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Farm 432

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Re: Farm 432

#3

Post by warble »

I talked to my kids about eating insects the other day with the expected results in the form of 'ew' and such. We've spent so much time in modern society associating insects with disease it's hard to dissassociate. For some reason shrimp which are essentially bugs are no problem because (I think) they come from the ocean, so there's an obvious mental line that can dissassociate them from other bugs.

This is a great idea if you look at the math, but almost impossible to get over the emotional response. Maybe processing the grubs/flies into something less recognizable would help, but at some point you read the ingredients and you're back at square one.

Disgust seems to be one of the more irrational and risk averse emotions, which makes sense - guessing something is disgusting when it's not has little risk, but guessing something is not disgusting when it really is dangerous carries great risk.

Interesting problem especially when recoginzing what damage our current meat production is causing, plus the base inefficiencies of it.

Re: Farm 432

#5

Post by Linell »

warble wrote: post #3

I talked to my kids about eating insects the other day with the expected results in the form of 'ew' and such. We've spent so much time in modern society associating insects with disease it's hard to dissassociate. For some reason shrimp which are essentially bugs are no problem because (I think) they come from the ocean, so there's an obvious mental line that can dissassociate them from other bugs. This is a great i…

These are my thoughts exactly. While I love the idea and think it may be great for some things, I just don't see many people making the switch to eating bugs anytime soon.

Re: Farm 432

#6

Post by zirkonit »

Obviously more of an art project than anything else, but a brilliant direction to focus our thinking on. Insect protein really is a good direction to grow our meat consumption in, and if at first “toy” projects like this mostly provoke disgust, I hope in 25-50 years they will be in a very different position.

Re: Farm 432

#8

Post by mikeash »

warble wrote: post #3

I talked to my kids about eating insects the other day with the expected results in the form of 'ew' and such. We've spent so much time in modern society associating insects with disease it's hard to dissassociate. For some reason shrimp which are essentially bugs are no problem because (I think) they come from the ocean, so there's an obvious mental line that can dissassociate them from other bugs. This is a great i…

Lobsters too. Can you imagine steaming and eating a two-pound cockroach? But that's basically what a lobster is.

I predict that techniques will be found to make good plant-based meat substitutes or other artificial meat before anyone figures out how to make us happy with eating insects.

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