Written with investigative vigour, provocative and controversial but always accessible, Eating is a hard-hitting exploration of our eating habits, making us look at what we eat as a moral issue. Organic foods are the fastest growing section of the food industry, and it is estimated that vegans are now almost as common as vegetarians. Veal consumption in the US has fallen by more than 75% since 1975, and in the UK, sales of free-range eggs have now passed in value sales of eggs from caged hens. Evidently we are concerned. But how concerned should we be about where our food comes from? Does the food we buy really affect the world around us? And what can we do? In Eating , philosopher Peter Singer and environmentalist Jim Mason follow three families with varying eating habits, from fast-food eaters to vegans, to explore how the food we eat makes its way to the table, and at what expense. The authors peel back each layer of food production, and examine how they ought to factor into our buying choices. Recognising that we are not all likely to become vegetarian or vegan, they go on to offer ways to make the most ethical choices within the framework of a diet that includes animal products.

"Each year, Peter Singer, the philosopher, ethicist, and Animal Rights activist, teaches a large undergraduate class on Ethics. In advance of the Thanksgiving holiday in America, he gives a lecture to his students on the ethical issues involved with its journey to our holiday tables. He covers how the bird came into existence and the kind of life and death it has as well as the conditions of the workers involved with its production and the environmental impact of their being factory farmed. It is not a pretty picture and may lead one to think twice about their turkey traditions. This very short book will be an expanded form of the essay based on that lecture he wrote for our book, Ethics in the Real World. The plan is to increase that essay from about 1,000 words to 8,000 and package it as an On Bullshit-sized book which could be a Thanksgiving classic!"-- Provided by publisher