Monday, October 21, 2013

My Journey of Awakening - At A Spiritual Crossroads

Popular Posts:
***************************************************************************************************

I recently published a book about my awakening journey over these past 5-6 years.  It is a very high level introduction to the insights and information I wanted to share with regard to my spiritual experiences.  My intent in publishing this book was to provide a summary on a variety of topics for those who want an introduction to New Age Spiritual topics. This book provides a good overview for your family, friends and neighbors who are wanting a place to start their research without being completely overwhelmed.  Below, I have listed the table of contents and references from the book to let potential readers preview an outline.  I hope you enjoy it...Peace and Love to all!  Mike

Here is the link to purchase the paperback version of the book (Amazon.com & Kindle digital versions coming soon):

My Journey of Awakening...At a Spiritual Crossroads - https://www.createspace.com/4061311

Amazon Kindle Version





Table of Contents

My Journey of Awakening 1
Gluten-Free Vegetarian Diet 5
Pure Water 12
Numerology, Angels and Qigong 15
Divine Matrix, Prayer and Quantum Theory 19
Quantum Physics and Time Travel 24
Intention and Manifestation 27
Chakras and the Law of Life 30
Power of Affirmations 39
Reincarnation and Karma Releasing 45
Dis-ease and Water 51
Rolfing, Release and Alignment 58
Healing Music 61
Angel Therapist 71
Oracle Cards 76
Nature and Animals 79
Songs and Lyrics 84
Ascension and DNA 91
Ascension Questions 97
Galactic Friends and Disclosure 109
Inner Earth 111
Closing 113
Keys to Living in Peace and Happiness 116
References and Links 120

References and Links







































Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Improve your health -- Stay away from Aspartame and MSG

Popular Posts:
***************************************************************************************************


Below is list of some of my research on the health topic of MSG and Aspartame...both VERY bad for you and to be avoided at all costs.  If you want a thorough understanding of their dangers, please read the following book:

Russell Blaylock, M.D., Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills (Albuquerque, NM: Health Press, 1996)


What Is Aspartame & MSG Made Of?

Aspartic Acid (40 percent of Aspartame)

Dr. Russell L. Blaylock, a professor of neurosurgery at the Medical University of Mississippi, recently published a book thoroughly detailing the damage that is caused by the ingestion of excessive aspartic acid from aspartame. Blaylock makes use of almost 500 scientific references to show how excess free excitatory amino acids such as aspartic acid and glutamic acid (about 99 percent of monosodium glutamate (MSG) is glutamic acid) in our food supply are causing serious chronic neurological disorders and a myriad of other acute symptoms.

How Aspartate (and Glutamate) Cause Damage

Aspartate and glutamate act as neurotransmitters in the brain by facilitating the transmission of information from neuron to neuron. Too much aspartate or glutamate in the brain kills certain neurons by allowing the influx of too much calcium into the cells. This influx triggers excessive amounts of free radicals, which kill the cells. The neural cell damage that can be caused by excessive aspartate and glutamate is why they are referred to as "excitotoxins." They "excite" or stimulate the neural cells to death.

Aspartic acid is an amino acid. Taken in its free form (unbound to proteins) it significantly raises the blood plasma level of aspartate and glutamate. The excess aspartate and glutamate in the blood plasma shortly after ingesting aspartame or products with free glutamic acid (glutamate precursor) leads to a high level of those neurotransmitters in certain areas of the brain.

***********
If you go to Whole Foods website, they have a list of unacceptable food ingredients: 

***********

See page 2 of the MSG PDF for a list of hidden sources of MSG.  Hidden Sources of MSG PDF

Sun Chips, Cheetos and Doritos are especially bad. Both Cheetos and Doritos list MSG as an ingredient.    
Most of Campbell's soups contain multiple sources of MSG
Dean’s French Onion dip has 7 sources of MSG (Hydrolyzed soy, MSG, Gelatin, Soy lecithin, brewers’ yeast, HYDROLYZED TORULA, modified food starch, carrageenan)
http://www.fritolay.com/our-snacks/sunchips-french-onion.html - French Onion Sun chips has 3 types of MSG in the ingredients (Maltodextrin, Whey Protein and Yeast extract)

*************
http://youtu.be/pvFRLIjOLOU - Fox News expose in 1999 on Aspartame

*************


*************

*************

Below is an experiment done by a mother who was at one point a scientist:


