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We can mine asteroids for space food

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Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#111

Post by sharpshadow »

jorgesborges wrote: post #82
Terr_ wrote: post #56

I suppose the next step beyond vegetarianism and veganism will be mineralism: Food using molecules certified never to have been part of any known living organism. I remember there was a fictional advertisement for such a product in a sci-fi story, but not exactly where.

This actually makes sense to me in terms of logical coherence. I understand and support people who follow ethically-motivated diets but the fact is a line is always drawn somewhere. Plants are alive. Why is a carrot’s life less important than a rabbit’s? I don’t think we’re good at making claims about where particular organisms sit along a gradient of consciousness we can’t even properly define. I like to imagine oth…

Well said a carrot and a rabbit are equal you can eat both.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#112

Post by mmooss »

ada1981 wrote: post #65
Terr_ wrote: post #56

I suppose the next step beyond vegetarianism and veganism will be mineralism: Food using molecules certified never to have been part of any known living organism. I remember there was a fictional advertisement for such a product in a sci-fi story, but not exactly where.

I think such a technical advancement would parallel a moral one. I’ve been vegan 25 years and would be happy to silence the “but what about plants” people once and for all.

There's a distinction - between obvious BS that is a philosophical puzzle to rebut on one hand, and genuine issues on the other. You don't really have to play the game of the former, unless you don't like philosophical puzzles of course.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#113

Post by tialaramex »

ben_w wrote: post #99
tialaramex wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many years ago my lecturer, Professor Stevan Harnad drew the line at backbones, if you have a spine or similar arrangement it's not OK to eat you. These days Harnad is a Vegan, which entails prohibition against a much larger array of animals being eaten or indeed taken advantage of in any way for your benefit. There is no reason to imagine that if there was alien life it would be able to comprehend us at all, for fic…

Mm. So, are The Affront the literary equivalent of a human in a halloween costume? Extreme sadism as the only definiting trait I can recall, so they probably count as Planet of Hats* even if the physiology is too different to be a costume department's job in a TV show. * https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PlanetOfHats

Sure, it's really hard to do SF where you have aliens and keep them alien, because they no longer fulfil ordinary plot parameters. The key characters in the parallel story in Greg Egan's novel "Incandescence" aren't humans, never have been humans, and they live somewhere that humans would immediately die horribly and we'd need an XKCD "What if?" discussion to figure out how they die exactly 'cos they're much too close to a collapsed star and there's also no Oxygen and you can bet everything is totally saturated in radiation... They're probably... tiny? Nevertheless, they're our protagonists for fully half of a novel, so, they're going to get humanized.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#114

Post by Waterluvian »

aylmao wrote: post #103
jorgesborges wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This actually makes sense to me in terms of logical coherence. I understand and support people who follow ethically-motivated diets but the fact is a line is always drawn somewhere. Plants are alive. Why is a carrot’s life less important than a rabbit’s? I don’t think we’re good at making claims about where particular organisms sit along a gradient of consciousness we can’t even properly define. I like to imagine oth…

I know a lot of people choose to draw lines, but I personally don't think it's necessarily a "line" one has to draw. I think this is best thought of as a gradient. A rabbit is more like us, than a carrot. It has eyes, a backbone, moms take care of their babies, etc. We look at a dogs and can clearly see loyalty, happiness, longing, etc— emotions we associate a lot with humanity. Where these animals fall in the "they'…

Where there’s a gradient and a binary decision, there’s absolutely a line.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#115

Post by tripper_27 »

aylmao wrote: post #103
jorgesborges wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This actually makes sense to me in terms of logical coherence. I understand and support people who follow ethically-motivated diets but the fact is a line is always drawn somewhere. Plants are alive. Why is a carrot’s life less important than a rabbit’s? I don’t think we’re good at making claims about where particular organisms sit along a gradient of consciousness we can’t even properly define. I like to imagine oth…

I know a lot of people choose to draw lines, but I personally don't think it's necessarily a "line" one has to draw. I think this is best thought of as a gradient. A rabbit is more like us, than a carrot. It has eyes, a backbone, moms take care of their babies, etc. We look at a dogs and can clearly see loyalty, happiness, longing, etc— emotions we associate a lot with humanity. Where these animals fall in the "they'…

Hey, will say your right about "seems similar to human", but behavior such as moms taking care of their babies is found in many plant species, as is loyalty. Probably happiness and longing as well.

Ask yourself how many of these feelings arise from the rational thinking part of your brain vs how they seem to be full body sensations, and realize that the central nervous system might allow such signals/awareness to propagate at mammal speed, but why would a plant need that speed?

There really is no reason why a CNS is needed for these emotions to be active, just a way to distribute hormones/chemical signals throughout the body.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#116

Post by FrustratedMonky »

ada1981 wrote: post #65
Terr_ wrote: post #56

I suppose the next step beyond vegetarianism and veganism will be mineralism: Food using molecules certified never to have been part of any known living organism. I remember there was a fictional advertisement for such a product in a sci-fi story, but not exactly where.

I think such a technical advancement would parallel a moral one. I’ve been vegan 25 years and would be happy to silence the “but what about plants” people once and for all.

What about the atoms?

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#117

Post by jaydeegee »

m463 wrote: post #79
Terr_ wrote: post #56

I suppose the next step beyond vegetarianism and veganism will be mineralism: Food using molecules certified never to have been part of any known living organism. I remember there was a fictional advertisement for such a product in a sci-fi story, but not exactly where.

Is mined food processed food?

Every* food is processed food the amount of processing varies.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#118

Post by Terr_ »

m463 wrote: post #79
Terr_ wrote: post #56

I suppose the next step beyond vegetarianism and veganism will be mineralism: Food using molecules certified never to have been part of any known living organism. I remember there was a fictional advertisement for such a product in a sci-fi story, but not exactly where.

Is mined food processed food?

Or cooking it, for that matter.

Plus there's the "processing" of an enormous mobile smelter-factory of nanomachines we call the human body. Chop and grind, add peptides, acid-bath, add neutralizing agent, churn with fermentation bacteria...

Yeah, I know, people usually implicitly mean "artificial" processing, but that's often more about who is doing the processing, rather than what kind of process is going on.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#119

Post by anon84873628 »

pugworthy wrote: post #61

This seems like the ultimate in ultra-processed / factory food. Kind of interesting to read the comments on the other recent post on ultra-processed foods ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42246739 ) and consider the arguments made against there and whether they would apply here.

That article states that we don't conclusively know how much the "processing" itself leads to bad health outcomes, versus the nutrient content / hyper-palatability / etc.

But in any case, the situation in space is going to be very different. You'll be eating a highly tuned macro & micro nutrient profile down to the individual calorie. There is no room for junk food or mindless eating. So most of today's problems with processed food will be irrelevant.

Whatever contribution the "processing" plays will eventually be isolated and mitigated with yet further inventions. Yes it's the pinnacle of the scientific reductionism hubris that many people find objectionable.

Re: We can mine asteroids for space food

#120

Post by polynomial »

Terr_ wrote: post #56

I suppose the next step beyond vegetarianism and veganism will be mineralism: Food using molecules certified never to have been part of any known living organism. I remember there was a fictional advertisement for such a product in a sci-fi story, but not exactly where.

Almost certainly Food of the Gods by Arthur C. Clarke.
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