Mankind's history is rife with examples of natural phenomena radically changing its existence, the ice ages and small pox to name two. HIV has had a profound effect on sexual behavior the world over. Now, a mysterious protein -- a prion -- is about to change the eating habits of many people in the West and those aspiring to "developed" nation standards. The timing is perfect.

I'm neither a vegetarian nor an animal-rights advocate -- just a rationale member of the 6-billion person human race, which is set to double in size in the next 50 years. Population growth and improving standards of living are putting pressures on natural resources, including water and arable land, not only to feed the growing number of people but also to feed them in the manner of "developed" societies. The question of "sustainability" arises in this context.

Some people would argue that HIV is nature's way of reining in unchecked human expansion and, likewise, that mad cow disease, formally known as bovine spongiform encephalitis (BSE), is forcing beef-eating cultures to reconsider their taste for this luxury food. Mad cow disease, like its human version Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), is just one of several deadly progressive neurological disorders called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. The operative word is transmissible -- across species.