67% of Female rats consuming Aspartame had tumors

As a private citizen, I performed a 2-1/2 year study, putting aspartame in the form of packets of NutraSweet in the drinking water of 60 rats and keeping 48 rats as controls. My female rats received about 45 mg/kg of aspartame per body weight per day. My males received about 34 mg/kg/day.
Of the 30 females in the aspartame group, 20 or 67% developed tumors the size of golf balls or greater. Seven males from the aspartame group developed visible tumors -- 23% of all males on aspartame.
Females hit harder than males
The total number of rats with tumors in the aspartame group was 27 – 20 females and 7 males. The percentage of females-to-males was therefore 20/7 or 286%, which coincides with the observation of H.J. Roberts, M.D, author of Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic, that females are more affected by aspartame than males by a 3:1 ratio.
Other adverse effects
The rats on aspartame also developed miscellaneous health issues, such as paralysis and other apparent neurological problems, eye problems and skin disorders, thinning and yellowing fur, and obesity, which is sad, because many people use aspartame to lose or maintain their weight.

Female rats with tumors video.


Male rats with tumors video

*************

List of books warning against dangers of aspartame:
  • H. J. Roberts, M.D., Aspartame (NutraSweet): Is It Safe? A Concerned Doctor’s Views (Philadelphia, PA: The Charles Press, 1990).
    • Synopsis
      • This is a book on the severe reactions to products containing aspartame. The artificial sweetner Aspartame, marketed under the name NutraSweet, is being consumed by nearly 100 million people in the US alone. The author is a specialist in internal medicine who has been responsible for major research studies in the fields of diabetes and hyperglycaemia. He became suspicious of Aspartame when he encountered an increasing number of patients with diverse symptoms which could not be attributable to specific medical problems. This book presents his findings which were arrived at through personal clinical encounters as a practising physician and through an extensive study of people with adverse reactions to Aspartame. It includes clear descriptions of the numerous reactions which patients and others have suffered.
  • Dr. Miladie L. Dillard, Food Sweeteners: Aspartame and Its Adverse Reactions, Strange Symptoms, Illness Behavior and Controversy: Index of New Information with Authors and Subjects (1997).
  • George Andrews, Ph.D., The Aspartame Documents: What Industry and the FDA Don’t Want You to Know, (Healthnet Press, 2002).
  • James Balch and Mark Stengler, Prescription for Natural Cures: A Self-Care Guide for Treating Health Problems with Natural Remedies Including Diet and Nutrition, Nutritional Supplements, Bodywork, and More, (John Wiley & Sons, 2004).
  • Michael Barbee, C.D.C., Politically-Incorrect Nutrition: Finding Reality in the Mire of Food Industry Propaganda (Ridgefield, CT: Vital Health Publishing, 2004).
  • Russell Blaylock, M.D., Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills (Albuquerque, NM: Health Press, 1996).
  • Russell Blaylock, M.D., Health and Nutrition Secrets That Can Save Your Life (Albuquerque, NM: Health Press, 2002).
  • Russell Blaylock, M.D., Natural Strategies for Cancer Patients (New York, NY: Twin Streams Kensington Publishing Corp., 2003).
  • Dr. Janet Starr Hull, Sweet Poison: How the World’s Most Popular Artificial Sweetener Is Killing Us--My Story (Far Hills, NJ: New Horizon Press, 1999).
  • Beatrice Trum Hunter, Consumer Beware! Your Food and What’s Been Done to it (New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1972),.
  • Barbara A. Mullarkey, Bittersweet Aspartame: A Diet Delusion (Health Watch Book, 1992).
  • Dr. Joseph Mercola, Sweet Deception: Why Splenda, NutraSweet and the FDA May Be Hazardous to Your Health, (Nashville, TN: Nelson Books, 2006).
  • Dennis W. Remington, M.D. and Barbara W. Higa, R.D., The Bitter Truth About Artificial Sweeteners (Vitality House International, Inc., 1987).
  • Byron J. Richards (Board Certified Clinical Nutritionist), Fight for Your Health: Exposing the FDA’s Betrayal of America (Tucson, AZ: Truth in Wellness, LLC., 2006).
  • H. J. Roberts, M.D., Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic (West Palm Beach, FL: Sunshine Sentinel Press, Inc., 2001).
  • H.J. Roberts, M.D., Breast Implants or Aspartame (NutraSweet) Disease?: The Suppressed Opinion About Perceived Medicolegal Travesty, booklet edition (West Palm Beach, FL: Sunshine Sentinel Press, Inc., 1999).
  • H. J. Roberts, M.D., Sweet 'ner Dearest: Bittersweet Vignettes About Aspartame (NutraSweet) (West Palm Beach, FL: Sunshine Sentinel Press, Inc., 1992).
  • Carol Simontacchi, The Crazy Makers: How the Food Industry is Destroying Our Brains and Harming Our Children (Tarcher, 1st Trade edition, 2001).
  • John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, Trust Us, We’re Experts: How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles with Your Future (Tarcher, 2002).
  • Paul A. Stitt, Beating the Food Giants (WI: Natural Press, 1982).
  • Mary Nash Stoddard, Deadly Deception: Story of Aspartame, Shocking expose of the world’s most controversial sweetener (Dallas, TX: Odenwald Press, 1998).
  • James S. Turner, The Chemical Feast: Ralph Nader’s Study Group Report on the Food and Drug Administration (New York, NY: Grossman Publishers, 1970).
  • Jacqueline Van de Kamp, Adverse effects of aspartame: January 1986 through December 1990: 167 citations (Washington, DC: Superintendent of Documents, U.S. G.P.O., 1991).
  • R.J. Wurtman, Dietary Phenylalanine & Brain Function: Proceedings of the First International Meetings (Boston, MA: Birkhauser, 1988). Note: Mary Nash Stoddard is co-founder of the Aspartame Consumer Safety Network and the Pilot’s Hotline. The latter was established as a support network after it was found that pilots have blacked out after consuming aspartame. Because of that, some have lost their pilot’s licenses.

