MODE OF NUTRITION AMONGST VERTEBRATES WITH THE MOST INTENSE PLEASURE

Back then in college, one of the most intriguing topics for me in biology was the interaction and feeding relationship between living organisms in an ecosystem. Personally, aside from the topic being very simple to understand, it was also easily relatable. Actually, what made it so was because of the mere fact that I grew up in a rural community and in this part of the world rearing farm animals is considered as a necessity. Funny enough, most of the villagers believe that these domestic animals are a sine qua non for a better life since the profit derived from this particular agricultural activity is always amazing. So with this opportunity at my beck and call, understanding the feeding patterns exhibited by most of these animals wasn't really a hard nut to crack.

Well, after a while, the whole thing got a little bit boring. Deep inside I kind of knew that I was only basing my studies on opinions and suggestions that were already taught in the classroom and I felt there was need for me to explore more. I'm pretty sure you are already eager to know if I did unravel anything new. I'll let you answer that for yourself after going through this article. So on that note, the major aim is to share my observation and deduction on the connection between these two slightly distinct phenomena known as nutrition and pleasure.

Lets start with the basis... What you should know about nutrition

You'll agree with me that the concept of living things showcase nutrition as one of the basic characteristics of life. According to Sarojini Ramalingam, author of the famous Modern Biology textbooks used by secondary schools in West African countries;

nutrition is the series of processes by which living organisms obtain food substances and use them to provide energy and materials for their growth, activities and reproduction.

As a matter of fact, the food obtained by all animals are considered as ready-made since there are basically gotten from plants. With that being said, it's pertinent to state that there are two specific modes of nutrition exhibited by living organisms. The first mode of nutrition is a major feature of green plants and it's called the autotrophic or holophytic mode of nutrition. In actuality, this mode of nutrition is what confers the plant with the ability to produce food through photosynthetic process. However, we'll not be considering the first mode of nutrition today; instead, our main emphasis will be on one of the subset of the second (heterotrophic) mode of nutrition known as holozoic mode of nutrition.

From the statement above, you'll notice that I used the word 'subset' when referring to holozoic mode of nutrition. The truth is that, holozoic mode of nutrition is not the only type of heterotrophic mode of nutrition. There are several other types such as parasitism, saprophytism, symbiosis, etc. Nevertheless, this article restricts us to only vertebrates and holozoic mode of nutrition is the only type that's exhibited by these animals with backbone. All the same, just like in other modes of nutrition, the way holozoic organisms obtain and ingest food depends on several factors. In this case, the factors range from the type of food, dentition, and alimentary canal.

Because of the above reasons, in order to vividly explain holozoic mode of nutrition, holozoic organisms are further classified into three groups which includes herbivores, carnivores and omnivores. Now, considering the fact that the classifications of holozoic organisms are being treated right from the elementary school, I'm convinced that there's absolutely no one who doesn't really have an idea or two about it. That notwithstanding, for the purpose of clarity, it's important to state that herbivores are animals that feed directly on plants; carnivores are exclusively flesh-eating animals; while omnivores feed on both plants and animals. In addition to this, it is worthy of note that the group carnivores can be split into two simpler groups. One of the groups feed on animals that are alive (a concept known as predation), while the other feed on dead animals and are known as scavengers.

Nutrition doesn't make much sense without pleasure

Have you ever done anything that made you feel on top of the world?. Something that gave you this kind of weird but pleasurable feelings?. I'm pretty sure you must have had an experience somehow. Now, it might interest you to know that to a great extent all living organisms are programmed to seek pleasure. Before we continue, I'll like to pinpoint the fact that the pleasure I'm referring to here has nothing to do with sex. If you were actually thinking towards that direction then you need a very strong deliverance lol. With that being said, based on Merriam Webster’s definition, "Pleasure is a feeling of happiness, enjoyment, or satisfaction".

In recent times, numerous researches have convincingly proven the existence of a vital connection between nutrition and pleasure. Researchers and experts believe that food can be a source of enjoyment. According to them, it's more than a recreational enjoyment because it definitely goes beyond the sensory aspect since the experience has some level of neurological impact. With regards to this, nutritional psychologist Marc David makes this a little bit clearer in his book The Slow Down Diet: Eating for Pleasure, Energy and Weight Loss where he asserted that:

You can’t receive pleasure unless you are aware of what you are engaging in. So, if you’re eating food and you’re not paying attention then you will potentially miss the experience of pleasure and this has very real biochemical consequences.

Personally, what I deduced from David's assertion is that pleasure in nutrition is more of how organisms eat rather than what they eat. Well, although he limited his ideology to human nutrition (omnivores); however, it made more sense as I compared it to other holozoic mode of nutrition (herbivores and carnivores). As we've also seen, since pleasure happened to be vital in nutrition; out of curiosity, I decided to formulate principles basically from symposium related to the subject matter at hand in order to ascertain the group of holozoic nutrition that experiences the most intense pleasure out of the three groups.

Feeding principles that can trigger pleasure

First and foremost, the main gist about these feeding principles I'm about sharing is that there highlight on approaches organisms could adopt to attend some level of satisfaction. These principles include:

•Timing
•Focusing
•Appreciating

Researchers and experts have proven that 'the only way to eat with pleasure is to notice if there's any pleasure that can be gotten from what is being eaten'. I guess this sounds a little confusing; so lets break it down. You'll agree with me that a greater percentage of individuals can't possibly notice something while rushing or in haste. Hence, as a result of not slowing down, they may either bypass important things. This illustration depicts exactly what happens when organisms are feeding. Actually, not taking time to savor the food that's to be consumed is what hinders pleasure that could have been derived from it.

Humans need to learn from the cat

The above premise my sound awkward but the truth is that, when we talk about the mode of nutrition amongst vertebrates with the most intense pleasure, it's definitely predation. I had to use the cat as a case study because I practically carried out my observation on predation using my neighbor's cat. Someone might want to ask the basis for my concession. The answer is simple, I followed the feeding principles.

For those that have seen the cat hunting its prey, without much explanation I'm sure they'll likely understand better. Actually, what happens is that once the cat is able to trap its prey, it inserts its sharp claws on it. Aside from inserting its claws, it renders the prey entirely vulnerable by biting it. The funny thing is that the cat doesn't just go straight to eating the prey, rather, it literally takes its time to savor the food (prey) very well. In most cases it will encourage the prey to try escaping knowing fully well that it can't go far. It's only after putting all the three feeding principles into action that you'll see the cat consuming the food with pride.

Unfortunately, unlike the cat and other predators, what most humans lack in their daily diet is vitamin P (pleasure). It's on rare occasions you get to see people take quality time to eat without rushing or focusing on something else. Like I said earlier, pleasure is very vital in nutrition and there are biochemical consequences if it's consistently overlooked.

I sincerely hope you've learned something from this article. You're free to discuss my ideas and share your own thoughts about the things I’m writing about. Thanks for doing this with me. Have a wonderful weekend!

To read more about this topic, check out these REFERENCES

Exploring the links between pleasure in food and healthy eating habits. Retrieved on 13th December, 2018
Eating for pleasure. Retrieved on 13th December, 2018

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