Are you one of the many People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, but love a big juicy steak? Well you may be in luck due to recent technology. Readers, have you heard about In Vitro Meat? In Vitro is real edible meat that does not include butchering an innocent animal. In Vitro Meat may offer a solution for carnivores to have their meat and eat it too.
Though the process is still being developed, In Vitro Meat is a hot topic right now. In Vitro is causing a stir of ambivalence among both meat eaters and vegetarians. PETA is offering $1 million to the scientists who are able to develop edible chicken flesh using test tubes and animal cells. The New York Times has even published some articles on this issue.
Sure, In Vitro alleviates many of the implications of meat production (environmental, health, animal rights, etc.), but will it better America’s meat addiction? I really want to hear what people have to say about this issue. Would you be happy eating synthetically grown meat? Do you think this is an unethical approach to solving an ethical problem?
Comments
I am really not sure what to say or think about this topic. Initially I think "great", kinda like tofu burgers, right? But maybe not...sure glad I read this AFTER lunch.
AUGUST 13 2008 AT 3:29 PM
Speaking as a vegan I should be able to offer a first hand perspective on this post.
- As a vegan I do crave meat-like substitutes. There are amazing substitutes like vegetable protein, mushroom stem and wheat gluten "meat". These are natural and not created in a lab. I have many concerns about Genetically Modified Organisms already - I'm not jumping on board this idea to eat lab-created food. The University of Marlyand is already working on creating artificial meat through a process called "Tissue Engineering". The process involves cloning animal cells and stretching tissues. (source: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/r...
- I think the money can be spent on better things like helping with food shortages (without the use of GMOs) or creating vegan food kitchens for the homeless.
- In vitro testing in place of animal testing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_vitro) would be a much better focus than Vitro meat replacements. I'm happy with my tofu and garden burgers. What I'm not happy about is all the animal testing that occurs to help find cures. I strongly support helping cure ailments of all sorts, but I always check with www.humaneseal.org before donating to a cause to make sure the organization doesn't cause the death of one create to save another's life. I encourage PETA to offer 1 million dollars for this effort over PR stunts.
Those are my 3 cents :)
AUGUST 13 2008 AT 4:23 PM
@KristinaD nicely worded!
AUGUST 13 2008 AT 4:34 PM
thanks for the comments kristina and roman!
yeah, i am personally uncomfortable with In Vitro meat. I don't seem to see the incentive a meat eater would have to go from "natural meat" to in vitro. I don't think that die-hard vegetarians and vegans are going to be persuaded to eat meat through this effort either.
AUGUST 14 2008 AT 12:13 AM
I personally wouldn't eat it, but I can definitely see multiple reasons why it would be a good thing. Obviously, it eliminates animal suffering (or does it? How do you create meat without technically creating an animal? Meat is animal tissue and muscle) Another huge factor is that it would eliminate the need to devote millions of pounds of grain used to feed cattle which could go elsehwere to feed the starving of the world instead. Plus, it sure would cut back on the methane gases the extreme overabundance of cattle in the world produces. But.....it would also put a lot of cattle farmers out of work....which is fine by me, but in this world of ours, we tend to make a lot of dumb decisions based solely on economic impacts.
Great post Hannah. When i first read about this challenge, I really had to ponder whether or not I'd eat it, because like Kristina above....I too love the multiple meat alternatives available these days.
AUGUST 15 2008 AT 9:50 AM