You just can’t make this stuff up. Well I guess you could, but it probably wouldn’t be any funnier than the real thing. Here’s The Guardian:

People should have one meat-free day a week if they want to make a personal and effective sacrifice that would help tackle climate change, the world’s leading authority on global warming has told The Observer

Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which last year earned a joint share of the Nobel Peace Prize, said that people should then go on to reduce their meat consumption even further…

Pachauri, who was re-elected the panel’s chairman for a second six-year term last week, said diet change was important because of the huge greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental problems - including habitat destruction - associated with rearing cattle and other animals. It was relatively easy to change eating habits compared to changing means of transport, he said.

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation has estimated that meat production accounts for nearly a fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions. These are generated during the production of animal feeds, for example, while ruminants, particularly cows, emit methane, which is 23 times more effective as a global warming agent than carbon dioxide. The agency has also warned that meat consumption is set to double by the middle of the century.

‘In terms of immediacy of action and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it clearly is the most attractive opportunity,’ said Pachauri. ‘Give up meat for one day [a week] initially, and decrease it from there,’ said the Indian economist, who is a vegetarian.

Now look — I like making jokes about global warming fanatics because I’m still not convinced that mankind has any say in the temperature of the planet. Even so, if we make it a few degrees hotter, I think that’s better than another ice age, right? (Remember, North America used to be under about 2 miles of solid ice. Also, I’ve read that global warming will cause another ice age. I guess I just can’t win.) But my mind is always open for new facts.

So let’s break this down: Dr. Pachauri — who is a vegetarian — wants the rest of the world to adopt his vegetarian eating habits. Now, that doesn’t disqualify his position that the planet should change their diets, but it certainly does raise some eyebrows.

I’m not sure that a reduction of cows as livestock would lead to a more carbon-neutral climate, though. I mean, What about all of the grass and plants that the cows feed off of? Do they not neutralize the carbon by converting it to oxygen? Perhaps the cows “emit” at a rate greater than the grass can absorb. But, cows can only “emit” when their bodies have taken in energy, so one might assume that the ratio of grass:cows is sort of a natural level. But I don’t know; I don’t have access to those sorts of numbers.

My point is, Don’t necessarily trust “authorities,” such as the UN. Dr Rajendra Pachauri is from India, where vegetarianism is practiced regularly (>30% of Indian citizens) for religious reasons. Once again, this doesn’t disqualify his position, but it raises a question of confirmation bias in his studies. Perhaps there are multiple benefits to the planet from eating meat that he overlooked? I’m not saying I know that to be true, but I am saying that I don’t know it to not be true.