What If You Could Eat Chicken Without Killing a Chicken? (theoutline.com)

From a report on The Outline: San Francisco-based startup Memphis Meats announced this week that it had grown chicken in a lab -- chicken strips, to be precise. The strips, which were grown using self-reproducing cells, are technically "meat," but because the cells were not from an animal, the process by which this "meat" was "raised" is much cleaner, resulting in animal food that has the potential to sate both environmental groups as well as animal rights activists and vegetarians. Memphis Meats says it's hoping the product is ready for commercial sale by 2021. The company is part of an ever-increasing horde of Silicon Valley startups trying to solve the complicated problems of the meat industry, which range from cultural ideas about food to industrial and environmental issues to, increasingly, discussions about animal cruelty. [...] About 99 percent of animals raised for slaughter in the U.S. come from factory farms, and about a third of the land mass of the Earth is used in raising livestock. More so than chicken, livestock is incredibly inefficient to raise: It takes about 2,500 gallons of water to produce just a pound of beef.

Comments

Tell me if you heard this before...

[__aaclcg7560]

There's still no chicken in chicken nuggets.

if it were cheaper, yes.

[netsavior]

I don't really care much about Peta's talking points. I would gladly eat cheaper meat, though.

Re:if it were cheaper, yes.

[silas_moeckel]

Climate change is an issue, the fix does not involve making things cost more especially food and energy those pretty much not optional spending. Much like fixing spam if the solution costs more it's not a solution. If this stuff is so much less taxing on the environment it should be much cheaper to produce.

Re:if it were cheaper, yes.

[DontBeAMoran]

Polluters do not pay the cost to clean up their mess. That's why some things are cheaper than they should be.

Re:if it were cheaper, yes.

[DogDude]

If this stuff is so much less taxing on the environment it should be much cheaper to produce.

Econ 101. Look up the word "externalities".

Re:if it were cheaper, yes.

[slew]

Did you know Chernobyl won't be clean for literally millions of years?

Apparently, w/o human intrusion for 30 years, the land around Chernobyl is thriving with life.

http://news.nationalgeographic...

An interesting quotable from this article...

Essentially, this means that human populations have a bigger negative impact than radiation.

Problem solved

[Pig Hogger]

Just go to Subway!

Bring it on!

[OneHundredAndTen]

I can't wait for the day in which it will be possible to buy meat surrogate, for all meats, at a reasonable price, and with a reasonable similarity to the real thing in texture, flavor, smell and taste.

Counting water

[mi]

It takes about 2,500 gallons of water to produce just a pound of beef

Am I the only reminded of Azimov's The Martian Way? I mean the part, where an Earth's politician is explaining to electorate, how much water (used as reaction mass) it takes for a spaceship to get into space. The book's main characters observe, that most of the water so used falls right back onto the planet. But at least, in that novel some amount of water, however minuscule compared to Earth's vast oceans, does leave...

Well, in case of meat production — or indeed any other Earth-bound activity — no water is lost. Zero. Nada. So, what is the quoted statement supposed to mean?

Re:Counting water

[hipp5]

Well, in case of meat production — or indeed any other Earth-bound activity — no water is lost. Zero. Nada. So, what is the quoted statement supposed to mean?

Yes, the net amount of water stays the same on Earth, but some water is more useful than others. E.g. fresh is more useful than salty, treated is more useful than not, a unit of water in the Sahara is more useful than a unit of water in Canada. When we "use" water, we often turn useful water into not useful water, or move it from a place where it's useful to a place where it's less useful.

Plus there's the issue where much of the water we "use" comes from groundwater sources, which can be completely non-renewable on any sort of human timescale.

Re:I'd eat a fake chicken sandwich

[sexconker]

There is a device called a fence. You may have heard of it.

There is this thing called a bird. It flies. Wild chickens fly quite well. Even a stray domestic chicken would be able to get over any fence you're allowed to build on your property if it cared to.

News for Nerds who eat pizza (programmers)

[fyngyrz]

how is that news for nerds? I live in my parent's basement and the only time I ever see the outside is when mom is working and I have to answer the door for the pizza guy.

Less environmental damage done by your pizza toppings. Safer pizza toppings for you. Cheaper pizza toppings for you. More variety of pizza toppings for you. Less killing for your your pizza toppings. More land available to grow pizza toppings.

Eventually.

Right now, IVM is about at the stage the integrated circuit was in circa 1958. So nothing to worry about; but still, interesting.

Re:So what?

[farble1670]

So what? Water is an effectively infinite global resource and it isn't ever actually consumed (i.e. lost).

Non-contaminated fresh water is not an infinite resource in any sense of the term. Water is only an infinite resource if you also assume energy (to decontaminate and desalinate) is also an infinite resource (it isn't).

Re:What's wrong?

[eaglesrule]

The difference between a chicken and a turnip is one is a vertebrate animal that is capable of learned behavior, while the other is a vegetable. You can't raise and dispatch a turnip inhumanely, because it is incapable of consciousness and feeling, a quality that is shared between humans and prey animals. Of course, for the approximately %1 of the human population who are psychopathic and incapable of experiencing empathy, this is not likely a concern. However some people choose to source meat where the animal was both raised humanely and dispatched instantly without pain or suffering, or forego eating it entirely since there cannot be a guarantee how the food was produced.

If there is an acceptable substitute to natural meat then there could be no chance that any animal was treated inhumanely or suffered in its production. Some would value having that choice.