> Animal farming is such a historical constant, I wonder what the unintended consequences of artificial meat are?
I know what you mean, but animal farming at the scale we currently do is not a historical constant. The unintended consequences of having 7B humans eat meat every day is a much bigger concern that not eating real meat every day.
Our current meat consumption accelerates global warming, drives wild inefficiencies in the market, and is a hell for the animals themselves. (Edit: Also represents disease vectors in humans, see shared farm resources and things like e. coli).
We need to move to lab meat to avoid the distaster that eating meat is bringing.
Yes, large swaths of forest are being cleared for cattle rearing/production and animals also produce much methane as cows do as an example.
Whilst this may help, it will take many years/decades until the trust is there and indeed trusted backing and for some that will not change.
For me, I forsee artificial milk production as a more accepted avenue and if we can develop a process in which we chuck grass in at one end and get milk out of the other as a bigger opportunity and one in which would aid the environmental impacts in a more positive way. Until then we will still have cows, even with artificial meat.
But artificial meat, will take ages until it is accepted by the public, for me, it is when the likes of McDonalds adopting it that will be a key marker in progress and that is a long long way off as it stands.
I know what you mean, but animal farming at the scale we currently do is not a historical constant. The unintended consequences of having 7B humans eat meat every day is a much bigger concern that not eating real meat every day.
Our current meat consumption accelerates global warming, drives wild inefficiencies in the market, and is a hell for the animals themselves. (Edit: Also represents disease vectors in humans, see shared farm resources and things like e. coli).
We need to move to lab meat to avoid the distaster that eating meat is bringing.