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Behind the Hype of 'Lab-Grown' Meat (gizmodo.com)
In an exclusive report via Gizmodo, Ryan F. Mandelbaum discusses the hype surrounding "lab-grown" meat: Some folks have big plans for your future. They want you -- a burger-eatin', chicken-finger-dippin' American -- to buy their burgers and nuggets grown from stem cells. One day, meat eaters and vegans might even share their hypothetical burger. That burger will be delicious, environmentally friendly, and be indistinguishable from a regular burger. And they assure you the meat will be real meat, just not ground from slaughtered animals. That future is on the minds of a cadre of Silicon Valley startup founders and at least one nonprofit in the world of cultured meat. Some are sure it will heal the environmental woes caused by American agriculture while protecting the welfare of farm animals. But these future foods' promises are hypothetical, with many claims based on a futurist optimism in line with Silicon Valley's startup culture. Cultured meat is still in its research and development phase and must overcome massive hurdles before hitting market. A consumer-ready product does not yet exist and its progress is heavily shrouded by intellectual property claims and sensationalist press. Today, cultured meat is a lot of hype and no consumer product.
"Much of what happens in the world of cultured meat is done for the sake of PR," Ben Wurgaft, an MIT-based post-doctoral researcher writing a book on cultured meat, told Gizmodo. Wurgaft finds it hard to believe many predictions about cultured meat's future, including the promise of an FDA-approved consumer product within a year. The truth is that only a few successful prototypes have yet been shown to the public, including a NASA-funded goldfish-based protein in the early 2000s, and a steak grown from frog cells in 2003 for an art exhibit. More have come recently: Mark Post unveiled a $330,000 cultured burger in 2013, startup Memphis Meats has produced cultured meatballs and poultry last and this year, and Hampton Creek plans to have a product reveal dinner by the end of the year.
"Much of what happens in the world of cultured meat is done for the sake of PR," Ben Wurgaft, an MIT-based post-doctoral researcher writing a book on cultured meat, told Gizmodo. Wurgaft finds it hard to believe many predictions about cultured meat's future, including the promise of an FDA-approved consumer product within a year. The truth is that only a few successful prototypes have yet been shown to the public, including a NASA-funded goldfish-based protein in the early 2000s, and a steak grown from frog cells in 2003 for an art exhibit. More have come recently: Mark Post unveiled a $330,000 cultured burger in 2013, startup Memphis Meats has produced cultured meatballs and poultry last and this year, and Hampton Creek plans to have a product reveal dinner by the end of the year.
When have the initial versions of a product not been hard to produce, expensive and limited?
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers"
Of course meat consumption is natural, or have you managed to change the dietary habits of some of the planet's apex predators? Try telling that to a shark. Make no mistake, your animal brothers would have no hesitation eating you given the right circumstances, and they *won't* treat you to a humane kill - they'll rip you to pieces.
Why do we have some teeth adapted to tearing meat?
Why do we have a gut that's ideal for an omnivorous diet?
I could go on. We're omnivores.
And, meat tastes great (that's "good"), and it has concentrated nutrients - many calories/protein/micronutrients in a small volume. Many vegetables taste great, too, and some have high-ish concentrations of nutrients - I like meat *and* veg, and enjoy both.
They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
Meat animals are pretty well-rendered. Non-edible parts are sold for leather, fertiliser, fur/wool, animal feed (although potentially dangerous), decoration (horn buttons, bone handles), fat and bone for rendering, etc. They're too valuable to waste.
They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
It seems to me they are going after the wrong market. The first lab-grown (excuse me, "cultured") meat should be sushi-grade Ahi tuna. Tuna is expensive, over-fished, potentially mercury-laden, and it already looks like it came out of a vat. And people already eat imitation-crab in their California rolls anyway.
Oh, the planet will continue to spin, and have life on its surface even. And a lot of people will continue to live high off the hog. But more people will be priced out of the market for meat; others will be priced out of the market for food.
Nature has a time-proven solution to a organism population that outgrows available resources: starve it until it fits.
Human society has proved more adaptable than Malthusian predictions thus far. Malthusians didn't predict the ability to of people to develop fertilizer technology and high-yield crops. But there are thermodynamic and other physical limits to how much food you can grow on an acre; only so much sunshine to extract energy from and so many minerals you can extract from the soil.
So if we are going to continue to grow our population, and grow our standard of living for the bulk of that population, we'll have to adapt. And that adaptation will take many forms: new technology (our favorite! it's like changing without having to change), developing greater efficiency, changing our diet (some of us by choice, others by force), and letting the most vulnerable fraction of the human population die.
And we'll do all of them, but my guess is we'll rely most on new tech and letting people die prematurely, simply because both of these share the advantage that they don't require making hard decisions.
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