Aspartame lawsuits allege major corporations are poisoning the public

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Lawsuits were filed in three separate California courts against twelve companies who either produce or use the artificial sweetener aspartame as a sugar substitute in their products. The suits were filed in Shasta, Sonoma and Butte County, California April 5, 2004 by the National Justice League, plaintiffs.

The suits allege that the food companies committed fraud and breach of warranty by marketing aspartame-containing products to the public such as Diet Coke, Diet Pepsi, sugar free gum, Flintstone's vitamins, yogurt and children's aspirin with the full knowledge that the artificial sweetener is a neurotoxic drug.

Aspartame is a drug masquerading as an additive. It interacts with other drugs, has a synergistic and additive effect with MSG, and is a chemical hyper-sensitization agent.

As far back as 1970, Dr. John Olney founded the field of neuroscience called “excitotoxicity” when he conducted studies on aspartic acid, which comprises 40 percent of aspartame, and found it caused lesions in the brains of mice. He made world news on the aspartame/brain tumor connection in l996.

Dr. Ralph Walton, Professor and Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry, Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine has written of the behavioral and psychiatric problems triggered by aspartame-caused depletion of serotonin.

Aspartame causes headache, memory loss, seizures, vision loss, coma and cancer. It worsens or mimics the symptoms of such diseases and conditions as fibromyalgia, MS, lupus, ADD, diabetes, Alzheimer's, chronic fatigue and depression.

Aspartame liberates free methyl alcohol. The resulting chronic methanol poisoning affects the dopamine system of the brain causing addiction. Methanol, or wood alcohol, constitutes one-third of the aspartame molecule and is classified as a severe metabolic poison and narcotic.

Recent news is full of reports of world-class athletes and other healthy consumers of aspartame suddenly dropping dead. Sudden death can occur from aspartame use because it damages the cardiac conduction system.

Dr. Woodrow Monte in the peer reviewed journal, Aspartame: Methanol and the Public Health, wrote: “When diet sodas and soft drinks, sweetened with aspartame, are used to replace fluid loss during exercise and physical exertion in hot climates, the intake of methanol can exceed 250 mg/day or 32 times the Environmental Protection Agency's recommended limit of consumption for this cumulative poison.”

The effects of aspartame are documented by the FDA's own data. In 1995 the agency was forced, under the Freedom Of Information Act, to release a list of ninety-two aspartame symptoms reported by thousands of victims. This is only the tip of the iceberg. H. J. Roberts, MD, published the medical text “Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic” -- 1,000 pages of symptoms and diseases triggered by this neurotoxin including the sordid history of its approval.

