[Closed] Evolutionary biologists: why did animals evolve to be delicious?

Because evolution is accidental.

It's because they are mostly made of tasty, tasty meat.

The more serious answer is that maybe we've evolved to enjoy the taste of other animals as an evolutionary incentive to catch and eat them rather than starve to death.

When did humans stop being so damn tasty?

he more serious answer is that maybe we’ve evolved to enjoy the taste of other animals as an evolutionary incentive to catch and eat them rather than starve to death.

Pretty much this I think.

...because BACON!

That one's for you Cougs!

"Delicious" is a social construct. You only think they're delicious because you were told that when you were a baby. If your parents had fed you on insects and grass clippings, you'd think those were delicious. That orange "cheese" that comes with boxes of Mac and Cheese is conclusive proof of this.

The more serious answer is that maybe we’ve evolved to enjoy the taste of other animals as an evolutionary incentive to catch and eat them rather than starve to death.

After Brexit, the long process towards finding cabbage and turnips delicious begins.

…because BACON!

And of course human flesh tastes of bacon apparently.

That orange “cheese” that comes with boxes of Mac and Cheese is conclusive proof of this.

It isn't. That is the forbidden cheese but it is even more delicious as a result.

When did humans stop being so damn tasty?

They didn't...

Burp.

They didn’t…

I have seen many short films on the Internet which seem to support this hypothesis.

I’ve eaten plenty of insects when I lived in Thailand. I wasn’t told they were tasty when I was young, but I can confirm they are delicious. I’d steer clear of ants eggs though.

Ok, I get that we (and other meat eating animals) evolved to think animals were tasty as that gave us good survival chances, but you’d think that tasting disgusting would be a good survival trait. An animal that mutated to taste bad would have better survival chances, no?

An animal that mutated to taste bad would have better survival chances, no?

Didn't work for Michael Jackson, did it?

That is the forbidden cheese but it is even more delicious as a result.

Oh dear. I Googled "forbidden cheese", it came back with "Why is maggot cheese illegal?" I'm not brave enough to click on the link.

Apparently bats are a bit moreish. Not recommended these days for some reason.

I’ve eaten plenty of insects when I lived in Thailand. I wasn’t told they were tasty when I was young, but I can confirm they are delicious.

Every time I eat shrimp, I can't help but to think that I'm eating sea cockroaches.

An animal that mutated to taste bad would have better survival chances, no?

Yes and no.

Evolution is like an arms race.

Every time the prey adapts to survive, the predator adapts by the process of natural selection to counter that mutation.

The prey taste bad...the predator evolves to find it tasty.
The prey becomes poisonous...the predator develops immunity to the poison.

Oh dear. I Googled “forbidden cheese”, it came back with “Why is maggot cheese illegal?” I’m not brave enough to click on the link.

Sardinian delicacy. Doesn't meet eu food standards. Mmmm Cheese,...

The prey becomes poisonous…the predator develops immunity to the poison.

Hasn't happened yet for Britney - she's still going strong.

Doesn’t meet eu food standards.

Something to do with exceeding the allowable maggot content?

My favourite bit of food evolution trivia involves chilli plants.

Chilli peppers evolved capsaicin as a chemical irritant that effects mammals but not birds. Birds are better at dispersing seeds than mammals, they tend to pass the seeds whole, rather then chewed up. So Chilli plants that produced capsaicin were more successful.

But then daft humans came along and decided they enjoyed the sensation of having their faces on fire so started eating the chillies.

Interesting topic.

For me, a lot of it is cultural. Tastes and preferences are socially constructed. Chomping down on some grisly chicken feet in China brings equal satisfaction to the revulsion of a vegan forced to eat a bacon sandwich in California. In western culture, meat has also been associated with masculinity and power, e.g. those muscleheads on IG posting pictures of stakes and boasting about their dietary habits or like the mythology of the hunter in the US and the values of self-reliance and sufficiency it engenders.

So it's also about values: the Incas, for example, wordshipped the lama, and so therefore refrained from slaughtering them, in India, the cow is sacred because it was a cornerstone of the agrarian society. I've never tried it human flesh, but I'd say it's probably as satisfying to eat as pork if sauteed, however most of us would balk if we found out we were eating our own kind because we've been taught to believe it's an abomination, as slaughtering a cow or eating your dog might be, depending on your cultural values.

