Early Meat Cheats

Schwartz, John. 2008. “PETA’s Latest Tactic: $1 Million for Fake Meat.” The New York Times. Available from: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/21/us/21meat.html?_r=1&hp

This is an interesting article in that it brings up the animal rights issue, which is strongly linked to this new research at the moment. Basically, back in 2008, PETA (People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) put up significant prize money ($1 million) to the first person to come up with a viable option for producing meat from animal tissue. However, despite the money being put forward and the challenge set, many of the PETA members were disgusted by this, claiming that eating road kill would be a more appealing option for them. Eating any part of an animal was still a major problem for them, even if it meant no animal was killed or even harmed in the process of creating this “non-meat.” Nevertheless, PETA went forward with this effort, knowing full well that it might cost them members.

It seems to me like this was –and still is - a very good compromise. Animal tissue would be used here to cultivate more tissue, “grown” into meat, and used as a replacement in many meat dishes. No animals would be harmed at all, yet the strong flavor and texture of meat would still be enjoyed. This gets into public health and environmental issues here as well, as mentioned in the article. Because meat can have harmful chemicals, drugs and hormones in it, it poses as a health risk to individuals. Meat cultured and produced in a clinically safe and sterile environment (in vitro) would lack these harmful substances. Additionally, a lot of pollution and waste products are created in the regular production of meat. In vitro production would cut down on this significantly.

Obviously, this was written a year and a half ago – lots of progress has been made in this field since. It is interesting to see, however, how PETA put up such a large sum of money to really get the incentive out there to find alternative ways of producing meat. In vitro meat is truly a revolutionary technology sparing the lives of animals, and yet some PETA members still resisted the idea. Personally, I feel as if this is a great compromise for animal rights activists and meat eaters alike – one that sacrifices neither meat composition nor actual animals. PETA states in this article that they are willing to “take uncomfortable positions” if it means that animal lives are spared. Though all animal tissue may not be spared in this case, it is still the next best thing. This challenge sets the stage for some fascinating innovations in this field, and the fact that was put forth originally by an animal rights organization (despite internal disagreement) says a lot about the practice of growing in vitro meat itself.


2005. “Scientists aim for lab-grown meat.” BBC NEWS. Available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4148164.stm

This article comes from the resources part of the website for New Harvest, the organization mentioned in the last article. In existence since 2004, they works towards finding innovative approaches to meat production without harming animals through research and collaboration, providing a forum for technological advances in this field. In a way, this article travels further back in time to give some more insight into the initial problems and hopes for this type of non-meat.

Written in 2005, this article also provides some great background into the world of in vitro meat production before it was a common thing. It explains how a single cell could produce the world’s meat demand, all in a clean laboratory environment. The text not only mentioned the health benefits to both people and the environment, but also the reduced harm in terms of animals. Not only would this prevent animals from being killed (an obvious positive), but it would also decrease the harsh treatment of farm animals in general in terms of overcrowding and underfeeding. Scientists also say texture would not be sacrificed, as they have developed ways to “stretch” the muscle cells across the plate to prevent the mixture from tasting like mush. This “meat cheat” provides a new dilemma for vegetarians however; some would be comfortable eating the non-meat due to lack of animal cruelty and healthy production methods, but since some are just intrinsically against eating any part of an animal, this would still pose as a problem. Many vegetarians reported having qualms with the lack of information provided about how the initial cells were taken from the animals, and therefore were still uncomfortable eating the food. In addition, this idea might be revolting to those that are against eating synthetic, processed or unnatural foods.

Though this did raise more legitimate ethical dilemmas, it clearly was not enough to stop the wave of science involving non-meat production. Again, this was back in 2005, and there have been four years of research and progress in this field. Currently, there is a strong movement, especially in the US, towards healthy, organic foods that were created using natural processes. This article brings up a good point: while this meat would probably be healthier and cleaner overall, it does not mean that health-food “junkies” are going to jump to buy this product. Rather, it seems like this type of meat might actually be worse because of the fact that it is not a natural product, but engineered in a lab. This could turn many people away. The current wave of healthy and fit individuals may actually rebel against “meat-cheats,” and this is something we will explore as our research continues.

Both of these articles work to lay the foundation for some of the failures and successes in this field, in addition to raising some key arguments against this method of meat production that are still being debated today.