If last month you told me that I could live on nothing but meat I would have thought you were trying to get me to commit suicide by stupidity. That was before I heard Jordan Peterson tell Joe Rogan about the health benefits that he received from a carnivore diet. He claimed that following the diet helped him cure a host of chronic health conditions including psoriasis and depression. While following the diet he lost 50 lbs and actually gained muscle mass.

I was skeptical about this because I thought you needed vegetables to survive. Actually, I thought that the more vegetables you ate, the healthier you were. Vegan advocates claim that quitting meat and dairy leads to weight loss and lower risks of obesity, cancer, and heart disease but follower of the carnivore diet claim these exact same benefits.

Obviously, both of these can’t be true, so I’m testing this out myself. I already finished three weeks on a carnivore diet and now I will do the same with a vegan diet, testing all of the same variables along the way.

But unlike carnivores, vegans are concerned with more than just their health. Animal welfare and the conditions in factory farms are near the top of the list.

I am by no means the biggest animal lover but I do think that future generations will look back at factory farming the same way that we see things like slavery, genocide, and child sacrifice. The treatment of these animals is undeniably cruel and also contribute to the second reason that people convert to a Vegan diet; the environment.

According to the creators of the documentary, Cowspiracy, ‘animal agriculture is responsible for 18% of greenhouse, more than the combined exhaust from all transportation’. Animal agriculture is also the biggest consumer of water in the US, accounting for over 80% of all usage.

These were problems that I was almost entirely ignorant of. I purposely avoided watching documentaries about the environmental impact of animal agriculture because I was under the impression that ignorance is bliss.

I never tried a vegan diet in the past because I thought that quitting meat would be like quitting cigarettes. But, it turns out that quitting everything except for meat was already tougher than I imagined it would be to quit cigarettes. Plus, I’m pretty sure that cigarettes are vegan. So, I’m going to give it a shot.

I took the same measurements that I did before started a Carnivore diet and will take them again after three weeks of a Vegan diet. This includes a blood test to analyze my testosterone, estrogen, cholesterol, and triglycerides. I got a DEXA scan to measure my weight, body fat, and muscle mass. I also took photos and tested my strength on different lifts at the gym to see how the two diets affect my skin and physique.

In addition, I am going to measure the different impact I will make to the environment and animal welfare when switching from a carnivore to a vegan diet. If I can help the environment and reduce animal suffering while improving my health then it almost seems evil not to eat vegan.

Follow along as I progress through the diet. Thank you for reading, Namaste.