5 ms·

s/Lab-Grown// would be a better idea. - Climate change - Antibiotic resistance - Novel pandemic pathogen evolution, including the "Spanish" flu and COVID-19

s/Lab-Grown// would be a better idea. - Climate change - Antibiotic resistance - Novel pandemic pathogen evolution, including the "Spanish" flu and COVID-19 - Air pollution - Water pollution - Soil pollution - Reduced total available calories - Increased food prices - Deforestation ... way, way down here is animal cruelty because the actions of 99% of people prove they don't give 2 fucks so long as they don't see it or the animals aren't cute.

swatcoder 3y ago
Reducing overall meat consumption would be great in a lot of ways, but lab-grown meats are a luxury product for the next few decades and will basically fall off the map if there's any kind of extreme or prolonged global crisis, which will happen sooner or later. I spent years being vegan and vegetarian and still eat many meals that way, but the idea of purging ranching and meat consumption from the world is technologist hubris and the start to someone's dystopian novel. I mean, maybe it'll happen responsibly some day, but if you're grounded in reality and history, it's a 500 year transition, not a 5 year one.
- xeonmc 3y ago
  Reminds me of "The Food of the Gods" by Arthur C. Clarke: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38303638 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38303638
- samus 3y ago
  Then there's no reason to ban it. If anything, real meat might surprisingly soon be the expensive luxury food. We humans are pretty good at figuring out ways to scale up complex production processes and drive costs down.
jesterson 3y ago
I would ask how "climate change" or "water pollution" has anything to do with proper meat, but there is no substantiated answer expected. You may "reduce total available calories" yourself, that's fine, but other people should have a choice in a free country. That's why I would never touch lab "meat" with a telegraph pole, but against banning it per se.
exe34 3y ago
Also, the flesh eaters get very emotional, just as much as the pro-"life" supporters. Cruelty is irrelevant to them.
- funcDropShadow 3y ago
  And the vegan climate activists that prefer to wear plastic shoes from mineral oil instead of responsibly produced leather shoes are not getting emotional?
- SideburnsOfDoom 3y ago
  Of course. "personal freedom" is a multi-edged implement, it's not just for meat-eaters. There is no "pro freedom" argument in preventing me from choosing "lab-grown meat", if I want to. My reasons might be good or bad, emotional or not, that's irrelevant. You can't prevent me and also claim to be all for personal freedom, as these states like to.
  - kelipso 3y ago
    The freedom to not be exposed to lab-grown meat. To live a life free of experimental, potentially harmful, not widely tested lab-grown meat is important for a happy and healthy life. Etc.
    - itishappy 3y ago
      That's not freedom. Are we also given the freedom to choose lab-grown meat if we so please? Otherwise "freedom to choose the only available option" is disingenuous. Also understand that the FDA regulates lab-grown meat to the same health standards as farm-grown meat, and you can go buy genetically modified meat in the store today. 95% of meat sold in the US is thus "experimental." https://www.fda.gov/food/human-food-made-cultured-animal-cells/formal-agreement-between-fda-and-usda-regarding-oversight-human-food-produced-using-animal-cell https://www.fda.gov/food/human-food-made-cultured-animal-cel... https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/gmo-crops-and-food-animals https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/gmo-crop...
    - 3y ago
anlum 3y ago
If you think lab-grown meat is anything other than a massive accelerrant to the problem of antibiotic resistance, you've got another thing coming. A bioreactor is basically just an animal with a severely curtailed feature set - limited homeostasis, no sense organs, cognition, locomotion, etc. Crucially, a bioreactor has no immune system. It's a soup of muscle cells with basically no defense against external pathogens. Sterile technique will only get you so far, especially at scale. Lab-grown meat pretty much constitutionally requires constant antibiotic input. It's the price you pay for stripping the concept of animal as meat machine down to its most basic essence.
- okokwhatever 3y ago
  Your answer is SO well informed and focused out of the hype that I just can say thanks.
  - bmer 3y ago
    Except it's also very wrong. So, it just happened to make you feel good, and therefore it felt well-informed?
- JR1427 3y ago
  I also find it interesting that people don't seem to think too hard about where lab grown meat is heading. You could imagine that the culture mechanisms will get more and more sophisticated, building up some of the systems seen in animals from scratch. I have (partly jokingly) thought about the idea that rather than redesign animals from the ground up, why not just engineer out the qualities that we (think) we don't want in livestock animals. It wouldn't be hard to selectively breed brain-dead carcasses that require life-support machines to grow. And then we can harvest the meat from brain-dead animals. Yum. Sounds appealing, doesn't it?...
  - dartos 3y ago
    I think it’s more likely that we just grow cells into basically a large living meatball. Why go through the effort to grow skin, eyes, and bones when all we want is a wad of meat

