[Riff] Rotter! "The content of a vegetarian's colon" was exactly the topic I was going to choose if I got into the chair. I would have set it as abstract since its animal, vegetable or mineral content could not be ascertained without removing it from the colon in question.

I do love sparking linguistic controversy.

Blimey! I thought that was a question leading towards the correct answer, not the answer itself. OK, I'll try and pick something simple that shouldn't lead to confusion (ha!) and get someone else in the chair. VEGETABLE

[Kim] I do apologise. Let me offer you, as a replacement, my backup idea: a chocolate-covered billiard ball. No one'll ever guess that.

Oops!

Is it commonly used as food?

[Riff] No. And it isn't a chocolate-covered billiard ball either.

I'm only doing this because the server has been down all morning....STRESSED!!

[Chalky] Spat is not the word I would have used, friendly banter seems more appropriate somehow. Do we agree though that the classification is purely on composition, and method of production doesn't come into it?

[Inkspot] To answer your Q as a whole. Not likely.
[Raak] No.
[rab] By-products could have practical applications.

[rab] Agreed - I should have prefaced the word 'spat' with the adjective 'friendly'. It was pure mischief on my part and I really should have remember that such posturing doesn't necessarily transfer well on to the screen. [Material composition - yes, which is why I still think milk should have in part an 'animal' classification :-)]

[Boolbar] The food one.

[Boolbar] Sorry - now where are my specs?

[Chalky] Using dictionary.com :
A plant cultivated for an edible part or the edible part of such a plant - No.
A member of the vegetable kingdom; a plant - Yes

As in an oak tree rather than oak.

The public library - such an oasis of calm.

Ha, nice to see I'm not the only one capable of starting minute pedantic arguments. See, everything is mineral really, and animal and vegetable are just more or less arbitrarily defined subsets of it, aren't they?

[Kim] Unrelatedly, some friends and I once spent a lunchtime trailing after Michael Howard surreptitiously through Folkestone town centre. Our stalking attempt was foiled when he drove off in a very flash car. Curses!

[Inkspot] Yes.
[Kim] Great Guess! But No.
[Raak] Yes.
[Breadmaster] Taking your 'Oak Tree' senario. I was thinking of a single thing like "An Oak Tree" as opposed to "All Oak Trees" or "Some Oak Trees", but I would give the chair to any of those three as they would be close enough.

Shame its not a Shrubbery! I want a shrubbery.