Since its discovery in 1965, controversy has raged over the health risks associated with the sugar substitute. From laboratory testing of the chemical on rats, researchers have discovered that the drug induces brain tumors. On Sept 30, l980 the Board of Inquiry of the FDA concurred and denied the petition for approval. In l981, the newly appointed FDA Commissioner, Arthur Hull Hayes, ignored the negative ruling and approved aspartame for dry goods. As recorded in the Congressional Record of 1985, then CEO of Searle Laboratories Donald Rumsfeld said that he would call in his markers to get aspartame approved. Rumsfeld was on President Reagan's transition team and a day after taking office appointed Hayes. No FDA Commissioner in the previous sixteen years had allowed Aspartame on the market.

In 1983, aspartame was approved for use in carbonated beverages. Today it is found in over 5000 foods, drinks and medicines.

Neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock, MD, author of “Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills” wrote about the relationship between aspartame and macular degeneration, diabetic blindness and glaucoma (all known to result from excitotoxin accumulation in the retina).

All of these neurodegenerative diseases are worsened by aspartame. In addition, we now have evidence that excitotoxins play a major role in exacerbation of multiple sclerosis and other demyelinating disorders including trigeminal neuraliga. Blaylock says that new studies show excitotoxins trigger significant elevation of free radicals in the lining (endothelial cells) of arteries, which means that aspartame will increase the incidence of heart attacks and strokes (atherosclerosis).

In original studies, aspartame has triggered brain, mammary, uterine, ovarian, testicular, thyroid and pancreatic tumors.

Defendants in the lawsuits include Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Bayer Corp., the Dannon Company, William Wrigley Jr. Company, ConAgra Foods, Wyeth, Inc., The NutraSweet Company, and Altria Corp. (parent company of Kraft Foods and Philip Morris).

Plaintiffs have asked for an injunction to stop companies from producing, manufacturing, processing, selling or using aspartame.

Plaintiffs in all three cases are seeking a jury trial.

The National Justice League is seeking individuals who have been adversely affected by consuming products containing aspartame. To arrange an interview, please Roberta Bellon at 208-246-1171.





Banning Aspartame - A

Common Sense Precaution

By Senator Jerry Ortiz y Pino

New Mexico

When many of my constituents hear that I plan to introduce a bill to ban the artificial sweetener aspartame in the upcoming legislative session, I get a lot of very strange looks. Or worse.
The American Diabetes Foundation, for example, considers aspartame almost sacramental for persons with the disease they battle, one that makes consumption of sugar very dangerous. To hear their lobbyists tell it, aspartame is the modern scientific equivalent of Lourdes water for diabetics: "If you take away my soft drinks with aspartame, what am I supposed to drink, then, huh? " (On each occasion that sentiment is expressed to me, I have to bite my tongue not to gently, but sarcastically, suggest cold water, unsugared ice tea or skim milk all perfectly drinkable alternatives, but not acceptable solutions for carbonation-crazed Coke or Pepsi devotees.)

Aspartame is currently used in over 6,000 processed foods in this country, practically everything that passes itself off as a "lite" or "nonfat" food or drink. Banning it, I am scolded, will create a massive economic depression, leading to factory closures, layoffs of thousands of workers, bank failures and rioting in the streets. Even the Coca-Cola corporation, which looks at a casual glance like a fairly prosperous company even an incredibly profitable one, I would think will be, I am assured, destroyed by such a ban a very heavy burden to lay on my shoulders.

Meanwhile, dozens of corporate lobbyists (the world's second-oldest profession) are praying that I introduce the measure again, as it would occasion a windfall profit of extravagant expenditures for their services when every soda pop manufacturer in the country rushes to hire clever mouthpieces to protect their interests from our attack. It is a veritable full-employment-for-lobbyists initiative.

To be candid, the chances of our efforts succeeding in the face of the phalanx of three-piece suits and slick leather briefcases that will be arrayed against our tiny cadre of concerned health advocates is extremely slim. Still, it is absolutely worth doing, I am convinced, if it furthers the awareness-expanding process and builds on the excellent work that is being done by the aspartame whistle-blowers like Santa Feans Stephen Fox and Dr. Kenneth Stoller, and the remarkable Dr. Betty Martini from Atlanta whose tireless advocacy is slowly turning the tide of public opinion against this absolutely worthless and extremely dangerous substance. It is even worth risking the destruction of the Coca- Cola empire, apparently much more fragile than any of us ever imagined.

