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Francois Lenoir / Reuters file
Dutch scientist Mark Post displays samples of lab-grown meat at the University of Maastricht.
The quest to grow meat in a lab rather than on an animal is due to reach its climax this fall, with the first-ever culture-dish hamburger served to a celebrity taster after a $330,000 development effort.
Mark Post, a physiologist at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands, said the project is being funded by an anonymous investor who is interested in "life-transforming technologies" and believes lab-grown meat could revolutionize the food industry.
"It's a reputable source of money, I can tell you," Post said today in Vancouver, Canada, at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Post hopes the tasting will be a media event, with experimental chef Heston Blumenthal cooking the burger. The patty will be much like a regular quarter-pounder — but with one big difference: This one will be created by growing bovine stem cells in a vat, transforming them into thousands of thin layers of beef muscle cells, mincing them into tiny pieces, then combining the bits with lab-grown animal fat to form a lump of meat the size of a golf ball.
If Post and his colleagues succeed, it would mark a technological triumph after years of working to improve upon the current, millennia-old method for making meat. Researchers in the field say the livestock industry in its current incarnation is too energy-intensive and land-intensive for a global population that's rising in numbers and affluence.
Meat production already takes up more than half of the world's estimated agricultural capacity, in one way or another. U.N. figures show that animal farming takes up 30 percent of the planet's exposed land mass. And over the next 40 years, the demand for meat products is expected to double.
If the researchers' assumptions are correct, growing meat in the lab "could reduce the energy expenditure by about 40 percent," Post said. Lab-grown meat has also won the endorsement of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, because the stem cells could be extracted without killing animals.
The money behind the meat
Post has been talking about serving up the first lab-grown burger for a long time, but it took the anonymous 250,000-euro ($330,000) contribution to turn the dream into reality. Traditional meat producers weren't interested in changing their ways, and were doubtful about success, he said. "Most people don't believe it's ever going to happen," he told reporters.
When Post started working on the project, he focused on growing stem cells from pigs to create a lab-grown sausage, but he said "my financier was not very interested in sausages."
There's still a long way to go between now and the celebrity cookout: Post said he doesn't yet know what the burger would taste like, because the samples that have been grown so far are too small. The pinkish-yellowish strips of muscle cells are only about an inch (3 centimeters) long, a half-inch (1.5 centimeter) wide, and so thin (1 millimeter) that they're semi-transparent. Post feels confident that his team can perfect the process by October, but full commercialization could take another 10 years or more.
The good news is that if there's someone out there willing to buy the second lab-grown hamburger, they can get it for "an extreme reduction in price," Post told me. He estimates that piece of meat should cost just 200,000 euros ($263,000).
Beyond meat
It's worth asking whether the quest to grow lab-grown meat is worth the effort, considering that there are already vegetarian alternatives to meat. Aren't tofurky and field roast good enough? Post and others note that such products haven't made a significant dent in the meat market, and are generally more expensive than the meat items they're meant to replace.
"If there is a vegetable-derived product that can take away the human being's craving for meat, that would be preferable," Post said.
Stanford University biochemist Patrick Brown says he's working on precisely that kind of stuff, and it could be on the market in the next year or so.
"We have a class of products that just totally rocks and cannot be distinguished from the animal-based product it replaces, even by hardcore foodies," he said. He promised that his plant-based alternatives to meat and dairy products would be tasty, nutritious — and profitable.
"I think it's going to be one of the easier things I've done," he said.
Brown joked that he couldn't talk about the details, "because if I did, I'd have to kill you." He'd say only that he "had no trouble getting investment" from a Silicon Valley venture-capital firm. To commercialize the concept, two ventures have been set up with placeholder names: Sand Hill Foods and Jasper Ridge Creamery.
The way Brown sees it, the meat industry is a "sitting duck for disruptive technology," offering a rich target for alternatives. He said the wholesale market for unprocessed meat has been estimated at $150 billion a year, which is 250 times the current market for meat alternatives.
Even though Post said the meat industry has been generally standoffish about lab alternatives, some companies are going against the grain: Nicholas Genovese, a visiting scholar at the University of Missouri at Columbia, told journalists that JBS, one of the world's biggest meat-packing companies, was interested in his parallel effort to grow meat in the lab.
More about the future of food:
- Scientists turn stem cells into pork
- Beef producers see America losing its appetite
- The skinny on milk nutrition: Cow, goat, rice or soy?
- Future of food: Drinkable bagels and beyond
More from the AAAS meeting in Vancouver:
- Scientists map the world's microbes
- Device turns gestures into song
- Researchers working to build a better leaf
- Answers ahead for physics' deepest mysteries
- Scientists revive sounds of Stonehenge and other sacred spaces
- Gas-drilling gaffes aren't unique to fracking, study says
Last updated 7 p.m. ET.