swatcoder 3y ago

Reducing overall meat consumption would be great in a lot of ways, but lab-grown meats are a luxury product for the next few decades and will basically fall off the map if there's any kind of extreme or prolonged global crisis, which will happen sooner or later. I spent years being vegan and vegetarian and still eat many meals that way, but the idea of purging ranching and meat consumption from the world is technologist hubris and the start to someone's dystopian novel. I mean, maybe it'll happen responsibly some day, but if you're grounded in reality and history, it's a 500 year transition, not a 5 year one.

xeonmc 3y ago
Reminds me of "The Food of the Gods" by Arthur C. Clarke: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38303638 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38303638
samus 3y ago
Then there's no reason to ban it. If anything, real meat might surprisingly soon be the expensive luxury food. We humans are pretty good at figuring out ways to scale up complex production processes and drive costs down.

jesterson 3y ago

I would ask how "climate change" or "water pollution" has anything to do with proper meat, but there is no substantiated answer expected. You may "reduce total available calories" yourself, that's fine, but other people should have a choice in a free country. That's why I would never touch lab "meat" with a telegraph pole, but against banning it per se.

exe34 3y ago

Also, the flesh eaters get very emotional, just as much as the pro-"life" supporters. Cruelty is irrelevant to them.

funcDropShadow 3y ago
And the vegan climate activists that prefer to wear plastic shoes from mineral oil instead of responsibly produced leather shoes are not getting emotional?
SideburnsOfDoom 3y ago
Of course. "personal freedom" is a multi-edged implement, it's not just for meat-eaters. There is no "pro freedom" argument in preventing me from choosing "lab-grown meat", if I want to. My reasons might be good or bad, emotional or not, that's irrelevant. You can't prevent me and also claim to be all for personal freedom, as these states like to.
- kelipso 3y ago
  The freedom to not be exposed to lab-grown meat. To live a life free of experimental, potentially harmful, not widely tested lab-grown meat is important for a happy and healthy life. Etc.
  - itishappy 3y ago
    That's not freedom. Are we also given the freedom to choose lab-grown meat if we so please? Otherwise "freedom to choose the only available option" is disingenuous. Also understand that the FDA regulates lab-grown meat to the same health standards as farm-grown meat, and you can go buy genetically modified meat in the store today. 95% of meat sold in the US is thus "experimental." https://www.fda.gov/food/human-food-made-cultured-animal-cells/formal-agreement-between-fda-and-usda-regarding-oversight-human-food-produced-using-animal-cell https://www.fda.gov/food/human-food-made-cultured-animal-cel... https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/gmo-crops-and-food-animals https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/gmo-crop...
  - 3y ago

anlum 3y ago

If you think lab-grown meat is anything other than a massive accelerrant to the problem of antibiotic resistance, you've got another thing coming. A bioreactor is basically just an animal with a severely curtailed feature set - limited homeostasis, no sense organs, cognition, locomotion, etc. Crucially, a bioreactor has no immune system. It's a soup of muscle cells with basically no defense against external pathogens. Sterile technique will only get you so far, especially at scale. Lab-grown meat pretty much constitutionally requires constant antibiotic input. It's the price you pay for stripping the concept of animal as meat machine down to its most basic essence.

okokwhatever 3y ago
Your answer is SO well informed and focused out of the hype that I just can say thanks.
- bmer 3y ago
  Except it's also very wrong. So, it just happened to make you feel good, and therefore it felt well-informed?
JR1427 3y ago
I also find it interesting that people don't seem to think too hard about where lab grown meat is heading. You could imagine that the culture mechanisms will get more and more sophisticated, building up some of the systems seen in animals from scratch. I have (partly jokingly) thought about the idea that rather than redesign animals from the ground up, why not just engineer out the qualities that we (think) we don't want in livestock animals. It wouldn't be hard to selectively breed brain-dead carcasses that require life-support machines to grow. And then we can harvest the meat from brain-dead animals. Yum. Sounds appealing, doesn't it?...
- dartos 3y ago
  I think it’s more likely that we just grow cells into basically a large living meatball. Why go through the effort to grow skin, eyes, and bones when all we want is a wad of meat