Lab-grown meat: Vegetarians, carnivores, those thinking of converting...

[jobycom]

would you eat it? Would you feel better eating it than killing an animal to eat it? For those who want to be vegetarian but can't give up meat, would this be a solution to you? Carnivores, would you feel funny eating it, since it wasn't killed? Veggies--okay, I doubt many vegetarians would eat it, anyway, but would some of you? And would you feel less uncomfortable about carnivores doing it?

It just seems creepy to me, to be honest, but it serves a lot of purposes, including environmental (not requiring use of farm land for the less efficient raising of cows, for instance. And yes, we ALL know that without the meat industry cows would become far less common).

Lab-grown meat is meat tissue grown in a lab, not sliced off a formerly living beast.

Edited to add link: http://www.alternet.org/envirohealth/38755/

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

1. I'm against it for both.

It just seems wrong. Too fake. Chemical.

[jobycom]

3. Less chemicals than meat on the hoof

That's supposedly one of the appeals. THis meat hasn't been fed hormones, pesticides, rendered animal products. It hasn't led to the abuse of land required to raise animals, and the tremendous polution to ground water and air that factory animal farming creates.

[LeftyMom]

2. I know this will come as a shock, but you can put me down as a no.

The original cells the lab-grown meat comes from will still be animal cells. So no matter what, while it'd be huge step up there's still animal exploitation involved, although to a greatly lessened degree. Of course there's still the health issue, even if I wanted meat and had no ethical qualms about it I'd still skip it because of the amount of saturated fat, salt and cholesterol involved.

[jobycom]

4. Actually, it comes from stem cells, and can be made without sat fats

That's the theory. It can be made so that a steak would have no saturated fats, could even have Omega-3s from salmon, for instance. The stuff is grown using animal stem cells, which many liberals say are okay for medical research. But not for eating?

I'm playing DA here, I wouldn't eat it, either, but not for ethical reasons. Meat just doesn't appeal to me anymore.

[LeftyMom]

5. From what I understand

it'd be useful for making chicken nuggets and lunch meat and maybe fast food stuff but probably nothing that actually has the texture of real meat. It's not likely they'll be able to make anything like steak with it.

I'm okay with stem cell research but not the use of animal cells. For me the difference is consent. A human can offer consent for use of thier own cells or those of thier embryos left over from assisted fertility work, but an animal can not offer consent for the use of thier own body.

[jobycom]

7. Good distinction. nt

[deucemagnet]

6. I don't think growing meat in vitro will ever be cost effective.

I worked in a lab that did cell culture, and even did a little bit of it myself. I think there are two major reasons why lab-grown meat won't work on a commercial scale.

First, cell culture medium is too expensive for this to work. The type we used in the lab costs more than $11 for a 0.5L bottle, even when you buy it by the case.
https://catalog.invitrogen.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewCatalog.viewProductDetails&productDescription=9426&

The cells we grew required addition of fetal bovine serum in order to grow, which is *insanely* expensive, about $86 for a 50-mL bottle.
https://catalog.invitrogen.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewCatalog.viewProductDetails&productDescription=167&

I forget exactly how much we used, since I didn't do much cell culture. IIRC, for a monolayer of hybridoma cells grown in a 75-mL cell culture flask, about 30 mL of growth medium was needed once about every 3 days. I can't even really guess-timate how much it would take to produce a piece of meat, but I know it's a hell of a lot more than what's needed to grow a single layer of cells in a 75 ml flask.

OK, here's the second problem: even if you can develop a growth medium that is cheap enough to be cost effective, you still have to deal with contamination. The same growth medium that keeps cells happily growing and dividing also makes bacteria and fungi very happy, too. Believe me, it is hard enough to keep cell culture flasks uncontaminated on a small scale even when you're using antibiotics. Scaling up to a commercial-size cell culture operation would introduce many, many more opportunities for contamination. They're touting this meat as clean and hormone-free, they probably won't have the luxury of using antibiotics.

If lab-grown meat ever hits the market, I see it as being way, way too expensive to be a viable alternative to meat on the hoof. Not in the near future, anyway.

[flvegan]

8. For the health factor alone, no.

I will say this, if it's a successful product and lessens the impact of factory farming, etc, then I'm all for it. If one is going to choose meat, I'd rather this was the one chosen.

[RedCloud]

9. I would avoid it like the plague...

people eat meat.
space aliens do not visit.

is there a connection?

[jobycom]

10. Well...

Vegetarians exist. And still no space aliens. Pick your causality! :rofl:

[RedCloud]

11. There's a deep thought...

I'll try again.

Aliens do not visit planets with meat eaters.
We have meat eaters on this planet.
No aliens will visit.
Q.E.D.

Quoted from "How not to serve man" page 3
published by space aliens who want the truth told.

[ThomCat]

12. Just what me need. More frankenfood.

I'll pass. Thanks. :)

[jobycom]

16. I figured most vegetarians would turn it down. I was curious about those

who say they have thought about becoming vegetarian but they like meat too much.

As for it being frankenfood, most people eat for less healthy junk than that on a daily basis. This doesn't have the danger of cross-pollination the way modified crops do.

[Ariana Celeste]

13. I'd totally give it a try.

I'll try (almost) anything once.

[Mutley]

14. If it was safe, sure I'd try it.

If I liked it, sure, I'd eat that exclusively over a former living animal.

[darkism]

15. I'd try it, but I doubt it would be as good as real meat.

Yum!

[supernova]

17. I'd try it.

While I have no qualms about eating meat, factory farming does concern me.

[Taverner]

18. Surprisingly, I would have no problem eating it

It seems like the technological comprimise between meat eating and vegetarianism.

But hey - I'm not so afraid of GMO's either - not all are bad.

[JVS]

19. Can it be done cheaper than the normal way?