Is it a state of mind? I used to eat meat. I have been meat free for nearly a year and the thought of eating meat turns my stomach (not preaching or owt, i'm not one of 'those' non meat eaters). But does that mean I wouldn't find it tasty? Or has my thoughts towards meat given me a phycological block that would subconsciously make me think it tastes bad?

Chomping down on some grisly chicken feet in China brings equal satisfaction to the revulsion of a vegan forced to eat a bacon sandwich in California.

Chicken feet are actually pretty tasty. I'd still go for bacon though.

most of us would balk if we found out we were eating our own kind.

Cannabalism is actually very unhealthy - high risk of spreading diseases. We may instinctively avoid eating our own species due to natural selection rather than due to cultural conditioning.

but you’d think that tasting disgusting would be a good survival trait.

you'd probably fins slugs pretty nasty, you can eat them, but the slime they produce is very bitter. Hedgehogs on the other hand, don't care.

Cannabalism is actually very unhealthy – high risk of spreading diseases. We may instinctively avoid eating our own species due to natural selection rather than due to cultural conditioning.

Yep, and some cultural conditioning was very useful from a food safety point of view.

BITD avoiding pig products or shellfish was a good way of avoiding parasites and food poisoning

@martinhutch - the answer  is "when KKKatie Hopkins was born"

Surely if they tasted like earwax nothing would want to catch and eat them, so they would have better odds of surviving and procreating

A species without predators overbreeds and exhausts it’s food supply / environment and starves to death. There’s a balance struck between breeding and being eaten and prey species rely on predators eating a percentage of their offspring before they themselves breed. (Although I doubt that they relish the idea)

When you see tadpoles in a pond most of them won’t live long enough to <span style="font-size: 0.8rem;">hop out of the pond - something like only 1 in 4000 make it to breeding age.</span>

species at the top of the food chain keep their own numbers low - breed in lower numbers and behave territorially and drive competitors away - even drive their own adult offspring away - so as not over predate their own food supply

Hedgehogs on the other hand,

...... taste a bit like chicken

For me, a lot of it is cultural.

Not in terms of evolution.

In evolutionary terms, humans as a species stopped evolving food-wise, as soon as they invented agriculture and domestication of prey animals.

We started evolving our food instead.

There's defiantly a programmed evolutianary reason.

Why do we like foot that's bad for us and get fat?

That's the wrong way to look at it, were programmed to gorge on calorific foods as in nature they would be scarce. Thats not to say you can't consciously override that urge with some thought and self control, but who ever just eats 3 pringles or half a chocolate bar?

Evolutionary biologists: why did animals evolve to be delicious?

You don’t need to be an evolutionary biologist to recognise the question is wrong - what examples are there of animals that evolved to be delicious?

Predators (like us) evolve to find their prey delicious - otherwise they would soon be extinct.

It’s pretty hard for animals to just evolve a new features, but some have tried quite hard, such as hedgehogs, porcupines and skunks.

haven't eaten meat since 14yo or dairy since 18yo, usually the smells that people revere (bacon, croissants) are nauseating to me. I'll cross the road to avoid the cheese shop smell, hold my breath going past the supermarket aisle with the pigs' legs hanging up (this is Spain btw).

End of the day it's what you're used to. The Koreans I used to work with loved the smell of a certain traditional fermented fish dish, but would decline to order it if we westerners were eating with them out of consideration. It was not for no reason.

We started evolving our food instead.

human flesh... however most of us would balk if we found out we were eating our own kind

I wonder if the Uruguayan rugby team were asked what it tastes like?

Hedgehogs on the other hand,

…… taste a bit like chicken

Are you sure? Last one I ate tasted very much of cheese and pineapple

I wonder if the Uruguayan rugby team were asked what it tastes like?

They ate the pilots first. Must have felt good.

why did animals evolve to be delicious?

They are not delicious to me, the smell of meat is ****ing disgusting and the sight of it lying in a butchers window turns my stomach.

Personally i consider it inhumane to eat meat, prob why im single (insert winky smilie)

The prey taste bad…the predator evolves to find it tasty.
The prey becomes poisonous…the predator develops immunity to the poison.

