So far as I know Man is the only animal that goes in forregular 'meals'.

Other species eat opportunistically or more or less continuously. Whilst some store food, they do not 'plan' regular meals ahead, human style.

So what is the evolution and development of this trait and what is the relationship with our overall evolution and development ?

Has it helped or hindered us ?

7 minutes ago, studiot said:

So what is the evolution and development of this trait and what is the relationship with our overall evolution and development ?

Is it an evolutionary thing or a habit we developed once we stopped being hunter-gatherers by developing agriculture, domesticating animals and settling in one area?

10 minutes ago, swansont said:

Is it an evolutionary thing or a habit we developed once we stopped being hunter-gatherers by developing agriculture, domesticating animals and settling in one area?

Well, as I see it, it allowed us time to do other things than scrabble for food.

It also must have played a part in the development of a stratified society

5 minutes ago, studiot said:

Well, as I see it, it allowed us time to do other things than scrabble for food.

Hunter-gatherers had free time, too.

“A study back in the 1960s found the Bushmen have figured out a way to work only about 15 hours each week acquiring food and then another 15 to 20 hours on domestic chores. The rest of the time they could relax and focus on family, friends and hobbies.”

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/10/01/551018759/are-hunter-gatherers-the-happiest-humans-to-inhabit-earth#

7 minutes ago, swansont said:

Hunter-gatherers had free time, too.

“A study back in the 1960s found the Bushmen have figured out a way to work only about 15 hours each week acquiring food and then another 15 to 20 hours on domestic chores. The rest of the time they could relax and focus on family, friends and hobbies.”

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/10/01/551018759/are-hunter-gatherers-the-happiest-humans-to-inhabit-earth#

We can't all live in paradise.

Conditions were particularly harsh for the first leavers of Africa , especially during an ice age.

Even early man built 'cities'.

But cities are not self sustaining by themselves.

they require substantial agricultural infrastructure, and social specialisation

We are still continuing this process today.

Physiologically it makes sense, 8 hours sleep with no food or water so eating soon after waking makes sense.

Then the digestion rate for full stomach empty stomach for an omnivore.

Ruminants cannot do that and carnivores can eat an antelope then chill for a few days before hunting again.

2 hours ago, pinball1970 said:

Ruminants cannot do that and carnivores can eat an antelope then chill for a few days before hunting again.

Could you tell my cats that? But seriously, that probably underscores the effect of domestication and a steady food supply. HG bands sometimes had to gorge, to eat a food before something else did. Not because it was optimal digestively. Moving into temperate zones might have been one change that brought the need to store foods for winter, and then ration that out as meals.

28 minutes ago, TheVat said:

... Moving into temperate zones might have been one change that brought the need to store foods for winter, and then ration that out as meals.

A similar situation arises in the Sudanian Sahel and Acacia Sahel belts of West Africa where long, practically rainless dry seasons limit land productivity almost as effectively as the boreal winter.

This contrasts sharply with the year long productivity of the equatorial coastal belt just a few hundred kilometres to the south where survival depends not on storage and rationing of food and water through lean times, but on defence of the home range.

The differences this has produced both culturally and physiologically over the millennia can be quite striking.

When I was employed I ate three squares a day because that is what my schedule allowed. Now that I'm retired I eat when I'm hungry. I suspect that people who have work schedules also have eating schedules by default.

+ 1 Vat and Seth

I did say physiologically so im Biology your societal. Granted they work together if on different time scales.

On that though, we must not forget our beautiful Croatian lizards, my favourite example of fast evolution involving changing nutritional needs and physiology to support it and evolve with it.

However, I will argue that as omnivores, our physiology gives us more wriggle room for how and when to eat.

What do you think?

17 minutes ago, pinball1970 said:

However, I will argue that as omnivores, our physiology gives us more wriggle room for how and when to eat.

Obviously it does since various patterns pertain throught the globe.

But please, we should accept the premise that it is possible for humans to have various eating patterns and discuss the op questions about how that affects our evolution and development - both the positive and the negative.

23 hours ago, studiot said:

So far as I know Man is the only animal that goes in forregular 'meals'.

Other species eat opportunistically or more or less continuously. Whilst some store food, they do not 'plan' regular meals ahead, human style.

So what is the evolution and development of this trait and what is the relationship with our overall evolution and development ?

Has it helped or hindered us ?

I think it is way more likely that it is a behavioural pattern which developed when cooking and other forms of food processing became a key element of human dietary habits. Creating a cooking place make things less flexible and more efficient to do it more centralized with fewer times a day used for feeding. Many groups which rely on hunting tend to have 1-2 meals a day, but there is also eating throughout the day when they have plentiful access to preserved food. Also, it should be noted that while feeding might be regular, the timing might not be and depend highly on food source and related to e.g. hunting patterns, seasons and so on.

