All of this is based on a Harris Interactive Service Bureau poll of 5,050 people in 2008.

Interestingly, the same poll found that 5.2 percent of respondents were “definitely interested” in following a vegetarian diet at some unspecified point in the future. Which means the door is open for more recruits, particularly as more studies like the World Health Organization processed meat review are released.

Meat vs. Vegetables

The practice of vegetarianism in Western culture goes back as far as ancient Greece, where mathematician Pythagoras was an early advocate of vegetarians. Plato described the diet as “divinely ordained.” In fact, vegetarianism was known as the “Pythagorean diet” until the 1800s, when vegetarianism took hold. Throughout history, such notables as Da Vinci, Tolstoy, Gandhi and Kafka were vegetarians, among many prominent people. Today, Ellen DeGeneres, Paul McCartney and Russell Brand are among the most prominent vegetarians.

The battle of meat vs. vegetables has no middle ground. There’s an old joke about how you tell if someone is a vegetarian. The punchline: Don’t worry…they’ll tell you. The joke reflects the sometimes strident and quasi-religious fervor of vegetarianism, which can be a battleground for harried waiters and waitresses who have to find out if the soup has chicken stock or if the cake was made with eggs.

On the other hand, vegetarians are typically somewhat healthier than their meat-eating cousins, with lower body weight, blood pressure and incidents of cancer. In fact, a 2013 study of more than 70,000 people claimed vegetarians had a 12 percent lower risk of death compared to meat eaters. That’s because they have a 32 percent less chance of developing heart disease, the number-one killer in America.