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Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

smithsonianmag.com

341–350 of 493 posts

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We could rewild huge parts of the Earth Probably not without radically changing how we grow plants for human consumption, assuming we still eat plants and don't move to an all-meat diet. Looking over the data for the area I farm, according to government figures, 36% of the cropland is used for animal food. Most farmers here grow a rotation of soybeans, corn, edible beans, and wheat. The edible beans and wheat are i…

> you get somewhere around 35% That still has to be in the millions or billions of acres globally. No?

Billions, it would appear. But that doesn't necessarily mean that billions of acres can be taken out of service.

While local conditions don't perfectly extrapolate to the world, remember that 100% of my acres grow human food when observed over the span of more than one year. The 35% animal food production seen in a single year is the outcome of the crop rotation.

Certainly, I'd be far more profitable if I could reliably grow beans for human consumption over and over and over, but Mother Nature is a harsh mistress.

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#342
post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Grass costs nothing, it's already there and we can't eat it. You have to shred it so it doesn't grow too high anyway. 2. Again, pastures are already there, nothing else is on them. 3. Perfect, that's more jobs, but I know small family farms with 100 head of cattle with no extra ranch hands. 4. Not really, unless they are very large farms, but at very large scales making artificial meet will have challenges too, mu…

> 1. Grass costs nothing, it's already there and we can't eat it. You have to shred it so it doesn't grow too high anyway. > 2. Again, pastures are already there, nothing else is on them. We’ve gone way beyond pasture just “being there” to rely on for animal agriculture at the rate we do it. Look at BLM grazing rates which are there to pay for renewing the grassland but to rate limit how many animal graze or the gras…

> We’ve gone way beyond pasture just “being there” to rely on for animal agriculture at the rate we do it. Look at BLM grazing rates which are there to pay for renewing the grassland but to rate limit how many animal graze or the grassland would be destroyed. Amazon in Brazil is also being cut back constantly to create new pasture land

A large part of America was already grassland. Many other parts the land aren't great, but cattle can still graze over it even with really sparse or dry vegetation.

> If doing things inefficiently just to create jobs is a good idea, we might as well ban shovels and backhoes and make everyone dig with spoons

I'm talking about families raising cattle on their private land and continuing to do so, not about banning shovels, backhoes, or meat.

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#343
I find it funny the photo is of chicken nuggets. A breaded, fried food that makes me think of the worst kinds of meat to eat and the easiest way to hide taste and texture.

I'm hoping this is a good thing but what are the industrial costs? What kind of raw materials are being used to make the lab equipment? How much electricity? Has the math been done or is it just comparing current numbers of livestock versus no livestock.

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#344
post #304
post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eventually shifting public opinion, and growing the subsection of people who "mind killing" seems like a major upside.

Everything you eat requires killing. We are only weird about killing for meat because as conscious life we are biased towards conscious life. Meanwhile, we don't blink an eye if we take down an entire field of corn, or even take town an entire forest to grow that field of midwestern corn, because its unconcious life and not valued by our moral principles. The secret is to just treat things with respect. You can be re…

?? We are not carnivores. We are literally some line between herbivores and omnivores. Carnivores have to kill or they will most likely starve to death. Vegtables and fruits are the natural foods of earth for herbivores and omnivores and some carnivores. You are not killing when you eat plants and fruits. Fruits and vegtables want to be eaten for their seeds to spread. It is not a question of concious vs unconcious. Killing animals when you don't need to is already morally unaccepted in society. Animal life and plant life are completely different. To combine them and act like it is the matter of concious vs unconcious bias is completely wrong. An animal will run till exhaustion to avoid being eaten. A fruit tree is there to be eaten. Plants and fruits don't have a central nervous system where they 'feel' pain. Humans are literally animals. Eat a fruit and plant the seeds and see what happens. Eat an animal and plant the bones and does a new animal come up?

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#345
post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When this technology finally gets there, and I see no reason to think it won't eventually, it will change the world so dramatically. The amount of land and water we won't need to raise animals or food for animals it's staggering. The amount of meat the world consumes will double by the end of the century (will it? I made that up). As the world gets richer, people eat more meat. Combine that with a rising population a…

> We could rewild huge parts of the Earth Probably not without radically changing how we grow plants for human consumption, assuming we still eat plants and don't move to an all-meat diet. Looking over the data for the area I farm, according to government figures, 36% of the cropland is used for animal food. Most farmers here grow a rotation of soybeans, corn, edible beans, and wheat. The edible beans and wheat are i…

Soybeans are crushed, meaning the oil and protein are separated. The major crushers are ADM, Bunge, and Cargill. The protein is then toasted into flakes for better animal digestion, and sold to milling operations of meat producers (e.g Smithfield foods). The oil is sold to consumers as soybean oil in most of the world, and marketed as vegetable oil in the US. Hunt-Wesson is the biggest soybean oil buyer in the US.

Your split of 60/40 human/animal split for soybeans is accurate on a calorie basis. I just though I would add some color as to why it is the case… the beans are split.

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you put cattle on farmland, and utilize regenerative agriculture techniques, it costs a bit more, because yields aren't artificially boosted while destroying the topsoil. In return you actually capture carbon into the grasses from the atmosphere. That would normally just rot, but the herbivores digest it and make it bioavailable for the fungi and bacteria in the soil, where the carbon accumulates. The herbivores a…

>In return you actually capture carbon into the grasses from the atmosphere. That would normally just rot, but the herbivores digest it and make it bioavailable for the fungi and bacteria in the soil, where the carbon accumulates I'm not entirely convinced by this argument. A lot of the ecological arguments against meat-eating is because cattle grazing requires huge swaths of land. Current practices generate this lan…

> Current practices generate this land via deforestation

Current practices in undeveloped countries. Advanced economies have been reforesting recently.

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.FRST.ZS?location...

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#347
post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When this technology finally gets there, and I see no reason to think it won't eventually, it will change the world so dramatically. The amount of land and water we won't need to raise animals or food for animals it's staggering. The amount of meat the world consumes will double by the end of the century (will it? I made that up). As the world gets richer, people eat more meat. Combine that with a rising population a…

I think you're overestimating that, probably because of vegan propaganda. Eg. A lot of the water you use for animals turns into milk or pee (or sweat?), and goes back to the cycle of water. I don't like posting videos but this one goes through several points: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGG-A80Tl5g

Literally no one worth a mention was saying the animal slaughter industry adds or removes water from the water cycle in meaningful quantities. The issue with their water usage is in the redirection of the limited fresh water sources into the virtually unlimited saltwater oceans, or pollutes it beyond the point of usability for any form of life.

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#348
post #287
post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think deforestation is for pasture? I thought it was for animal feed crops like soy

Is there is a meaningful difference between removal of rainforest for pasture vs animal feed? They both seem to be "in service to animal agriculture" to me at first glance.

The issue is that 60%+ of all crops are for animal feed.

Re: Lab-Grown Meat Is Safe to Eat, FDA Says

#349

The many "Lab meat still has a long way to go" comments here haven't been following the space. Please check out wildtypefoods.com for an example of "lab" grown salmon that you can eat right now . There are other startups doing the same, google them up.

Eagerly anticipating cultured sashimi v0.1 myself but it’s not wrong that this is still an expensive, rudimentary approximation of slaughtered meat products. We’ll get there—for a sustainable planet we have to—but the road is long and we are indeed at the rough beginning.
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