We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production • Hacker News Board

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#91

Post by PorcinoDios » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 1:31 PM UTC

slimed wrote: post #36

DoreenMichele wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A guilty conscience concerning global warming? People who don't want to personally change their lifestyle seem to frequently look for "magic" solutions at the societal level, often overlooking logic fails in the scenario that is being painted. It's like they imagine if the whole world changes, then I don't have to. Or something.

Isn't that exactly what technology enables? Ways of living and solving problems that were previously impossible with little to no additional effort from the actual consumer?

(Quoting:) > Isn't that exactly what technology enables?

'Ways of living with no additional 'customer-effort' ?'

Yeah, I see now what you're getting at.

^^

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#92

Post by urban_strike » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 1:32 PM UTC

whamlastxmas wrote: post #87

scotch_drinker wrote: post #82

I guess we'll never learn from things like margarine and other lab invented foods. Beyond Meat is heavily dependent on seed oils which are terrible for us (expeller pressed canola oil is ingredient #2). Red Meat actually isn't unhealthy at the levels most people currently eat it. While it wouldn't surprise me if more people ate Beyond meat and its ilk in the future, it doesn't make it better for us and will likely ju…

Beyond Meat has never claimed to be a healthier alternative to meat and it's a bit of a straw man to comment like they did. I also don't see many margarine induced illnesses or deaths. Everything is fine in moderation.

> Beyond Meat has never claimed to be a healthier alternative to meat and it's a bit of a straw man to comment like they did.

Not sure why you'd think that's a straw man when they explicitly state it on their website. First sentence on their Products page:

"Imagine your favorite meaty dishes like burgers and tacos delivering the juicy, delicious taste you know and love, while being better for you and the planet." [0]

[0] https://www.beyondmeat.com/products/

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#93

Post by ImprovedSilence » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 1:39 PM UTC

marcus_holmes wrote: post #76

montalbano wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the report: > The cost of proteins will be five times cheaper by 2030 and 10 times cheaper by 2035 than existing animal proteins This is about more than nutritional equivalence. The meat in a burger is usually the most expensive component so artificial proteins could lead to a reduction in the price of a burger by approximately 5x. Also, naturally grown food means different things to different people. As mention…

A farmer friend of mine opines: "organic just means bugs have crawled over it before you eat it" The rise of veganism, mostly on ethical grounds, shows that nutritional equivalence may in fact be a minority concern, and that the ethics of "cruelty-free" eating supercede all nutritional concerns.

I’m not big on organic produce per se, but the other side of that argument would be non-organic just means your food has been lathered in chemicals that the insecticide industry puts a lot of money into “proving” isn’t carcinogenic and destroying the food chain in other ways.

It’s easy to see bugs, it’s not so easy to see or ever know the externalities of invisible chemicals.

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#94

Post by salasrod » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 1:46 PM UTC

mrfusion wrote: post #90

scotch_drinker wrote: post #82

I guess we'll never learn from things like margarine and other lab invented foods. Beyond Meat is heavily dependent on seed oils which are terrible for us (expeller pressed canola oil is ingredient #2). Red Meat actually isn't unhealthy at the levels most people currently eat it. While it wouldn't surprise me if more people ate Beyond meat and its ilk in the future, it doesn't make it better for us and will likely ju…

What’s wrong with oils though? And if canola is bad why can’t they switch it out for olive oil?

Olive oil is not that good for you, and most importantly, it burns at really low temperatures, and ends up tasting horrible when it happens.

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#95

Post by 52-6F-62 » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 1:58 PM UTC

scotch_drinker wrote: post #82

I guess we'll never learn from things like margarine and other lab invented foods. Beyond Meat is heavily dependent on seed oils which are terrible for us (expeller pressed canola oil is ingredient #2). Red Meat actually isn't unhealthy at the levels most people currently eat it. While it wouldn't surprise me if more people ate Beyond meat and its ilk in the future, it doesn't make it better for us and will likely ju…

Not many people like to talk about this point because it seems off mode but those things made me quite sick. I was disappointed because I’m always in for a good burger no matter what it’s made with. (Don’t extrapolate that on me please!)

There were several threads on r/vegan that spoke to the same symptoms, but with only vague guesses to the cause—like the oils.

