Why Do We Refuse to Eat Predators?

Tuna hunts. Lions hunt. So why is one in your lunchbox and the other never on the menu? We follow the meal backwards: the food bill, what builds up inside a predator, a real parasite outbreak, and the reason the question feels so strange in the first place. CHAPTERS 0:00 A predator in your lunchbox 0:21 Both are hunters 0:42 The easy answers 1:14 Can you actually eat a lion? 1:40 The food bill 3:11 So why is tuna cheap? 4:06 What builds up inside a predator 5:54 The meal that survived the freezer 7:09 The twist 7:48 Why the label changes your appetite 9:20 The answer SOURCES Yellowfin tuna diet and fishery (NOAA): https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/species/atlantic-yellowfin-tuna Lions: feeding and conservation (Smithsonian's National Zoo): https://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/lion Energy flow through food webs (University of Michigan): https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/globalchange/lectures/flow-of-energy/ Mercury in food (FDA): https://www.fda.gov/food/environmental-contaminants-food/mercury-food-and-dietary-supplements Advice about eating fish (FDA): https://www.fda.gov/food/consumers/advice-about-eating-fish DDT history and status (EPA): https://www.epa.gov/ingredients-used-pesticide-products/ddt-brief-history-and-status 2022 bear-meat trichinellosis outbreak (CDC MMWR): https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/73/wr/mm7320a2.htm Trichinellosis sources (CDC): https://www.cdc.gov/trichinellosis/about/index.html Food likes and dislikes (Rozin et al.): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK217511/ Disgust and disease avoidance (Curtis et al.): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3013466/ The 2022 meal is an illustrated reconstruction. Energy numbers are illustrative. #FoodScience #AnimalScience #Evolution