I think that specifically three meals a day is a rather modern development and I wouldn't be surprised if it was linked to the rhythms created by the industrial revolution.

19 minutes ago, CharonY said:

I think it is way more likely that it is a behavioural pattern which developed when cooking and other forms of food processing became a key element of human dietary habits. Creating a cooking place make things less flexible and more efficient to do it more centralized with fewer times a day used for feeding. Many groups which rely on hunting tend to have 1-2 meals a day, but there is also eating throughout the day when they have plentiful access to preserved food. Also, it should be noted that while feeding might be regular, the timing might not be and depend highly on food source and related to e.g. hunting patterns, seasons and so on.

I think that specifically three meals a day is a rather modern development and I wouldn't be surprised if it was linked to the rhythms created by the industrial revolution.

Thank you for noticing my typo.

Try as I might they always seem to creep in.

As to 3 meals or any other number.

The explanatory text did say (or was meant to say) simply 'regular meals' without specifying a number of meals.

The 3 was just a common expression.

I am also aware that some people also have deliberate fast days.

But the point I was trying to make is 'regular'

As opposed to 3 meals Monday, 2 Tuesday, 3 Wednesday, 1 Thursday and so on.

Many also have only 2 on a Sunday on account of a large Sunday Lunch.

But the Daily and Weekly pattern repeats.

Also yes the workplace also has shaped in the past and continues to shape in the present the nature and timing of meals.

Edited November 13Nov 13 by studiot

23 minutes ago, CharonY said:

I think that specifically three meals a day is a rather modern development and I wouldn't be surprised if it was linked to the rhythms created by the industrial revolution.

A little earlier. An early breakfast became the norm in England around the turn of the 16th century.

Throughout the mid- to late-mediaeval period, it was sneered at by the 'gentry' as being for those who engaged in manual labour in the morning ie. the agricultural peasantry.

Bread and beer isn't such a bad way to start the day I think.

2 hours ago, CharonY said:

I think it is way more likely that it is a behavioural pattern which developed when cooking and other forms of food processing became a key element of human dietary habits. Creating a cooking place make things less flexible and more efficient to do it more centralized with fewer times a day used for feeding. Many groups which rely on hunting tend to have 1-2 meals a day, but there is also eating throughout the day when they have plentiful access to preserved food. Also, it should be noted that while feeding might be regular, the timing might not be and depend highly on food source and related to e.g. hunting patterns, seasons and so on.

I think that specifically three meals a day is a rather modern development and I wouldn't be surprised if it was linked to the rhythms created by the industrial revolution.

My inclination is to think it is indeed a behavioral pattern. My own experience is admittedly an outlier, but I have always been very physically active and, until about my 30's fairly thin. In my 30's I began to gain significant weight, and decided to begin skipping breakfast. That got me back on track weight-wise. By my 60's I again began to qain, so I Also stopped eating lunch. I discovered having only an evening meal seemed to give me much more time for other things during the day, so I cultivated the habit. As of now, I have been on one (large) evening meal a day for almost 20 years. My health is excellent, my doctor raves about my excellent blood chemistry, and I find I really enjoy the freedom that comes from not needing to interrupt my activities during the day. So-- my vote is that it is behavioral.

10 hours ago, OldChemE said:

My inclination is to think it is indeed a behavioral pattern. My own experience is admittedly an outlier, but I have always been very physically active and, until about my 30's fairly thin. In my 30's I began to gain significant weight, and decided to begin skipping breakfast. That got me back on track weight-wise. By my 60's I again began to qain, so I Also stopped eating lunch. I discovered having only an evening meal seemed to give me much more time for other things during the day, so I cultivated the habit. As of now, I have been on one (large) evening meal a day for almost 20 years. My health is excellent, my doctor raves about my excellent blood chemistry, and I find I really enjoy the freedom that comes from not needing to interrupt my activities during the day. So-- my vote is that it is behavioral.

I'm the same, only I prefer to wait until I'm hungry enough to enjoy the food, the longer I wait the better it tastes.

Edited November 14Nov 14 by dimreepr

19 hours ago, studiot said:

Thank you for noticing my typo.

Try as I might they always seem to creep in.

As to 3 meals or any other number.

The explanatory text did say (or was meant to say) simply 'regular meals' without specifying a number of meals.

The 3 was just a common expression.

I am also aware that some people also have deliberate fast days.

But the point I was trying to make is 'regular'

As opposed to 3 meals Monday, 2 Tuesday, 3 Wednesday, 1 Thursday and so on.

Many also have only 2 on a Sunday on account of a large Sunday Lunch.

But the Daily and Weekly pattern repeats.

Also yes the workplace also has shaped in the past and continues to shape in the present the nature and timing of meals.

