Have you ever considered the fact that if we cured all diseases, then the larger population would cause food shortages that would lead untold numbers of people to die of starvation? If we stopped all kinds of violence against one another, more people would starve or die of diseases. I have a sneaking suspicion that if we cured all diseases and ended all violence and solved the food problem, an asteroid would hit us. Or we would ruin the planet as a place to live… which we are already doing, but we could do it faster with more people.
I am not trying to depress you. And I don’t have any answers as to what all this means. I just wonder if anybody else ever thought about this stuff? Just like I sometimes wonder if vegetarians ever really thought through the ramifications of what would happen if they converted everyone on the planet and we stopped eating meat. I mean, people don’t raise cows for fun. They sell them. For meat. If people stop eating meat, those millions of cows aren’t going to be put in retirement homes.
Well, now I am not sure exactly where I am going with all this, so I think I will stop going there now.
Pouring My Art Out 
Ah man, WP just ate my comment. Anyway I had a good friend Elroy when I was trucking and he was anal about his truck being in perfect shape. He was an amazing licensed mechanic who could make anything with wheels better. I jumped into the passengers seat one day while we were waiting for a load and Elroy was idling the truck for the air conditioning. I noticed that two of the gauges on the dashboard weren’t working so i inquired why – sure there was a story. Elroy responded:
“They are my insurance.”
Me: “Against what?”
Elroy: “The universe will not tolerate perfection, so if I fix those gauges, something else, likely bigger, like a transmission, will break for sure.. So, I always leave at least one or two small things broken on the truck to keep big things from breaking.”
Amongst things to consider Art – you gotta read this – especially the letters; http://kindnessblog.com/2015/07/29/bags-of-blessings-feeding-hungry-children/
wow… that will bring a tear to your eye…
I am using that one next time I don’t get to a chore my wife gave me… HA!
Please, if you could find it among your squirrels, kindly proceed with these thoughts. You got me hooked!
I can’t think to much in one week… my head overheats.
Your method works.
Don’t mean to be pushy, but when can you continue this piece?
well it didn’t start out as the idea for a series. I think I did a series called; ‘thinking about stuff’ or something like that… I have done tons of posts about thinking about stuff. It is even one of my categories.
I do think about these things. I wonder if they provided enough food to feed the world, would it be nutrient dense enough to do anything but keep our sromachs full.
soylent green…
I’ll become a vegetarian the day cheeseburgers start growing on trees.
mmmmm cheese trees…
Maybe this could be called the “How now Brown Cow?’ Philosophical theory?
I like the sound of that
hahahaha…just a little cow humor to lighten
do you have a beef with me?
hahaha I am “steering” you away from gloomies and lonesome cow spiral …the squirelles make me do this.
sigh
awww…
wheeeeeeeeeeee
wait… just a little cow humor to lighten the mooooed. 🙂
ha
Does this mean we ought to celebrate the anniversary of the bubonic plague’s outbreak?
No… just wondering how much we are all a part of natural selection and the circle of life thing still.
Don’t worry. It will be obvious that we’re still a part of natural selection when all those nukes start going off.
that would be unnatural selection
I’ll take a cow on, look after the fucker, drink the milk, shag it…scratch that.
I am not sure that offer was on the table, but the cow might like that better than being eaten… so I will let the two of you work out the details.
Actually, just this morning I was thinking about what happens to the cows when we stop eating meat. And I think we’d still have to eat all the extra ones that can’t be supported by existing land – which would be easily 80% of the current cow population.
So… beef binge party?
Or beef patty binge.
patty party beef binge…
Your first line, ‘if we cured all diseases..’ gave me a panic attack. I’m smack in the middle of a five and half year gruelling medical course. All that for..nothing?!
But I gave you other stuff to panic about… so we are good, right?
YEP my mind runs away like that sometimes too
phew
If we cured food shortages and everyone lived, someone might be born that could figure all this out for us. They could fix it.
As for cows, we artificially breed them for meat. These aren’t animals that would breed like this naturally, we force them to do it. I think they would get along fine if we were all vegetarians. It takes about 100 times more energy to produce a cow than a turnip; just from an energy balance standpoint, turnip beats cow.
right, but the cows living now would not live happily ever after… not the beef ones anyway
Well I don’t know… they might be perfectly happy on some pasture somewhere…
Hey, am I coming through as being an Italian? Are you getting views from Italy? I’m totally in Italy!
I love Italy. Brindisi is nice. Rome rocks. Venice is the bomb.
I was in Milan. Now Riga, Latvia. Tomorrow Vienna. My head is spinning a bit.
only your head?
Occasional turnip may be nice, but I will still prefer a steak to a 100 turnips.
turnip burgers…
Nope. I’m not letting beef mix up with turnips.
what about turnip-fed cow meat?
I can live with that.
with just a hint of turnip flavor… is that possible… because garlic infused meat… onion beef… what about if we feed cows to other cows and eat them… extra meaty!
Oh, you said “turnip-fed”… I thought you said “Trump-fed”…
I would like to feed trump to some animal… but not a cow… maybe a great white shark…
You’re wrecking the earth with your steak consumption, X!
Keeping the world safe… from cows…
I love this…with all of the things poor cows go through. I’m not veggie, but you are right. I only hope my grassfed beef isn’t false advertising….and no, I don’t eat it everyday.
It is all something to think about, I suppose.
*sigh* disturbing questions…. but interesting thoughts!
sorry