OMG BUGS Janie Kullmar part one of three

Eating Bugs is recomended for the health of you, society and the planet!

As the human population increases we need to be able to find ways to increase food production with decreased resources. One of the most practical ways to do so would be to eat… bugs 

Bugs could  be one of the key steps toward the future of humanity's survival. The UN already promotes them because they are a healthy, environmentally sustainable, and socially advantageous food group that its not yet being used on a wide scale. These issues are directly related to the philosophical implications about the current meat industry. These are the issues that I will emphasize in this blog post. Next week I will talk about it more indirectly as it is a reflection of the role that society plays in our lives. And finally I will talk about how entomophily can also be considered an ethical choice from a Judeo-Christian, Kantian, or Utilitarian perspective and how Ethical considerations about eating bugs should continue as the practice becomes more popular.

            Individual bugs have very different levels of nutritional content.In general they are high in iron and in fiber. High Iron is important especially in developing countries. WHO says Iron deficiency is one of the biggest problems in the developing world and Iron is especially important for childhood development. The UN directly compares mealworms to beef and states that they tend to have less fat, comparable levels of mineral, and of course higher in vitamins except for B12. 

            Bugs use much less resources, like water and land, than beef. According to PETA 30% of Earth's land mass is used by the meat industry. Creating a bug farm requires far less space than the space used for cattle, or even the chickens in very cramped quarters. The space used directly by the meat industry is low compared to the amount that is used to produce the food for animals. Bugs not only require less feed for more nutrients it is not required that they used feed at all.  In fact bugs can eat waste,💩. Its a gross thought, but its so environmentally sustainable. They can eat things that would otherwise be wasted and used to harm the environment. While animals just produce more waste while consuming food that could be eaten by people. This will probably never be good enough to use for people though but it could be used for chicken feed with chicken wastes.

            Growing economic inequality could be aided with bug farming as well. Currently bugs are being farmed as well as captured then directly sold. Both can be done at very low startup costs. Currently large scale agriculture kills off many of the bugs that destroy crops with pesticides that have been shown to have negative effects on people, animals and the crops that it supports. Trapping bugs and using them for feed is preferable in that regard to killing them with pesticides. As a farms they do not require much human labor and are currently run by small families, that have historically been used to feed other animals.

This would hopefully replace the already controversial use of animals and animal farming. 

 Vegans and people that vilify speciesism would not be likely to condone the use of these animals for human purposes. Joan Dunayer, a Princeton gradate who published two books on speciesism said " Like mammals and unlike plants, insects should have rights to life and liberty because they can experience life and liberty."

            Descarte said that animals were okay to eat because they did not feel pain. This has been scientifically disproven and that is reason enough to discount this justification for eating meat. However it presents a more valid case than insects. There is some evidence that fruitflies feel pain because they avoid it, but it was difficult from research to separate this from reflexes. However there is other evidence seems to state that they do not feel pain. People say that because injured insects do not avoid further damaging themselves by limping. However we do know that they do not have the mental capacity to equate pain with any emotion. From this perspective Descartes view becomes more reasonable. Bentham was of the view point that as long as everything is done to animals is done humanely then it is okay. Insects being killed and treated humanely is certainly easier. It takes less space and it is less costly so in that respect it is more likely that bugs will have room and more natural means of growth. From my perspective it seems in pictures far less disturbing to see a bug farm  than a chicken farm. But more on that next week when we talk about the reasons that society has trained us. We see bugs as gross and meat as good like we see blocks for boys and Barbies for babes.

Bug Farm

 

Chicken Farm