Like chillies, and all the delicious spicy foods all right minded people adore.

Ah, beaten to it.

Predators (like us) evolve to find their prey delicious

It has been speculated that a long extinct big cat probably preyed on early Australopithecines. Makes sense, there are leopards and Hyenas that will take chimps. There's a very interesting book called Man the Hunted that explores this really fascinating aspect of our evolutionary past.

An animal that mutated to taste bad would have better survival chances, no?

Evolution doesn't work in this case. The humans assumptions is that the animals for given breed taste the same. The human only finds out after they have killed one so any less nice ones will not survive more than the nicer ones.

whut?

Taste has nothing to do with evolution really other than as a safety mechanism to ensure you don't eat something that is poisonous or will do you harm. Animals are driven by hunger first, then sex. If they're not grazing or hunting, they're looking to get their leg over. They spend their time starving almost all the time, and horny. Humans have solved one of those in that they no longer spend all their time starving so we have the luxury of taste and selecting food based on taste preference...but if you're hungry enough you'll eat anything and hunger will completely drive your behaviour.

Any animal that evolved not to be delicious to predators (or eliminated its predators, see humans) wouldn't have pressures of natural selection and would get slower and weaker. Then some other animal would evolve to eat it because it's plentiful and easy to catch.

I'm sure I've heard about animals that are poisonous but some other specific species evolved to tolerate the poison and munches away at leisure - but I forget the details...

That doesn't explain why cake is more popular than quinoa.

Cake is more attractive as its high in fat and sugar. Rare commodities for a hunter gatherer.

Humans have solved one of those in that they no longer spend all their time starving

That's only true of the last 150 years or so, since we've managed to use fossil fuels as a main driver of agriculture. Previously to that most humans still spent most of their lives in hunger.

Humans have solved one of those

Wasn't the Internet invented to solve the other? 😁

Any animal that evolved not to be delicious to predators (or eliminated its predators, see humans) wouldn’t have pressures of natural selection and would get slower and weaker. Then some other animal would evolve to eat it

I like that. Good work molgrips.

That’s only true of the last 150 years or so, since we’ve managed to use fossil fuels as a main driver of agriculture. Previously to that most humans still spent most of their lives in hunger.

Well yes but there is a difference between hunger and starvation. Animals live in a constant state of starvation, teetering on a thin line between life and death. For a Cheetah, not catching that gazelle now might spell death as you don't know when the next one might come bobbing along. Starvation and the hunt for food totally dominates their lives and behaviour. Humans for most of our time have just been hungry. Quite early on we moved away from hunter gatherer lives - chasing animals around and foraging for fruit, berries and nuts, and created societies to do agriculture, taking our destinies into our own hands, and since then we've not been starving. Hungry yes, but not life or death starving.

But mechanisation really turbocharged things. 100 years ago something like 80% of the worlds population was living in poverty, but now less than 10% of the world is in poverty despite an explosion in the global population. So much progress over the last 100 years in 150,000 year of human history. It's beyond exponential. And now we're in the absurd situation where globally we waste more food than the entire world needed 100 years ago. Hunger for most of us is an attack of the munchies in between meals that are way too large for us...and even that is driven mostly by the boredome of our modern monotonous hum-drum lives. Hence our luxury to indulge ourselves in flavour and preferences. Taste would not even cross the mind of a Cheeta who catches that Gazelle as it buries hits head right into the gut of the animal...it just want to gorge itself as much as possible before the Hyena's come along and steal the carcass from it.

Cannabalism is actually very unhealthy – high risk of spreading diseases.

Kuru being a specific disease. Very similar to CJD, transmission is through eating infected human brain. New Guinea is where it’s found, the Foré people practiced funerary cannibalism, passing the disease along.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuru_(disease)

When did humans stop being so damn tasty?

People allegedly taste like pigs. This is why whenever I catch a flight I always take honey and pineapple rings in my carry on luggage. If the planes crashing I’m going to eat like a king! Sweet honey glazed humham and pineapple..Mmmmm

Quite early on we moved away from hunter gatherer lives – chasing animals around and foraging for fruit, berries and nuts, and created societies to do agriculture, taking our destinies into our own hands, and since then we’ve not been starving. Hungry yes, but not life or death starving.

