping and cock fighting are still around. Since our food source is domesticated, this may serve as release for our natural tendencies.
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Well many humans no longer have to look for the prey, so watching a gazelle hopping around probably wouldn't spark aggression in us.
You're right, we need to modernize this experiment to allow for any potential environmental influences on instinctive human behaviors.
Have test subjects sit in a waiting room for a few hours so they'll be hungry. Then they're given a coupon for a McDonald's burger, and told not to open it until they get outside.
As soon as they leave the McDonalds the subject is distracted by a text message while a hexacopter with a cargo hook picks up the burger and flies away. The subject is then observed for any aggressiv
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I've seen the reaction a big Yellow M has on child passengers in a car. Clearly images of pray, possibly escaping, can trigger in them a bloodlust.
pleez? (Score:2)
Makes sense... (Score:2)
Bloodlust is before (Score:2)
Certainly, seeing meat "could have" caused bloodlust, and certainly that's the easier hypothesis with which to start testing, so I'd have done the same thing. But it certainly makes more sense that it'd be calming.
When seeing a wild turkey, bloodlust would help the hunter. After killing it, and stripping it, now staring at the meat, the hunting is done, the bloodlust isn't required. What's more, we need to turn into digestive mode -- which in humans is a very energy-intensive task.
Not to mention, there a
It makes you feel relevant ... (Score:3, Funny)
McGrill University? (Score:2)
That'll slow 'em down. (Score:2)
Great! I can just imagine a new PsyOps tactic in Afghanistan.
Spraying the aroma of slowly simmering meat all over a suspected Al Queda camp. Cover a whole mountainside or carpet (bomb) an entire valley with the sweet smell of roasting meat.
Instead of “Daisy Cutter” munitions, spread dissension among the opposing side by starving them out (or requiring them to get much better mobile kitchens to run their recruiting.)
That’ll drive the enemy mad trying to figure out where the ovens are.
Incompatible input format. (Score:2)
Sorry, I must be "evolved". This meat does nothing for me.
Calming Images:
A pile of classic arcade game cartridges [flickr.com].
Earth as seen from the mother ship [wikimedia.org].
Our place in the known universe [youtube.com].
What's wrong with this picture... (Score:2)
Looking at Lady Gaga at the MTV Awards in her butcher shop couture [nydailynews.com], made me a lot of things... but calm and sedate weren't among them. She should have made her purse out of a barf bag.
Makes no sence (Score:2)
"had initially thought the presence of meat would provoke bloodlust, believing the response would have helped our primate ancestors hunt."
That makes no sense.
Why would it be a good thing for are primitive ancestors to want to hunt when they already have caught and butchered meat lying around?
So it is just the opposite, because it would help out ancestors out to get agitated and go hunt when the food runs out.
Hey, makes sense to me... (Score:2)
I can't speak for anyone else, but I know if -I'm- looking at a nice juicy steak, I'm pretty calm and content. :3
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You can still LOOK at meat, you know.