There is a lot of hubris displayed in the world of nutrition when any scientists I’ve spoken to in the research (rather than product) space seem to conclude that there isn’t enough known about the complex interactions that occur in our bodies when we eat a “whole” food utilizing the variety of compounds and their structured forms/proportions to say whether or not we can realistically and safely just supplement them yet. I’ve always been told, sure go ahead and supplement but just eat the food as well. Just don’t over eat. And eat mostly real food, shy away from processed stuff.

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#96

Post by mantap » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 2:02 PM UTC

scotch_drinker wrote: post #82

I guess we'll never learn from things like margarine and other lab invented foods. Beyond Meat is heavily dependent on seed oils which are terrible for us (expeller pressed canola oil is ingredient #2). Red Meat actually isn't unhealthy at the levels most people currently eat it. While it wouldn't surprise me if more people ate Beyond meat and its ilk in the future, it doesn't make it better for us and will likely ju…

What is your source that margarine is more unhealthy than red meat? And what do you mean by "healthy" anyway?

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#97

Post by rjknight » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 2:03 PM UTC

Jommi wrote: post #71

mogadsheu wrote: post #11

While I don’t disagree with the sentiment of the report, I do question its credibility. They don’t cite their sources, but do make bold claims with broad statistics and buzz words. Looking into the authors, they don’t lack credentials, but it seems like they’re newsletter and report writers, not people who are putting skin in the game to back their claims. First impression: be skeptical of “the Seba Technology Disrup…

Did you not read the actual report?

I know that "did you not read..." comments are normally (rightly) down-voted, but in this case I think it's a reasonable question.

The article makes a number of bold claims, without citing evidence. This is only acceptable because it's a summary of a larger report which _does_ cite evidence, but the presentation of the page doesn't make this as obvious as it could. It would be quite easy to skim-read the post, observe that there are bold un-sourced claims being made, and fail to notice that the full report is available to download.

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#98

Post by 52-6F-62 » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 2:11 PM UTC

witten wrote: post #47

zplizzi wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes - this is how impossible foods makes the heme protein which is central to their burger tasting "meaty". There are tons of startups working on this for other food products, but it's well established in other industries. Many pharmaceuticals are produced via synthetic biology, for example.

And xanthan gum, another example of this general process (perhaps without the "programming"), has been around since the 1960s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xanthan_gum

Just don’t let it go near infants apparently. Holy hell! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necrotizing_enterocolitis

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#99

Post by stefantalpalaru » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

bitL wrote: post #48

vturner wrote: post #27

I'm curious how one is attracted to precision "chemically engineered" food. As I am gaining interest week by week in consuming foods in their most natural form, I want the opposite of what this article claims is "the future" (I'm a vegiterean too, it's not an animal VS impossible burger thing for me). What am I missing here to be excited about a future of custom fermented food products?

What would you say if you knew 50% of European produce never saw soil, and was instead growing on top of some chemical "water"? Disruptive "scientific" companies are buying high-quality cheap soil in Eastern Europe and impregnating top layer with their experimental chemical ingredients, leading to prediction the soil will be written off in 20 years; it survived thousands of years, reaching top quality, yet some get-r…

> What would you say if you knew 50% of European produce never saw soil, and was instead growing on top of some chemical "water"?

I'd say you're wrong by more than two orders of magnitude. Europe is not the Netherlands and produce is not lettuce.

Re: We are on the cusp of a disruption in food and agricultural production

#100

Post by jgrin » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 2:20 PM UTC

marcus_holmes wrote: post #76

montalbano wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the report: > The cost of proteins will be five times cheaper by 2030 and 10 times cheaper by 2035 than existing animal proteins This is about more than nutritional equivalence. The meat in a burger is usually the most expensive component so artificial proteins could lead to a reduction in the price of a burger by approximately 5x. Also, naturally grown food means different things to different people. As mention…

A farmer friend of mine opines: "organic just means bugs have crawled over it before you eat it" The rise of veganism, mostly on ethical grounds, shows that nutritional equivalence may in fact be a minority concern, and that the ethics of "cruelty-free" eating supercede all nutritional concerns.

Put another way, “organic means a bug was able to crawl over your food without dying”.