Alan Boyle is science editor for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter or adding the Cosmic Log Google+ page to your circles. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Leave a Comment:
This is a rather interesting concept. The crux is making it affordable. It can taste bland and have an unnatural texture, but if you make it a tenth the price of regular meat then there will be a very big market for it. Likewise there will always be a market for the natural thing, of that there is no doubt. Personally I don't care where my meat comes from so long as it tastes good. I just doubt that this will taste good. At least not for a long time. The only market for this until the price is less than that of natural meat is to vegetarians that can afford it.
PETA- People for the Ethical Treatment of Amoebas - My idea would be to feed it to those whack jobs for a decade or so, then if they are still OK, send it to marketing. Sounds a little "Soylent-Greenish" to me....
BUT: interesting!
My guess is that real meat will become a premium product that only the wealthiest can afford, like real hand fed Kobe beef cattle. Everyone else will be eating meat like substitutes manufactured in a chemistry lab...better living through chemistry.
Ritdog --
Soylent Green. A manufactured food from a 1966 Harry Harrison novel (Make Room! Make Room!) dealing with overpopulation, and the film was made in 1973. Soylent Green turned out to be a real horror -- equivalent to the 'barbecue' in Fried Green Tomatoes...
However, in The Space Merchants by Frederick Pohl (1952) there was a huge mass of vat-grown chicken breast called Chicken Little -- almost exactly what we see in the article above except (a) they didn't know about stem cells in 1952 so they 'cultured' the chicken breast and fed it processed algae; and (b) the meat in the article is 'beef' not 'chicken.'
Let the PETA wackos eat this @!$%# and feel good about themselves. I will only eat beef from real live corn fed steers.
You'd be better off eating beef from real live grass-fed steers. Corn-fed cattle are sick a lot of the time, and require a lot of antibiotics. Corn isn't cattle food--grass is. The only reason the industry uses corn is that the higher caloric intake gets the meat to market faster. That's at the expense of the health of the animal AND the quality of the meat. Grass-fed beef just plain tastes better.
I hope they make some artificial gasoline at one tenth of the price.
Just think how many people they could feed for that $330k as opposed to creating something people will fear and not want.
I thought that PETA was the (People Eating Tasty Animals). I have the Tee shirt to prove it.
Think how much birth control could have been provided for that money...and it might help actually fix the real problem.
I wonder how much energy creating something like this will cost? If it can be done cheap and easy, perhaps when we send people to Mars, they can eat "meat" there, as I don't think people will eat it here....UNLESS it is something like the "Pink Slime" that McDonalds "used" to put in their hamburgers that people like me didn't know about.
Yup, thank you (who ever you are) for "outing" the chemical mess that McDonalds was adding to the burgers. If they end up buying this crap, then that really will be the end of them.
I tought the Swiss were smarter than this.Talk about frankenfoods.
Why does the movie "Soilent Green" come to mind? This is an outrageous price for something that may not be even feasible for another 10 years, if then.
Uuuum yeah? Ever eat a burger at public school? 9 times out of 10 that's not meat either. It's mostly soy. It's cheap and you can buy the same kind of patties at the store for cheap. It never took off. Why? Because it sucks. It tastes like soy and the texture is like soy. The only response I have to meat grown in a lab: YOU EAT IT. That leaves more of the real thing for me and others intelligent enough to know what nature intended for us to eat.
How do you assure the nutritional content of robo-meat grown in a vat with no sunshine and no grass?
It was the Dutch, not the Swiss, who developed this artificial meat.
If they make it bland and tasteless, all the better to add sauces and herbs for a unique taste. Sort of like a meat eaters tofu.
Its possible that to start with it will be in hamburger form mixed with the real thing and over time the mix will be changed giving a slow change to the consumer so a difference in taste will not be that noticeable, also some fast food places will probably start adding it slowly to whatever it is claiming their meat product is, its not real meat in allot of places now. as it is we are eating allot of very strange things, have you ever wondered what added protein is in a product that already is protein? I know do you? there is a reason I only eat fast food if I have to, I will eat it if I have to, but only if there is no other choice. one of the big ones claims their product to be 100% beef, well that's before they alter it with their added protein.
Terror Bird
Here we go with the war between the rich and poor again. Rich eating real meat and the poor being feed some other form of meat the FDA says is good for them.
First it was the seed mutation, then scientists are turning to "leafs", now to meat ?
Yeah, next is to "clone" the scientists to make them non-reproductive.
Robert - You can't feed anyone with $330k - I doubt you will find a single person whose nutritional needs can be met by a bunch of little pieces of paper (unless maybe they lack fiber). You can only feed people with actual FOOD. And yes, of course you can purchase plenty of food with $330k, but then you just have that much less food available for everyone else. You may have fed one group of people, but you did so at the expense of another group, so overall you didn't really reduce hunger at all (I'm making a macroeconomic argument here, it would make more sense with amounts greater than $330k, but bear with me...). If, however, you invest that $330k towards developing novel ways to produce food at a much larger scale and lower cost than those currently available, then you will increase the overall supply of food, which would actually lower starvation, rather than just moving it around. Get it?
