eli5: if vegetables are so important for our diet, how come carnivores doing fine without them?

Question

eli5: if vegetables are so important for our diet, how come carnivores doing fine without them?

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Answer 1

Different organisms have different dietary needs. So when we say “vegetables are important for *our* diet” we are specifically talking about the dietary needs of human beings, who aren’t carnivores.

Simply put, carnivores have evolved to eat meat only. Their entire digestive system is adapted to gorging on lots of meat and slowly digesting it over a long period of time, extracting all of the nutrients while neutralizing putrefaction.

Humans aren’t. Our system is adapted to handle moderate amounts of both meat and plant matter, and while we can survive on both solely, if we carefully choose our food sources, it is not the most efficient use of our biological systems.