St. Matthew Island

[dr.walrus]

vat-grown meat

I am so waiting for this to happen, but properly.

[mDust]

...vat-grown meat tastes pretty awful, from what I hear, but imagine the possibilities!

I am so waiting for this to happen, but properly.

Nasty. Nasty. Nasty. I'll continue preferring my food to have been conscious before being slaughtered and fed to me. But if we have to go that route, then I can't wait for recombinant DNA to be in everything so I can grow glow-in-the-dark meat plants in my home garden.

[dr.walrus]

I'll continue preferring my food to have been conscious before being slaughtered and fed to me.

Can I ask why?

[x88x]

Nasty. Nasty. Nasty.

It is now, but once it's better developed I'm confident at least most of the taste problems will be solved. Then we'll be able to produce it at a much lower cost of resources than growing an actual animal to maturity.

[Diamon]

I agree that there are risks with manipulating the genes of plants and animals. But what is the alternative? There are many who go hungry today and the Earth's population is still growing.

[Snowman]

I agree that there are risks with manipulating the genes of plants and animals. But what is the alternative? There are many who go hungry today and the Earth's population is still growing.

We could start with the hundreds if not thousands of Americans that have children to just collect a paycheck. There was a time when people did the same thing, only those kids worked for a living on a farm. I suppose we could go back to those ways, but that would be deemed child abuse now a days. This is one of the biggest problems I see in today, why would any person in their right mind want to lay on their back for 12 years and collect a pay check, then neglect that child or worse. Then release them into societies hands because they don't care as long as they collect their money. Then they spend it on things like hot cheetos, candy, and fountain pops because the screwed up system is based on whether or not that store charges a grocery tax. Sorry got on my soap box a bit there, but I do think that the above scenario will and currently is one of the problems that will lead to the demise of America as we know it, and is definitely a strain on the food supply.

[mDust]

Can I ask why?

For all of history animals have been more or less conscious and moving about before being eaten...so it's natural and hardly out of the ordinary. I also don't trust 'meat' that's been grown in a vat to ever be anything more than slimy glop. Meat is mostly muscle and if those muscles have never been used they are small, weak, and gamey. I don't like it. Meat from free-range animals almost always has a better taste and texture than industry mass-produced meat that has been literally fattened up in a cage.

vat beef < mass produced beef < free range beef...or any other meat for that matter.

I want it to be conscious so I know it's natural and has likely moved around a little bit in its life. I've heard hippies and others say that happy animals taste better...while I can't tell when a cow is happy or not, I'm somewhat inclined to agree based on the following reasoning: I assume that hippies just say the animal is happier when it's not in a cage 6" larger than its body and out roaming a field somewhere. I agree that free-range animals that aren't fed chemicals or unnaturally fattened do actually taste better. I love a good steak...or chicken breast...or pork chop... I don't love eating a slab of fat.
As for the slaughtering part, I don't eat animals that are still alive or raw. (Well, maybe the occasional sushi/sashimi but they're at least dead.) So they have to die and hopefully grill/broil.
The 'fed to me' part is due to both laziness and modern society not allowing me to hunt for my own food outside of hunting seasons. I would if I could. I've found that 'do it yourself' projects, no matter if it's hunting, fixing your car, home repairs, landscaping, or anything else, are an order of magnitude more satisfying than paying for someone else to do it for you. I'll continue to purchase my food from the grocery store for now though.

[x88x]

Meat is mostly muscle and if those muscles have never been used they are small, weak, and gamey.

Muscle activity is just electrical impulses passing through cells, causing them to contract and expand. Nothing that couldn't be simulated.

I've heard hippies and others say that happy animals taste better...

There is actually a bit of truth in this. If an animal is relaxed when it is killed, the meat does have a better texture to it. Something to do with chemicals released into the blood, I don't remember exactly. That's why chickens are gassed before being processed (idk about other mass-produced meat animals; I grew up in chicken country ).