LOL...it is! Actually, that is the original PETA, to which the entire human race owes its very existence. This group has stolen the name and brought great shame to it. Too bad they can't be sued for copyright infringement...
What, you expect someone to actually attack the problem instead of the symptom? That would require the application of uncommon sense (there is nothing "common" about sense anymore) and that ain't happening due to that disgusting concept of "political correctness"!
As for eating this lab-grown "culture" (I cannot and will not refer to it as meat), NO THANKS! I'll stick to the annual refilling of my freezer with delicious, 100% natural and healthy venison! Mmmm GOOD!
Step in what?!!?!?!? You are right about that!!!!
BikeBoy - Thanks! BTW...did you see where I did my best to clear up your confusion in that "mountain man" thread. You got it right, that "Wexy" commentor got everything bass-ackwards. LOL!
seems like a waste of resources. we need less people, not lab grown meat.
Sounds great, served on a plastic bun with polyester pickles.
I might be willing to eat one of those petri dish burgers myself -- IF the scientists who developed it and rich financiers who paid for it make it the main part of their own diet for five years first. Let THEM prove how "safe" and "wonderful" it really is.
This is good news. Our nutrition completely relying on the sun, water, fertility, and time is foolish. To get to a new planet (after ours is detroyed by the death of our sun) we will need total mastery of sustanence production.
This progress will eventually lead to energy reassingment. Making anything at will, from almost anything else.
Poor countries leaders already turn down lab grown grains so what makes these idiots think that lab grown meat will be accepted. What is scary about this is how big name companies are interested in it like they want to sneak it into the public without proper testing. One of the main reasons people dont want fake grains is also there wasnt enough testing done on it. Even the scientists behind messing with biological properties of organisms say they do not really know what kind of other effects their meddling has on the organisms they are trying to play "God" with. You already see what kind of drugs these scientists are creating and releasing on the sheeple with all the ads saying if you got this disease while taking this drug come and sue the company. They dont have a clue of what they are doing but you put faith in these shills thinking their new miracle drug is the answer when most of what they have introduced in our society there was natural cures for in the old days. I would rather eat bugs then some fake ass lab grown grain or some fake ass meat im sure anyone with a brain would agree. Humans havent come this far by eating man made anything so as soon as that is the standard I'm sure humans will go extinct faster then any animal species recorded to date.
Wow...science creates an innovation that can save over 9 billion lives per year in this country alone and you people just hound on like you're auditioning for a sitcom and act like the cavemen who froze to death because they *didn't* like og's terrifying new invention, FIRE.
Bet you'd eat the stuff if it was spoon-fed to you with a silver ladle as someone pats you on the head and tells you "You are greatest player." God, and I bet over half of you are the atheist crowd who says christians are the blind and terrified ones.
I don't even know why I bother trying to educate you people, what good will it do? You'll just find some way to go kill one another. Why don't you go find a way to weaponize books. -_-
and I'll reiterate because my above comment will probably be collapsed, 9 billion animals in this country alone die each year, and half of that or more is thrown away because people want a variety they won't eat. I worked in a grocery store where over 500 pounds of meat was thrown away each week. Tons of bread and other food was thrown away too, but I'm sure with synthetic meat synthetic plant material isn't far behind.
They discover the thing which can differentiate the human race between art-capable locusts and a civilized race...and people just shout it down. >.<
Sorry there Random, but there isn't any where near 9 billion people in this county, let alone the world. In 2011, the "Whole World" was slated to surpass 7 billion people and it did. The United States has approximately 311 million, note I said Million, not Billion, Huge, Huge difference there.
My thoughts on this is, that that is just plain scary and disgusting. Also, if they are going through with this, and it appears that they are, they should use these Frankenfoods to feed the army of prisoners all around the world. Chances are, it would be better than the nasty chemical crap that they get fed now anyways. I would rather turn vegan(yikes! did I just type that?) than eat some nasty a$$ man made cattle product.
I could be wrong, and this could be a great idea, but God help us all if they keep this crap up. To me, it is just not natural at all. Another thing that disturbs me is, I just do not believe that animal farming takes up 30% of the worlds land mass. You can drive for hundreds of miles in any direction where I live, and not see an animal farm. That stat didn't add up for me, it may be true, but I seriously doubt it. NO SOYLENT GREEN for me, Thanks.
Okay, I just saw your second entry, and if you did originally mean 9 billion animals, (I don't feel like looking that up) then disregard my first paragraph Random Fox. But, I still have ZERO INTENTIONS of eating some lab created frankenfood.
I almost forgot, realitycheck-3009300, Polyester Pickles, now that was funny. hahaha!!!
Oh you silly people and your talk about Frankenfood and the lab stuff having no nutritional value. Maybe if you picked up a Biology book and educated yourself some you would understand how foolish you sound to the educated people. Meat is nothing but muscle with fat mixed in. The muscle tissue from the lab is no different from the stuff from the actual animals.