To be honest, I did not notice any typos. I frequently don't find my own to begin with. Regarding regularity, I don't think that this is universal in humans, either. In many cultures, it is heavily determined by seasonal activities. Those dependent on hunting, would often have meals after a catch, which can vary. And in a meeting with First Nations Elders, the typical meal times were described as one element of colonization, as traditional in some First Nation cultures, their mealtimes were more flexible and dependent on hunger. I strongly suspect that some of these patterns were dependent on how regular they have access to food. Seasonality was a bit thing too, as it determined what food was available and how long it would take to acquire it.

Nomadic cultures can have communal meals in correspondence with their traveling patterns, whereas groups with a more agricultural component might have more regular patterns. Depending on time and place there are various constraints, e.g. availability of natural light, how easy it was to make fire or other meal preparation methods and so on, that I find it hard to believe that regularity was very common or even easily achievable until a number of developments happened, such as settlements of a certain size, predictable availability of food, improved food preparation methods and so on.

19 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

A little earlier. An early breakfast became the norm in England around the turn of the 16th century.

So only off by 200 years or so ;).

20 hours ago, studiot said:

As to 3 meals or any other number.

The explanatory text did say (or was meant to say) simply 'regular meals' without specifying a number of meals.

The 3 was just a common expression.

It’s in the title, too, so I think everyone can be forgiven for taking that as the premise, but even with that clarification I think my original point still stands - you have not shown that regular meals is anything but a recent development, in evolutionary terms.

17 hours ago, CharonY said:

To be honest, I did not notice any typos. I frequently don't find my own to begin with. Regarding regularity, I don't think that this is universal in humans, either. In many cultures, it is heavily determined by seasonal activities. Those dependent on hunting, would often have meals after a catch, which can vary. And in a meeting with First Nations Elders, the typical meal times were described as one element of colonization, as traditional in some First Nation cultures, their mealtimes were more flexible and dependent on hunger. I strongly suspect that some of these patterns were dependent on how regular they have access to food. Seasonality was a bit thing too, as it determined what food was available and how long it would take to acquire it.

Nomadic cultures can have communal meals in correspondence with their traveling patterns, whereas groups with a more agricultural component might have more regular patterns. Depending on time and place there are various constraints, e.g. availability of natural light, how easy it was to make fire or other meal preparation methods and so on, that I find it hard to believe that regularity was very common or even easily achievable until a number of developments happened, such as settlements of a certain size, predictable availability of food, improved food preparation methods and so on.

There's certainly a hefty cultural, religious and, to some extent, scientific argument that suggests, periodic starvation/fasting, is good and healthy; in many different ways.

Food is one of the most insidious of addictions, especially when hunger has no part in the taste equation, who can't manage that "wafer thin mint"?

Seems like we are, in evolutionary terms where hundreds or thousands of generations are sometimes needed to implement systemic physiological changes, only starting to shift from Homo nomadicus (with shifting and sometimes sporadic nutrient supply) to Homo urbanus (with complex networks of mass food production and a steady grain-dominant diet). Lactose tolerance was managed in relatively few generations thanks to the LP mutation, which was a SNP, and its great adaptive value for pastoralism (herder agriculture).

But a system retooling, where we would all manage a very non-HG diet well, e.g. lots of grain without the woes of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome, would be much harder given that these woes don't much block reproductive success and are amenable to cultural management (shifting to higher fiber, pharma intervention in developed nations, Paleo diets, etc.) And meal frequency is another highly adjustable cultural factor and some such adjustments are being shown to ameliorate metabolic syndrome, e.g. the sixteen hours between dinner and breakfast regimen that's becoming more popular. Pretty much all the research I've seen points to small-scale fasting as something we are built for and benefit from.

On 11/13/2025 at 6:52 PM, OldChemE said:

As of now, I have been on one (large) evening meal a day for almost 20 years. My health is excellent, my doctor raves about my excellent blood chemistry, and I find I really enjoy the freedom that comes from not needing to interrupt my activities during the day. So-- my vote is that it is behavioral.

OldChem has really taken that short-fast ball and run with it. Like Ramadan, year-round! 😄

21 hours ago, swansont said:

It’s in the title, too, so I think everyone can be forgiven for taking that as the premise, but even with that clarification I think my original point still stands - you have not shown that regular meals is anything but a recent development, in evolutionary terms.

Indeed I haven't but then I didn't set out to prove this.

There definitely was a time when human custom and practice was more like that of other animals.

I am just trying to consider the differences, bearing in mind the adaptability of humans has led to them doing different things at differnt times in different places and different circumstances.

6 hours ago, studiot said:

Indeed I haven't but then I didn't set out to prove this.

There definitely was a time when human custom and practice was more like that of other animals.

