Originally posted by CD Lee

Showing of course that it is possible to become a very good hunter and tracker. Especially if your life depended on it. Who needs guns? Early men did not use them kill animals. I'll bet Indian hunting parties could have done just as well.

*** RRRRRRRRRRRR no, showing how hard it is to catch enough game to sustain only 5-10 people!!!
To add a point about Native hunting parties, as I mentioned, these parties weren't organized so they could get some good meat to eat! Not only was it for that (there i'll give you one point) but for shelter, clothing, medicine, religion/rituals.

Yes, but that still did not stop hunters and hunting parties from doing it. Even in the rain forests TODAY, tribes still hunt and successfully kill pigs with bamboo spears with no steel, and have a good portion. Saw that one on TLC, and they basically snuck up on him and skewered him with multiple spears. (Not bad considering they had a camera guy following them and still got the pig. )

*** I got nothign on that one

Acutally, it is accurate, just not to all tribes, as you pointed out. But they did do certain things to exist. Eaters of opportunity. Using Native Americans is a GREAT example. They did not have guns or horses for a while, some were nomadic, some were not, and we know what they did in an undeveloped land to survive. You are just saying that we cannot attribute all aspects of one tribe to all other tribes.

*** Well i posted what i think about those examples and i'll wait and see what your response is before i go into this one.

So in summary, I think a lot of your 'beef' is not the historical record of man eating meat, but rather, that some people draw general or extreeme conclusions from them. Such as, "well, if they had a spear and killed with it, they only ate meat from the spear or must have ate 90% meat". I can understand that people will do that from time to time. And the converse is also possible. "Well if they had access to vegetables, they would not spend valuable time and calories to hunt meat." People tend to do what they desire. Bears don't mind 50 bee stings on the nose, if they can get some yummy honey. Not the easy road, but it sure tastes good.

*** You're partly right. Again, I'm not arguing that we didn't eat meat or anything, i'm arguing it's importance/significance in our diet and it's role in our survival. The reason I got into this thread was because people were all, "Bah, we were designed to eat meat from day one!!! We are meat eaters blalbalbal" And i'm simply stating, well if meat was so crucial, then why was it not an important staple in this civilization, or that one? Maybe meat isn't an important part of our diet, especially if the civs mentioned didnt' need it.
I"m off to Montreal!!! I'll be looking forward to Sunday !!