Oh, and if the idea of meat from the lab disgusts you, maybe you aught to check out where exactly a lot of your current meat comes from. I'll take the lab stuff over the "natural" stuff, its a less loaded with antibiotics and is likely cleaner.
As a vegetarian, I can assure you that this "meat" will not be on my menu.
Made from bovine (cow) stem cells makes it a meat product. Then they add stem cell fat. WTF?
This is merely engineered meat, probably with all the drawbacks of meat.
I will happily stick to my veggies thank you.
Lab grown meat. Right on the heels of GMO produce investigations? Good choice. We don't even know the side effects of GMO produce on the body and now they're rolling out totally lab grown meat? Count me out, you guys can eat as much as you want but when everyone starts getting cancer don't say I didn't warn you.
You'd fit right in, in the 12th Century.
Didn't get to the top of the food chain to eat veggies (or lab meat)
Volunteers? Anyone?!
In regards to the article, this sounds like some delicious SCIENCE! Brought to you with TECHNOLOGY!
With 7 billion people at the top with ya and 12 billion soon, chances are you won't be eating anything at all.
BBBBLLLLLEEEEEECCCCCHHHH!!!!!!!! That sounds so gross disgusting I believe I will give up meat and go vegetarian. I'm almost there as it is. This sounds worse than bologna and hot dogs.....nobody really knows what's in them either. Stem cells or not, it sounds too grisly like one of those "saw" movies or some weird alien movie...what if those things start to move on their own???? Zombie meat??? Ahhhhhhhh. No good can come from this....ewwwww....
They already do, it's called 'electricity'
Just throwing out a thought to all you "I'm a vegetarian, so this isn't my problem and if you go vegitarian it won't be yours either" folks... Do you have any idea how much land would bne required to grow enough vegetables to supply enough calories for all the people of the world? It is mind boggling. Meat -- like it or hate irt -- is very calorie dense, thus requiring less of it to amount to the same number of calories in a larger quantity of vegetables. Yes, I know... in the modern USA, the word "calories" is a dirty word. But in the world of survival, calories are vitally important. In order to be a healthy vegetarian (let alone vegan), one must be careful to eat the right combination of plant materials to get all of the required nutrients -- some of which are readily available to the human digestion system from processing meat. Not impossible to do, of course, but more complicated to be sure. I would agree that our use of animal products needs to be re-evaluated. Wate is a major issue. The West probably relies a little too much on meat. And we currently get too many calories. BUT... given the demands of growing enough of the right combination of fruits of veggies to supply the entire world population with the nutrients required by the omnivorous human animal in the total absence of meat... I'm not sure wholesale conversion to vegetarianism is the answer.
What do you think cows eat, duh - it takes more land and water to grow meat for food than same amount of vegetables for food.
I wonder if our ancestors had similar aversion to horticultured foods, hybrid foods, and husbandry? I can imagine them yelling "It's not natural!"
I wonder if people feared agricultural products as 'less tasty' and claimed that they would never eat them. Wild berries and fruits are indeed quite tasty compared to the stuff on farms.
Humanity relies on room for expansion, and increasing food production capabilities has been the catalyst for all our advancement as a species. There were always people close-minded to such advancements, but their thoughts will end up in the dust-bin of history like all the others. Progress is an unstoppable force, we must breed and feed (expansion) - because the alternative is war and famine (contraction).

You need to take into consideration the nutritional value compared to the energy required, though. It's not all about 'amount' or 'weight'... it's about how many people can get the caloric intake that they need at a particular energy cost.
/facepalm
What is it you don't get that to get 10 pounds of meat you gotta feed an animal 100 pounds of grain, plus it takes a half acre of land? You are killing me here, our ancestors didn't have a lot of choice, read the bible sometime - they ate as much produce as they could during the summer and used meat to get them through the hard times. The whiny Jews complained about manna and God made them eat meat 'until it came out their nostrils', that should give you some idea how God feels about it, but from a purely nutritional standpoint meat isn't all that good for you, its alright in moderation but your average walmart shopper doesn't need 5 servings of beef a day to do nothing at all worthwhile.
And the fact that the Hebrews ate the sacrificial meat should give you another idea about it. Using biblical reference to prove a point about the use of land for meat production seems ill advised.
Besides that, the Jewish portion of humanity is a small portion. One can not draw conclusions about the eating habits of all humanity by the habits of the few.
If you read the bible this same theme is actually all through it, people live best on a diet that is varied and most people at meat only sparingly. I merely pointed this out for those who may care, not being particularly religious myself I think its good advice but I don't accept anything on pure 'faith'. The land use is a seperate argument against widespread eating of meat, we are using 40% of non ice covered land to raise meat, thats just ridiculous, and most of that used to be forest or wild areas that we clearcut and mowed down to make way for corn fed hormone and antibiotic laden animals...
I'm not totally against people eating meat, but I think your average 300 lb woman who doesn't do jack all day and then eats 5 servings of pork and beef really speaks for itself.
Two words people: Delicious. Science.
Roll those words over in your mind for a while.
Delicious science. MMmmmmmmm.