I am just trying to consider the differences, bearing in mind the adaptability of humans has led to them doing different things at differnt times in different places and different circumstances.

Upon reflection, I actually don't think that regular meal times are that unusual. I recall a practicum that I had where we looked into feeding patterns in birds, based on dominance patterns. IIRC, the birds we investigated typically had two major feeding cycles, a bit early in the day and late before sleep time. The assumption was that they kept lean most of the day to avoid being too sluggish, but less dominant birds in a group would feed more frequently as they were less certain to get something from the feeder.

Considering that in most animal species feeding patterns are driven by the circadian clock (there exceptions, like predators who digest their prey over prolonged periods) it is likely that for the most part their feeding pattern has some regularity.

In general, the pattern would match their activity periods (e.g. nocturnal vs diurnal), ability to store or acquire food and so on. Evolutionary speaking, it makes most sense the molecular mechanisms regulating hunger (and drive feeding patterns) are in line with the environmental pressures and opportunities that would allow food acquisition and there are strong interconnections in prey-hunter relationship of these patterns (which is what the practicum was based on).

I think humans are not so special in that regard, except that in industrialized nations the food supply is not a limiting factor anymore. Instead food patterns are a compromise between natural predilections (i.e. feeding at least once a day, and usually during the day) and the requirements of job patterns.

17 hours ago, CharonY said:

The assumption was that they kept lean most of the day to avoid being too sluggish

In humans I wonder if caffeine has served, among other things, to counteract the sluggish feeling that can follow breakfast. When I greatly reduced caffeine ( due to an inner ear issue ), I really noticed post-BF sluggishness. I eventually joined those who skip breakfast, not eating until after 10am. This created a microfast each day, around 16-18 hours, and improved several health markers for me.

But really, I think Dostoevsky had it right: "Man is the animal who can get used to anything."

2 hours ago, TheVat said:

In humans I wonder if caffeine has served, among other things, to counteract the sluggish feeling that can follow breakfast. When I greatly reduced caffeine ( due to an inner ear issue ), I really noticed post-BF sluggishness. I eventually joined those who skip breakfast, not eating until after 10am.

Whereas I've recently resumed taking an early breakfast to better structure my daily routine (I can too easily slip into a nocturnal lifestyle). Sitting out on my balcony shortly after sunrise with a whole-wheat taco and pot of strong black tea watching the aerobatic display of the dozen or so little swifts (Apus aerobates) that take their breakfast in our courtyard is a real pleasure.

On 11/13/2025 at 11:21 PM, CharonY said:

I think that specifically three meals a day is a rather modern development and I wouldn't be surprised if it was linked to the rhythms created by the industrial revolution.

The concept of “Three square meals” had another provenance dating from slightly before the industrial revolution, and derives from the serving time of meals onboard British naval warships in the later 18th and early 19th century. This in turn relates to the system of watch-keeping used in the British navy to this very day.

The crew of a ship are divided into two 'watches' called 'port' and 'starboard' who alternate on duty according to a pattern of seven watches. Five of the watches are of 4 hours duration, the other two from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., and 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. are of 2 hours duration and are known as 'dog watches'. The purpose of 'dog-watches' is to force an uneven number of watches in a day to ensure the men are never on duty at the same time from day to day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchkeeping

The time within a watch is marked by chiming the ship's bell every half-hour with a rising number of strokes up to '8 bells'  to mark the end of of a four hour  watch, or  '4 bells to mark the end of a 'dog'.

Middle Watch  -       00.00  - 04.00

Morning Watch        04.00 - 08.00

Forenoon Watch      08.00 - 12.00

Afternoon Watch     12.00 - 16.00

First Dog                 16.00 - 18.00

Second Dog            18.00 - 20.00

First Watch              20.00 - 24.00

In British warships around the time of Lord Nelson, breakfast was served at around 7.00 am (at “six bells” in the morning watch) and consisted of oatmeal porridge and ship’s biscuit.  Dinner was served around 11.30 am to midday (“seven bells” in the forenoon watch) and was the main meal of the day consisting of boiled salt beef, peas and  biscuit. Supper was served around 4 pm or 6pm catering for the men in the shorter ”dog watches”, and usually consisted of biscuits and cheese.

Sailors ate from square wooden trenchers with raised edges known as a “fiddle”. These tray like trenchers gave rise to the term “a square meal”, and the raised edges of the tray acted as a form of portion control. Having food piled higher than this edge was known as “being on the fiddle” - a punishable breach of naval discipline and rationing control.

https://collection.thedockyard.co.uk/objects/9066/square-plate

The British navy in the time of Nelson was famous for its strict watch-keeping, and a rota of meal times which ensured that  sailors were well-fed with “three square meals” per day.