Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

css.umich.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 794 posts

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#301

Post by bushidonei »

sweetheart wrote: post #36

While it is not my experience at all, I understand that some folks have certain negative opinions of Beyond Burgers, and other fake meat/imitation burgers: - The texture is off - Maybe they cook strangely - Potentially less taste But the most important thing about them, and the reason I urge everyone to at least _try_ Beyond Burgers, is they require no violence against animals. This is not an argument that fairs well…

That's interesting. Can you give me your job? I mean, there are millions of people all around the world who are living in poverty and you are occupying a job that they could have had. There are many people who commit suicide because they no longer have any economic opportunities.

I like how modern people can pretend they don't live in the real world because it is hidden behind abstract complexity. Life is a competition with every living thing. You can pretend that it isn't while you order your uber eats and massively overpriced food, but you are only doing so due to some kind of psychological need.

The further you get into the city, the further you get into the lives of rich people, the more you see this "please think of the animals" attitude, because you become so removed from reality that you think the world is completely different to what it actually is. The irony is that you are in the most privileged place, taking the money that other people could have used, and using it to buy overpriced burgers.

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#302

Post by rbg246 »

Gustomaximus wrote: post #191
sweetheart wrote: post #36

While it is not my experience at all, I understand that some folks have certain negative opinions of Beyond Burgers, and other fake meat/imitation burgers: - The texture is off - Maybe they cook strangely - Potentially less taste But the most important thing about them, and the reason I urge everyone to at least _try_ Beyond Burgers, is they require no violence against animals. This is not an argument that fairs well…

> Beyond Burgers, is they require no violence against animals. I find this interesting, in that cropping has plenty of violent against animals but one step removed. I have a small cattle property, we run on hill country with diversified ecosystem, mixed grass and bushland. We have a heap of native animals living across the property. And at the end of the day the steers do get sent of for slaughter after 18 to 24 mont…

Firstly, thank you for preserving some of the natural ecosystem on your farm. That is a tricky choice to make but from what I see driving about you are in a minority.

You take a drive from Melbourne to Sydney and you get to see the effect of livestock farming, it's been completely denuded of natural vegetation everywhere where it's flat enough to smash down.

The destruction is right there in front of your eyes. Knocking down scrub for cattle farming wipes out the natural environment, there are some species where it does good for them or kangaroos and birds that like open grasslands but for everything else it's really bad.

Drive from Melbourne to Adelaide you get the same thing.

Australia knocked down more open forest in the last four years than they did in the Amazon - 90% for beef farming.

You can grow crops on a much smaller area, without even mentioning organic crop growing where you don't use chemicals to wipe everything out.

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#303

Post by tomcam »

atweiden wrote: post #292
tomcam wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel you. I stopped eating meat for 40 years for the same reason. But... they are on the same food chain we are, and they’d eat us in a heartbeat, right?

> I feel you. I stopped eating meat for 40 years for the same reason. But... they are on the same food chain we are, and they’d eat us in a heartbeat, right? Herbivorous ruminants like cows would never eat you, and would generally never harm you unless provoked. Breeding intelligent lifeforms in a bespoke way to murder them for cash — whatever the reason or creature involved — is diabolically evil. If you do this for…

Well... look up things like “cow eating chicken” or “deer eating bird” on YouTube. Not saying it’s common, but “never” is perhaps too strong a word. And of course I really meant it in a larger sense, not the direct ruminant/person relationship.

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#305

Post by atweiden »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #109
MPSimmons wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really enjoy both BeyondBeef and Impossible Burger. My thoughts are that BeyondBeef has a kind of plastic-y smell, but is almost exactly right in terms of color and texture. The smell is not concerning to me, but it is distinct for my palette. I still eat it, and don't mind. Aside from the burgers, I also really enjoy the spicy Italian sausages. There is a slightly different taste than pork-based sausages, but I wo…

Totally agree on Impossible Burgers. Like the GP, I also try to avoid eating meat due to animal welfare concerns. That, said, I've tried going vegetarian multiple times before and honestly I felt awful - I'm naturally very slim and not particularly energetic to begin with, and when I was on a vegetarian diet I felt totally lethargic. With Impossible Burgers, though, it really tastes and feels like I'm eating a real b…

> That, said, I've tried going vegetarian multiple times before and honestly I felt awful - I'm naturally very slim and not particularly energetic to begin with, and when I was on a vegetarian diet I felt totally lethargic.

The same thing happened to me when I first tried going vegan. It wasn’t until I went through a major effort at planning my meals — to the point of making an outright diet plan for myself — that I was able to make veganism work for me.

From your description, it sounds like you were eating too little calories.

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#306

Post by patrickmclaren »

gonehome wrote: post #278
patrickmclaren wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the best angle is the one given in the title: 90% less greenhouse emissions, 99% less water, and 93% less land. This is an approach that provides compelling meal options in a manner that scales much better than our traditional livestock methods.

I disagree actually - I think the animal suffering morality angle is the best argument for most people (as long as it's done in a way that isn't too adversarial). Most people don't care about the environmental costs, we do lots of things that have environmental effects because we like them and think it's worth it. Impossible and Beyond, while good, are still noticeably worse than beef to me. The animal suffering bit…

Valid. Different messaging for different markets perhaps!

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#307

Post by sweetheart »

Kranar wrote: post #275
sweetheart wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you still think that if it applies to someone nurturing a dog to adulthood, and then stunning it, slitting its throat, and drowning it in hot blood water? Would you still accept that as the Way Things Are?

I think bringing up dogs is very interesting. Certainly in much of the Western world there is a cultural association between dogs and humans so that presenting that scenario suggests that the dog was likely killed for some kind of senseless or sadistic purpose, after all why would someone just decide to randomly kill a dog? But plenty of Asian cultures do exactly that, they raise dogs to adulthood, and then kill it a…

> Furthermore there is emerging evidence that vegetarianism is often not an ethical choice

What is this evidence?

And, you didn’t really answer the question. Would you be fine with my stunning a dog, slitting it’s throat, and boiling it alive? I’m well aware of how culturally acceptable it is in other places, but i’m not asking that. Im asking if you’re cool if I do that to a dog.

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#308

Post by rank0 »

mykowebhn wrote: post #119

I've been trying to eat less meat for environmental reasons, and it's been made much easier because of Beyond Burger. I personally can't tell the difference between Beyond Burger and a real beef burger, especially when I buy it from fast food chains like Carl's Jr where it is covered in sauce. I've had Impossible Burger several times and I could never get over its smell. Beyond Sausage Spicy Italian is also a favorit…

https://youtu.be/sGG-A80Tl5g

Re: Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)

#310

Post by alentist »

__jem wrote: post #296
acituan wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I urge everyone to at least _try_ Beyond Burgers, is they require no violence against animals. I understand what you mean by violence and I don't want to come across as a stickler just for sport, but if we are taking a hard ethical stance based on principles we need to be precise with categories. Two of which is most important; 1. category of animals include humans 2. category of violence include any suffering infl…

i don’t understand why you think this is a huge gotcha. most vegans are oriented around harm reduction, not absolute minimization. otherwise, they’d just kill themselves. there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism, etc. either way, the causal chain between me and the rotisserie chicken is far shorter than between me and the tiny bit of cobalt in my iphone.

> there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism

What do you mean by that?

Post reply on HN