Grazing animals produce a lot of green house gases, including methane. With lab grown meat, we could eliminate many of these animals (send some to zoos, eat the rest). The lab meat would also be potentially cleaner and safer.
But i wonder what converse effect eliminating grazing animals would have on the rest of nature? What would predator animals eat for starters?
The problems most non-insane people have with the meat industry (in addition to the gas issue) is the amount of water and biomass these animals require as well as the addition of antibacterials to keep them healthy. It's a reasonable concern. The market will never die, though. Just as PETA psychos and legitimate vegetarians alike would prefer this petri dish meat, many people will still prefer natural meat. This tech has some good things for everyone, though. Not just PETA. If it can be made much more cheaply than current meat, then affordable protein can be exported to starving nations. Even grown in areas where the food is needed. This isn't just a matter of ethics (even if that is what is currently driving it).
I think even if they could get this stuff to taste awesome I'd still like a good old-fashioned steak every once in a while. I think a lot of people would agree with me on that. That's why this brand new industry will, at best, only be a supplement. Never a replacement.
Disclaimer: PETA is insane. Most vegetarians/vegans are not.
well lets see......people maybe?? stupidest idea ever!!! how many labs would we need to accomodate a billion people a day eating burgers? what about steak? still gotta have the cows for that! i for one will never eat a petrie dish grown porterhouse!!! im glad i dont have a whole lot of time left on this rock cuz this place is going downhill fast!!
Terror Mass - If farmers would feed cows the food they are SUPPOSED to eat as ruminants (i.e. grasses), the cost of food for the cows would not be an issue. Neither would antibacterials - since the only reason most cows need antibiotics is because they are being fed things they shouldn't eat and are being kept in cramped quarters (barns, feedlots) instead of being outside and grazing like they are supposed to. Joel Salatin's book "Folks, This Ain't Normal" outlines the myths of the methane gas issue, too. I doubt there will ever be a healthy, lab-created "meat" that could match the health benefits of CLA- and Omega-3 rich grassfed, pastured beef. Do your research people, this is obnoxious.
I meant to put this reply up here instead of down where it ended up for some reason:
Terror, this still isn't vegetarian or vegan, so it's not a matter of anything related to that. I'm not sure why anyone would think it would since it's still meat. Now it's just processed more. Not only would I not eat that as a vegetarian, but I wouldn't due to the processing. If it were inexpensive, quality protein that could feed people where they have no food animals or access them them I could very slightly see it, but I'll stick to my veggies, thanks.
"What would predator animals eat for starters?"
Um, we typically don't let predators eat agricultural domestic grazing animals, anyway. Wolves and mountain lions don't count on cattle as prey. Nothing changes for predators....
ram - I may be ignorant on the matter, and I apologize if I am. But don't vegetarians and vegans have their own individual choices for not eating meat. It was my understanding that some chose not to eat meat because of the pain and suffering of the animals (no animals here, so no foul, right?). Some even choose to be vegetarians purely because meat takes up so many resources, if I am not mistaken.
This isn't processed meat, by the way. It is cow muscle and fat grown from stem cells. These cells can, in theory, replicate indefinitely. Either way, a blastocyst is a rather harmless way of obtaining meat. There is no animal... and that is part of the point. A blastocyst is coaxed to replicate until enough cells are present, then the cells are coaxed into becoming muscle or fat tissue. Or at least that is my understanding of the process.
With the exception of the original blastocyst, no animals are involved. And that blastocyst is removed with minimal pain and suffering to the animal. Even calling it meat is a stretch as it didn't grow from an animal. It is synthetic bovine muscle tissue and synthetic bovine fat tissue. Not meat as meat implies that it came from an animal.
All in all, as I stated in the beginning, I am not a vegetarian nor do I claim to be savvy in such matters. Apologies all around if I missed the mark somewhere.
@Frank Glover - We don't let predators eat our meat cattle, do we?
Lab technicians produce a lot of methane gas. That "pink slime" probably produces methane gases in humans.
Are you meat eating pruist as concerned about what science is doing to the plant based foods/produce found in todays markets or are your concerns limited to frankenmeat?
They can have my share of that stem cell meat for starters.
Frank Glover: ..."Um, we typically don't let predators eat agricultural domestic grazing animals, anyway. Wolves and mountain lions don't count on cattle as prey".......
Somebody wanna tell me what's wrong with this statement?
Anybody?
Bueller?
Time's up.
Frank Glover. YOU, my friend, are a preditory animal. You are a non practicing-vegetarian-preditory animal.
Are you just finding that out?
Duh.
I see a new Frankenburger drive thru restaurant in our future.
It is an interesting concept and I have no doubt that it may be successful, but it is unlikely it tastes like beef without putting in a bunch of additives.