For those wishing to become more familiar with the aspartame menace, a good starting point would be the two hour-long documentary films (available as DVDs) produced by Cori Brackett: Sweet Misery and Sweet Remedy, available through Sound and Fury Productions at www.soundandfury.tv. What you see in these two films is a frightening case study of how corporate greed can completely overwhelm the supposed protections of our governmental watchdogs, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Environmental Protection Agency, and the state and federal departments of Health.

It is worth taking a moment here to review the history of how a true poison like this might be passed on to us as "food" over the protests of the scientists who tried to say "No!" but who were, and who continue to be, subverted by corporate money spent to influence politicians. And it may be instructional to consider as well how this same process of erosion in public protections could actually be going on with ever-growing sophistication and success in many other public health areas of concern, such as mad cow disease and E. coli outbreaks at meatpacking plants.

Coca-Cola has changed 180 degrees from its position on aspartame in 1980. At that time it testified in opposition to aspartame 's approval at FDA hearings looking into the safety of it. Now they help finance its defense. Of course, the FDA itself has flipped. Its initial denial was reversed a few years later in 1983, when Donald Rumsfeld (ring a bell?) persuaded the Reagan administration that denial was not bad chemistry but bad politics. At that time Rumsfeld headed Searle, the pharmaceutical firm that helped develop aspartame.

When concerns over the product's safety seemed likely to produce lawsuits, Searle sold the manufacturing rights to Monsanto, which in turn peddled them to its current primary producer, the Japanese chemical giant Ajinomoto. That outfit has made billions on the production of this artificial sweetener, a significant percentage of which has gone into shoring up the political fortunes of the company’s reputation with American congressional figures.

Brilliantly too, the company has consistently made the American Diabetes Foundation one of the chief beneficiaries of its charitable giving largesse that has created vast gratitude and easy acceptance of whatever "scientific" rationales the company chooses to feed the diabetes advocacy community.

Many more studies of the medical effects of aspartame consumption have been undertaken with financing from the industry than by independent researchers. Their findings that the formaldehyde-laced artificial sweetener is perfectly safe are, therefore, of questionable objectivity.

Last year, however, a truly independent assessment was published by an Italian academic researcher, Dr. Morando Soffritti. His findings substantiate the links between aspartame and cancer, calling it a "neurotoxin" with serious other health consequences and concluding it has major negative impacts on those who ingest it. Soffitti 's study has been repeatedly attacked by industry spokespeople and their paid researchers, but its conclusions stand substantially intact. In Europe and in India, its impact is already producing governmental action to restrict or remove aspartame.

Efforts to act similarly in this country have been solely at state levels so far, though the recent congressional changes may open the door to much more active oversight by the Feds than was possible under the previous leadership. Nevertheless, I would like to proceed with our state initiative. It will, win or lose, further the effort to draw attention to the serious medical dangers that aspartame represents. It would serve as a precaution and could save lives.

New Mexico Senator Jerry Ortiz y Pino



NutraPoison
By Alex Constantine

The FDA is ever mindful to refer to aspartame, widely known as NutraSweet, as a "food additive"-never a "drug." A "drug" on the label of a Diet Coke might discourage the consumer. And because aspartame is classified a food additive, adverse reactions are not reported to a federal agency, nor is continued safety monitoring required by law.
·         NutraSweet is a non-nutritive sweetener. The brand name is misnomer. Try Non-NutraSweet.

o   Food additives seldom cause brain lesions, headaches, mood alterations, skin polyps, blindness, brain tumors, insomnia and depression, or erode intelligence and short-term memory. Aspartame, according to some of the most capable scientists in the country, does. In 1991 the National Institutes of Health, a branch of the Department of Health and Human Services, published a bibliography, *Adverse Effects of Aspartame*, listing not less than 167 reasons to avoid it.
·         Aspartame is an rDNA derivative, a combination of two amino acids (long supplied by a pair of Maryland biotechnology firms: Genex Corp. of Rockville and Purification Engineering in Baltimore.)

·         The Pentagon once listed it in an inventory of prospective biochemical warfare weapons submitted to Congress.

o   But instead of poisoning enemy populations, the "food additive" is currently marketed as a sweetening agent in some 1200 food products.






