Manufactured meat

[TetsuoShima]

Another website/forum I frequent, had an interesting article featured. I was curious what people on this forum had to say about it (if they ever visit this subforum at least...):

 

t takes just two weeks to turn pig stem cells, or myoblasts, into muscle fibers. "It's a scalable process," says Jason Matheny of New Harvest, a meat substitute research group. "It would take the same amount of time to make a kilogram [2.2lbs] or a ton of meat." One technical challenge: Muscle tissue that has never been flexed is a gooey mass, unlike the grained texture of meat from an animal that once lived. The solution is to stretch the tissue mechanically, growing cells on a scaffold that expands and contracts. This would allow factories to tone the flaccid flesh with a controlled workout.

 

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/research/4212533.html

 

 

Some people oppose the consumption of meat because of the unfortunate fate of animals from which it is issued.

Aside from allowing meat-processing companies to circumvent animal slaughter, lab-grown meat also presents a number of other advantages. Such meat would be free of hormones, antibiotics, and diseases, and it could be made healthier with added vitamins and fatty acids. In-vitro meat does currently costs around $45,000 per pound, but Popular Mechanics says meat-processing companies expect to start selling factory-grown pork at affordable prices in "under a decade."

 

 

So? Would you buy factory-grown meat if it were equally priced to the normal stuff? Or do have any other remarks/comments?

[GorunNova]

Whoo!  Science is staving back the population growth vs. food supply barrier yet again, it seems. ^^

 

I'm all for it.  Not only would it be a lot more efficient as far as food stock goes (i.e. growing the meat probably requires less nutrients than it currently takes to raise whole animals), but it means a reduction in the slaughtering of animals.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those PETA people who want to stop all animal product use... it's just that when it comes to a choice between eating something that was alive and felt vs. eating something grown that never actually lived, the answer is obviously the latter for me.

 

The lack of hormones and antibiotics in the meat is a definite plus, too.

 

<- has heard about this a while ago, and I fully support it.

[Megalith]

yeah this meat would have hardly any fat content too meaning it would be healthier than traditional meat. I was a vegetarian for a long time (16 years) but the arguments i used for it where sentient life shouldn't be bred for harvesting and the diseases and hormones/steroids stuff. I eat meat now but feel a little guilty when i do and do worry about the damage that the additions are doing to my health. I would rather buy this form of protein than corpse meat when it comes to it. Likewise have heard about this for some time and it is the future... my dad would say 'so what will you do with all the cows and pigs? we will soon be overrun by herds of wild animals' i usually laff at his views, these creatures are being forced to breed at the moment stopping that alone would reduce the size of these herds  ::) it will be a while however before this meat becomes commercially viable.

[ZaphodiLe]

If I had a choice and if it would be economically viable for a student (me) that, right now, can't afford meat as often as I would like anyways, I would definitely choose manufactured meat.

I don't like to cause anything pain, and I've considered becoming a vegetarian, but unfortunately I would probably perish if I tried :P

 

The sad fact is that, though if this would become a reality, many (most) people would just continue eating real meat, just for the sake of it, and making up arguments about it tasting better or it being better like the old days, more natural.

 

Religious people (ie most of the world) would probably claim that real meat is what god intended.

[Hilander72]

If it tastes good and doesn't cost to much, I'll switch to 'lab-meat'. :)

 

But it's going to take a long time before it's going to be on the dinner plate... Even if they had the technology today it would take years before the could produce the need amounts. Then I suppose the 'real' meat industry will do anything in their power to promote anti-lab-meat and advertise the 'real' meat as a superior product and all that to delay it even further.

 

It's funny that they didn't mention the fact that tissue growing (in labs today) can also be in theory done with out antibiotics and hormones, but they don't, since it's far more efficient and cheaper to use those and I'm quite sure that economics comes first then health and everything else (sad but true it's always money first for the industry).

[Guest c4evap]

How 'bout some slab meat?

 

 

:P

[Tierkreis]

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for killing animals for food, but if a purer or at least healthier form of meat is available, I'm all for it! Grazing land for cattle is destroying our rainforests and taking up a lot of usable farmland. If we could produce meat in a compact factory, it would make a lot more room for people to grow food and/or live on.

 

So long as said meat isn't made of soy beans, human feces, or soylent green.

[Amnot Borg]

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