We eat a lot of "fake food" now and don't realize it. It is completely possible to fool our taste buds. The question is whether or not the chemical cocktail and the processing are safe. I don't see this as being that much different than vegetable products being turned in fake meat that may have a similar flavor. By the time you add all the stuff to simulate the taste you want, you may well have cancelled out any health benefits. Ideally, we would be much better off acquiring a taste for more vegetable products. There are a few "Veggie Burgers" that taste nothing like meat, but have their own unique and enjoyable taste.
If this ends up tasting close to meat and has the same nutritional values, that would probably be a good thing as satisfying our tastes for meat is not really all that good for the environment. But being able to grow some cells and growing a steak are far different. I have a lot of doubts about this and I'll believe when I see it and taste it.
$330,000 for a hamburger ? It better come with fries and a drink thrown it. Come to think of it, supersized !
or just a diamond studded wrapper...that'd do me fine...
Melissa B.-1176537, it's all about profit. It's currently not as expensive to factory farm produce meat on tiny plots while pumping them full of medicines and nearly force feeding them to get cows to market ASAP. Your favorite fast food chains are not interested how happy and healthy a life some free range cow had, they want the lower price.
@ Shut yer yap and Jim Hawk III:
(sigh) I'm sorry that you seem not to know the difference between 'carnivore' (which we are, wolves are, mountain lions are, and I never suggested otherwise) and 'predator,' which carries with it an element of hunting. (check a dictionary, please)
Can you really say with a straight face that we hunt our own agricultural meat cattle? Now there's a challenge...
But we use everything from fences to guns, to insure that nothing else hunts them, either, and those predatory animals have no opportunity to become dependent on them. That was my point
Pay attention class, you will be tested...
PETA = People Eating Tasty Animals. I sometimes wonder what these people think we raise chickens, pigs, and cattle for, pets? Being that this hair brained idea will never fly, it doesn't matter that much but suppose it did. Are we supposed to put all the cattle farmers out to pasture, feed what we have left until it dies and then bury it? It's exactly what we need, to drive yet another industry out of this country so we can import what we need just like we did with manufacturing. Frigging idiots.
PETA is just asking for the ETHICAL treament of animals...no one is taking away your meat fella.
Bull crap, if you'll excuse the term. They are asking for everyone to be vegetarian; in fact, they're damn near demanding it. Since their idea of ethical treatment means no killing of animals (hard to argue to a point, it would be hard to treat me ethically while nonetheless killing me) and they are not above disrupting those with whom they disagree, such as hunters, they are millitant advocates, some of whom have links to terrorist groups like the Animal Liberation Front, which releases lab animals in late-night break-ins and burns down developments becasue they ARE developments. To me, if most vegetarians/vegans are as harmless to society as Quakers, then PETA are more likeWestboro Baptist Church.
BTW, PETA's largest single "supporter" is Rush Limbaugh. When Christie Hime was awarded royalties for his continued use of her song "My City Was Gone" as his theme song, she demanded that his payments be assigned to PETA, as she knew how much he despised and belittled them. I don't care for PETA, as you can tell, but I LOVE irony.
wlockridge.
You should do a little research on how your food is brought to the table. Find out how the pigs, chicken and cows you eat are treated so you can leave their meat half eaten on your plate.
Think a little before you call people idiots.
The amount of "I don't care how what I want comes to me" automatons in this world is shameful.
Sure, PETA sometimes goes slightly overboard, but they know more about YOU and your world, than YOU know about them.
You mean like the ANIMALS that they are? LOL!!! There is a reason humans are at the top of the food chain...and it is because we kill better than animals do!
And then you said...
HA HA HA HA HA....I'm still laughing at that one and I'm sure I will be for a while! That has to be the early leader for understatement of the year!!! Thanks for the laugh though, I really needed it.
@still working-4265157 I find that funny since their mission statement is "total animal liberation". Also, I find it funny since PETA hosts kill shelters and puts down more animals than they place into adoption every year. Their 2011 stats were 1,992 animals received at the shelter main shelter in Norfolk, VA: 34 transferred out of the shelter , 24 placed into adoption and 1,911 euthanized. That means they put down 95.9% of the animals they take in. How is that for ethical?
Sure, I'd like to try this. But I'll wait for the price to go down.
In the words of Bart Simpson: Don't have a cow!
Instead, hurry on down to Frankenburger and get a double beef-like patty with a side of French fried starch product.
Fraknenburger: No animals were harmed in the production of this burger.
Rlquall "Fraknenburger: No animals were harmed in the production of this burger"
Except the customer. LOL
You ever see some of the people in fast food joints? They are the equivalent of the People of Wal-Mart, YIKES I Tell Ya, YIKES!!!! Frankenburgers, almost one people served.
While you folks make the PETA jokes etc the real boon to this science is that one day, humans will get off this planet.
Do you think they'll have room for steers, chickens and pigs? The first attempts might not satisfy the palate but without this effort, when the time does come, we'll have the technology of how to do it.
How many people starving from crop failures could possibly benefit from this? If you're starving, you'll eat it.
Thanks, and I'll wait till then.