No.

We've been hunter-gatherers for pretty much the entire existence of  all of the Homo species, from at least 2.4 million YA to only really in the last 100 years that the last groups have died away (or don't rely on H-G 100% of the time), so no not "quite early on" It's only comparatively recently (10-14,000 years) that we've been ploughing and scattering..and it's only more recently still that some rich countries have managed to produce food cheaply enough (fossil fuel and slavery) so that the majority of population isn't hungry/starving or a couple of meals away from them all the time.

Most of the foods described here are only delicious when cooked: cooking food provided a significant advantage as it essentially is pre-digestion and allows humans to consume more calories more easily. It wouldn't be surprising, therefore, if humans have evolved or are conditioned to find (generally) cooked meat and fish appealing.

Raw meat tastes great. Cooking is more important for safety and not having to eat food fresh.

Why do we like foot that’s bad for us and get fat?

Same ‘reason’ as drugs. Not everything has a ‘reason’ as much as a cause.

Natural selection produces all kinds of dead-ends and we are certainly making a gigantic mess of both ourselves and the ecosystem. Luckily we have time to profit even as the party winds down.

The boss of the sugar-factory may be queen bee but the worker bees have diabetes. Luckily for the queen bee, the workers keep breeding which is also good business for the boss of the insulin-factory (current total compensation for CEO of the insulin factory is $54,800,000 )

Likewise, intensive animal farming is just getting into gear. Buckets of fat and sugar will keep the blues away.

Raw meat tastes great. Cooking is more important for safety and not having to eat food fresh.

No. Cooked food is easier chew and easier to digest, and was fundamental to humans developing larger brains.

Most of the foods described here are only delicious when cooked:

Was what I replying to. And it’s not true. Raw food is delicious but impractical… being freed to be able to store and later use a wide variety of food, which with many foods only really works thanks to cooking, gave the human animal a huge advantage over others. I haven’t suggested that cooking wasn’t vital to the advancement of our species.

Raw food is delicious but impractical

You're quite right: I look at a plate of chips and wonder why I couldn't have a raw potato instead.

Most of the foods described here are only delicious when cooked:

Potatoes weren’t mentioned. Thread was about animals. My reply to this comment was explicitly about meat. Although I want raw chillies on my tea now.

Potatoes weren’t mentioned.

You said

Raw food is delicious but impractical

Perhaps you could point me to where you excluded potatoes.

Anyway, my roast chicken tea is ready now. I do think the crispy skin and gravy from the cooking juices are disgusting, though.

I said…

Raw meat tastes great.

And it happens to also be true of a lot of the things humans eat.

the crispy skin and gravy from the cooking juices

Drool…

Oh… no one go trying raw farmed chicken please…

I said…

Raw food is delicious but impractical

Some raw food is delicious and some of it is impractical. On the subject of meat, I'm confident that the majority here are thinking of cooked food.

One of the reasons food tastes good is because making it taste bad is expensive. Plenty of animals are unpalatable, but those that aren't are successful despite being tasty. If you have to put too much energy into making bitter tasting flesh (and with large animals it might be impossible to get enough of the appropriate compounds) then you'll have less for procreation which is the main driver of success.

What puzzles me is that fly's have evolved to make a noise that makes every single person want to kill them then kill them some more and then a bit more still.

What puzzles me is that fly’s have evolved to make a noise that makes every single person want to kill them then kill them some more and then a bit more still.

They've also evolved to be quick enough so you can't.

Also, the things that come into your house and eat stuff that HAVE evolved to be quiet, you don't know about...

That doesn’t explain why cake is more popular than quinoa.

Quinoa is the result of Darwinism

Cake is the result of Intelligent Design. Which is why you get a lot of it sold at church fetes.

Why do we like foot that’s bad for us and get fat?

No food is bad for us. Otherwise it wouldn't be called food. Everything is toxic in the sufficient dose - drink too much water and you'll slip into a coma and die. The foods we think of as bad are in fact very very good as food - lots of important stuff like calories in them. Too much of anything is bad for you - but thats what 'too much' means.

They’ve also evolved to be quick enough so you can’t.