Well Known Vegetarians

Popular Posts:
***************************************************************************************************

I have now been vegetarian for 2 years now + Gluten-free and alcohol free for 3 years.  Never felt better in my life...It helps to know I am in good company with my decision ;-)

Peace...

Well-known Vegetarians



Albert Einstein:
“Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.”
Bob Marley:
“I-man say don’t make Jah body a graveyard for de dead animals!”
Leonardo DaVinci:
“I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men.” DaVinci claimed that flesh eaters were using their bodies as “grave yards.”
Charles Darwin:
“The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man.”
Thomas Edison:
“Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.”
George Bernard Shaw:
“We pray on Sundays that we may have light to guide our footsteps on the path we tread; We are sick of war we don’t want to fight. And yet we gorge ourselves upon the dead.”
Percy Bysshe Shelley:
“Let the advocate of animal food force himself to a decisive experiment on its fitness, and as Plutarch recommends, tear a living lamb with his teeth and, plunging his head into its vitals slake his thirst with the steaming blood.”
Henry David Thoreau:
“I have no doubt that it is a part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, as surely as the savage tribes have left off eating each other when they came in contact with the more civilized.”
Mark Twain:
“It is just like man’s vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions.”
Benjamin Franklin:
“Flesh eating is “unprovoked murder.” On the subject of vegetarianism, Franklin noted that one will achieve “greater progress, from the greater clearness of head and quicker comprehension.”"
Thomas A. Edison, 1847-1931:
“The Doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will interest his patient in the care of the human frame, in diet, and in the cause and prevention of disease.”
Francis of Assisi:
“Not to hurt our humble brethren is our first duty to them, but to stop there is not enough. We have a higher mission-to be of service to them wherever they require it.”
Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi:
“To my mind the life of a lamb is no less precious than that of a human being. I hold that, the more helpless a creature, the more entitled it is to protection by man from the cruelty of man.”
Abraham Lincoln:
“I am in favor of animal rights as well as human rights. That is the way of a whole human being.”
Thomas Paine:
“Everything of persecution and revenge between man and man, and everything of cruelty to animals, is a violation of moral duty.”
Henry Salt:
“The emancipation of men from cruelty and injustice will bring with it in due course the emancipation of animals also. The two reforms are inseparably connected, and neither can be fully realized alone.”
Albert Schweitzer:
“…the time is coming when people will be amazed that the human race existed so long before it recognized that thoughtless injury to life is incompatible with real ethics. Ethics is in its unqualified form extended responsibility to everything that has life.”
George Bernard Shaw:
“Vivisection is a social evil because if it advances human knowledge, it does so at the expense of human character.”

“A man of my spiritual intensity does not eat corpses.”

“Animals are my friends; I don’t eat my friends.”
Leo Tolstoy:
“If a man aspires towards a righteous life, his first act of abstinence is from injury to animals.”
Alice Walker:
“The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for whites, or women created for men.”
Abraham Lincoln:
“I care not for a man’s religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it.”
Pythagoras:
“Animals share with us the privilege of having a soul.”
“The earth affords a lavish supply of richess of innocent foods, and offers you banquets that involve no bloodshed or slaughter; only beasts satisfy their hunger with flesh, and not even all of those, because horses, cattle, and sheep live on grass.”
John Robbins (p. 49 Diet for a New America):
“Our understanding of what constitutes intelligence is utterly relative. If an aborigine drafted an I.Q. test, for example, all of Western civilization would probably flunk. We have a very convenient and self-serving way of defining intelligence. If an animal does something, we call it instinct. If we do the same thing for the same reason, we call it intelligence.”
In addition to his writings on non-violence, Leo Tolstoy’s advocacy of vegetarianism led to his friendship with Mohandas Gandhi. He wrote several essays about vegetarianism, but perhaps never more compellingly than when he said: “flesh eating is simply immoral, as it involves the performance of an act, which is contrary to moral feeling: killing.”
Nikola Tesla was a humanitarian who loved animals. He argued that animal slaughter was “wanton and cruel” and eventually became a vegetarian.
Voltaire was an advocate of civil rights and freedom. He also believed in the virtues of vegetarianism. He once wrote that “men fed upon carnage, and drinking strong drinks, have all an impoisoned and arid blood which drives them mad in a hundred different ways.” This sounds like an early precursor of the phrase “you are what you eat.”