Terror, this still isn't vegetarian or vegan, so it's not a matter of anything related to that. I'm not sure why anyone would think it would since it's still meat. Now it's just processed more. Not only would I not eat that as a vegetarian, but I wouldn't due to the processing. If it were inexpensive, quality protein that could feed people where they have no food animals or access them them I could very slightly see it, but I'll stick to my veggies, thanks.
It's not processed more, it's processed less! It was never even in the animal, it can be grown in a hamburger shape from the get-go, and require NO processing!
You say you are a vegetarian? Do you drive a car? it takes beef by products to make tires, Antifreeze, Asphalt, Car Polish, steel ball bearings,. Do you live in a house? it takes beef by products to make- Linoleum, Sheetrock, Glue, cement Blocks, Insulation, Paint, Plastic,. Also Shoe Polish, Deodorants, Perfumes, Candles, Shaving Cream, Crayons, Cosmetics, Soap, Ice Cream, Yogurt, Chewing gum, Printing Ink and the big one Medicine all use beef by products so if you are a true vegetarian you couldn't use any of these things. The beef industry is a whole lot more than just producing meat.
Also all you people who think grass fed beef are healthier than corn fed--- you are just being fed false information . Don't believe everything you hear or read until you check it out .
really? and they don't gotta drill a hole through cows to dig out the corn cuz their stomachs can't process it and they'll get infections if we don't do that? and that's healthy? riiiiiight....
i've been eating several brands of vegi burgers made from stuff that bears no relationship to a cow, other than that a cow might have eaten some of it as food also. It takes a certain setting aside of perceptions to accept. But given the facts of an overpopulated earth with finite and dwindling resources...better to start experimentation of food substitutes now rather than later. With enough catsup or worcestershire sauce I'm sure it will taste as good as Soylent.
It's amazing to me the lengths we humans will go to to avoid being uncomfortable. Hey I'm guilty of measures to stay comfy. But I ask you . . . lab meat?
Why don't we simply curb our population growth? If we would quit breeding ourselves toward extinction or other ecological disaster MOST of the problems facing our species would be negated.
(No I do not have children in case you're wondering. And no I do not consume commercial meat products, though I do enjoy wild venison. Some of the people in my part of the country here have six or eight kids because "it's fun, it's nice, and hey the world isn't too crowded. " They actually believe there is still plenty of space available. Amazing thing to me - their naivete; what looks like open land here could be termed 'heavy industrial farming' because that is exactly what is going on. There really isn't much open space except desert or other undesirable spots we humans can't live or use. Sad state of the world today.)
Bottom line fellow humans - QUIT BREEDING
Well, not quit altogether. Maybe just cut back a good bit.
Yes, i can only "HOPE-295312" you "QUIT BREEDING".
Not that you have yet, as you say you have no children, I can just hope that you don't.
Every time I see a person say something about curbing population growth, and then someone responds to that comment with something along the lines of "stop breeding", or "don't have children" to said person, I always think the responding someone is jealous, jealous of having kids they have to take care of. Just a thought of mine. By the way, I completely agree with Hope, and am also glad and proud to be able to say that my wife and I haven't reproduced, either.
IF people treated each other better, and IF countries weren't so self-interested and nationalistic in their agriculture policies, the world could easily handle billions of more people. I've heard people whose knowledge dwarfs mine say that properly intensively irrigated and cultivated that the state of Texas could feed the entire current population of the world, and to spare.
But we all know that the above scenario will NOT happen. NOT EVER. So what's the solution? Just wait. In the past, as countries became more affluent, family size declined. People didn't need lots of children to help them on the farm as agriculture consolidated and mechanized and they moved to the city where room was at a premium and fewer children meant fewer mouths to feed and more for the ones that there were. People in Europe became better-educated, less religious, and delayed marriage and reproduction to the point that countries like Italy are losing population and the Nordic countries, France, and Spain are barely growing. This trend is now expanding to the former "Third "World" in many instances as well. Also, the apperance of social programs for the aged has meant that people needn't have lots of children in the hope that some will see to them in old age. And the habit of having large families in the hopes that a few children would survive to adulthood is less necessary than ever before due to decreased infant and child mortality, although it seems to take a couple of generations for this reality to sink in for most locales. The only think that realistically could disturb this trend would be, of course, an upswing in religious fanaticism.
I have seen studies that seem to indicate that world population will reach about 9,000,000,000 by around 2050 and then roughly stabalize or decline slowly, not that this is ever likely to effect me. So if they are doing this to feed the untold teeming billions yet unborn, I would say not so fast. If they are doing it in the idea that one day there could be a market for this if it can be done inexpensively enough, then that seems likely to be enough motive to go foward with it, but I won't be the first, or second, or third one in my neighborhood to try it, I assure you. Tofu seems highly preferable to a massive of cultured cells that was never actually alive in the sense of having been part of an actual animal, if you ask me.
I grew up eating meat. Loved the stuff.
Became vegetarian. Had to adjust my taste buds, slightly.
Big deal. I've accidentally eaten meat. Tastes disgusting to me now.