Yes but we've evolved to a point where we can create a spray which allows us to not only kill them but stare right into their many eyes and watch them die as their entire nervous system fires of all their muscles at once and laugh and laugh as they slowly perish.😊

One of the reasons food tastes good is because making it taste bad is expensive.

This sentence has confused me. Why would anyone endeavour to make food taste bad in the first place? Is there a company out there that has invested time and resource in to making food taste as shit as possible and then said “You know what, making this food taste bad is getting expensive, it’s never gonna catch on. How about we make it taste nice instead?”

Or have I just missed something?

This sentence has confused me. Why would anyone endeavour to make food taste bad in the first place?

To deter predators

* edit

Although I’m not convinced that the average Victoriaspongeasaurus would have the requisite amount of Sherlocks to connect their unusual (and lately rather bitter) diet to a corresponding dearth of interested predators.

How does expense play in to that then? Evolution doesn’t have a cost attached. It’s not like a platypus had to handover its life savings to have its offspring taste shitty. I get what you’re saying, but that doesn’t fit with the wording of the sentence I’m referring to

I get what you’re saying, but that doesn’t fit with the wording of the sentence I’m referring to

Well, it was user ‘joat’ that was stating it, I was simply attempting to explain that (at least what I got from it) they weren’t talking about:

a company out there that has invested time and resource in to making food taste as shit as possible

We’re probably on a similar footing regarding cost vs benefit scenarios, although I would imagine that there are examples whereby costs (hardships) are suffered/chosen in exchange for benefits (survival/reproduction). It’s the issue of conscious/voluntary exchanges (as opposed to instinct/happenstance) that I find challenging/unlikely. At least in non-human species. Yet even with our (comparatively) enhanced faculties and (comparatively) limitless/conceptual/existential powers of choice+reason we still somehow (customarily, collectively and frequently) manage to shit the bed and poison the well*

*Which could well be population control?

Cannabalism is actually very unhealthy – high risk of spreading diseases. We may instinctively avoid eating our own species due to natural selection rather than due to cultural conditionin

So is eating meat: I read today that 70% percent of disease comes from animal agriculture, including one some might know called SARS-Covid19. People seem totally ignorant of this, so I guess we'll just stagger into the next pandemic, though perhaps next one will have the death rate of Ebola and the infection rate of measles. Those left standing might well turn to cannibalism.

Seems I started something then buggered off. I think my point has been explained though. There is no thought to evolution, just a retrospective cost/benefit analysis. If what you'd evolved, be it strength, cunning or camouflage, gave you an advantage then you'll pass on your genes. The expense notion is just pointing out that making a being uses resources that have to be balanced against their benefit. You could evolve a million protective spines and never be eaten but they'd be no use if the trade-off was not being able to walk far enough to get food.

That makes sense. The original sentence just threw me for some reason. Then again I think you might be anthropomorphising to a degree. I don’t think taste plays that much of a factor for most predators. They simply eat the prey that lives in the same ecosystem. Some of that prey will evolve defence mechanisms to lessen the chance of being eaten.

maccruiskeen
Subscriber

Hedgehogs on the other hand,

…… taste a bit like chicken
Posted 7 hours ago

Actuall they taste of pork, hence the name. Hedge because of where they live, hog because of the taste.
To cook one encase it clay and cook it in the hot hot ash of a fire. When the clay baked crack it open and it takes the spines away with it, hedgehog flesh cooked to perfection.
Badgers and foxes open them b rolling them into water, the hedgehog has to uncurl to breath and swim, exposing the soft underbelly to a bite

Marshall Sahlins did metastudy of hunting and gathering societies and found that meat only constituted about 5% of the diet, that they spent less time chasing or gathering dinner than people in the west spend at work and that women did most of the gathering and preparation of food therefore they (and vegetables) were the mainstay of the small scale societies. The genetic variant (from the near east) for digesting milk spread rapidly because groups that had domesticated animals like cows, sheep, goats, could live on the milk and hence inhabit places that were otherwise inhospitable, like Scotland. Milk in this respect was more important than meat. The Neanderthalers were big meat eaters and things didn't go too well for them.

groups that had domesticated animals like cows, sheep, goats, could live on the milk and hence inhabit places that were otherwise inhospitable,

I thought the ability to convert milk to cheese (which can be stored for winter) was a major factor.