Lesson. Tastes change. Babies know this. They eventually stop thinking wads of candy and chewing gum are a tasty meal. Adults can too.
Have a nice day.
if our populations supposed to get that bad you may wanna do some math, 1 how much surface area does earth have(land only) 2 how much drinkable water does the earth have, 3 how much space does the average person take up, and 4 how much resources min-max does a single person on average use up per a day average and don't forget the human body produces heat and holds water, so if we are 90% water what will that do to our oceans lakes and streams? and if that many people are producing 98.6degF accost the globe evenly(excluding uninhabitable areas) that means that by just guessing this will raise our climates temperature and there will be nothing left but humans at this point and no room for animals wild or domestic and barely any room for farming let alone the size of our garbage dumps and fecal matter produced(and that's a really scary thought when you think about it). I'm pretty sure you get the point. hopefully a big disaster cuts our current population in half or more because the ecosystem will die off if we keep it up which means we all die. and yes i agree with hope as well. stop breeding, especially since the ones who are currently breeding are dumb as a box of rocks and its being passed down to the children and effecting our society and no i don't breed ever i consider the concept of reproduction revolting and dangerous(especially when its not planned for).
Seeing as this "meat" wouldn't really be exercised, wouldn't be flexing, etc...what kind of texture could this possibly have? The reason certain cuts of meat are tougher than others is that they're the muscles that wrok more. This lab grown muscle wouldn't have any of that, so who knows what kind of absolutely horrendous texture this could end up having. I'm guessing it'll have a texture of veal at BEST, and a texture of tofu at worst. Also, PETA is a terrorist organization and should be treated as such. I have absolutely no respect whatsoever for anyone who supports them.
You wanted a tender steak, you got a tender steak. Mush actually.
Although I agree with you that PETA is a terrorist organization I think your statement about their supporters is rather harsh. For whatever reason, be it ignorance, low self esteem, etc, some people are more susceptible to their propaganda.
In order to stay on topic I will say this, lab grown frankenmeat will never pass my lips. If anybody would care to learn another disgusting thing about " meats " just google meat glue.
might be a breakthru for long time space application
There's no food in our food now, all we need is artificial meats. Ever wonder why those who eat nothing but processed food don't seem to be as healthy as those who eat real natural food?... hmm let me guess.
Perhaps nature does it better?
China can't wait to steal the technology & the lawyers can't wait to sue cause it's only a matter of time they find out the fake meat gives a small % of the population cancer.
Wow. Now we can look forward to all sorts of lab grown meat. I've always wanted to have an elephant burger or a tiger steak. Heck, I could even have a burger made out of myself.
And what cancers is a fake burger going to cause now? Most cancers are caused from all the processed food and the chemicals they put in it. You didn't see all the cancers you see now in the early 1900's because most food was still in its natural state when consumed, not fill with preservatives and chemicals.
Or because most of us weren't around in the early 1900s to see their cancers? Nor were the diagnostic tools? Also maybe people died earlier, before they had a chance to get cancer? Or they died of cancer, but nobody knew, so they just called it dead? Just sayin'.
Before a century ago, so many people died young in accidents and from communicable diseases, not to mention starvation and nutritional deficiency, and most cancers manifest in middle and old age (although it is the childhood and young adult cases that make the biggest emotional impact on most of us), that certainly more people are dying of cancer than in the past. I do think that environmental inputs caused by humans have something to do with this, but often they are the byproducts of the same changes that have lessened mortality from the causes noted above.
Cancer is an age related disease, since its linked to natural or environmentally induced mutations, both of which increase with exposure (age). Even with strong carcinogens like those in cigarettes, it can take decades to get a cancer from the exposure to those chemicals. Also, when you age, the mutation reparation mechanism starts to fall appart, which also increases chance of getting cancer.
When people died before the age of 60 (on average), most people died from viruses, bacterias, blood loss, inflammations or accidents.
Despite all that, the proportions of people dying from cancer has stabilized or is slowly trending down (helped by less smoking in men).
@Steve-1888700 you also didn't see so much cancer in the 1900s because we didn't have the technology to diagnose and detect them then, so they just called it 'natural causes'.
Another artificially formulated and genetically engineered product. No thanks.
zombie apocalypse!!!!!!
Ewww.
That looks like the "pink slime" MacDonald's was using. I won't eat it. Will you?
I read the headline and thought "Aren't they all lab-grown these days?"
*shrugs*
for some strange reason; soylent green starts to beat the drums just outside my peripheral conciseness
So PETA has all the sympathy in the world for a cow but could give a rat's azz about a living cell. How do they know a single cell doesn't feel pain?
No brain...no pain.
Tea party should be safe then. (couldn't resist)
I hear the screams of the vegetables
watching their skins being peeled
grated and steamed with no mercy
how do you think that feels?
Carrot juice constitutes murder
greenhouses prisons for slaves
it's time to stop all of this gardening
let's call a spade a spade.
That's why GWB was always smiling.
Holding my breath in anticipation for frankenfurters. Yummy!