I am willing to take bets on the following proposition:
By the end of 2021, at least one restaurant regularly serves cultured animal tissue for human consumption.
I may accept alternative propositions as well.
Caveat: I have spoken to some of the people involved in clean meat work which may have given me access to information that is not available to the general public.
Update: I’ve agreed to be the arbiter of the bet with Buck and Michael. My current working definition of “regularly” is something like
“A restaurant sells a product made primarily of cultured meat for at least 3+ meals/week for a continuous period of at least 4 weeks before the end of 2021”
There should probably be a stipulation on to what extent buying cultured meat is rate-limited as well.
Let me know if any EA forum reader reading this hears of something that might plausibly fulfill the bet resolution.
If we develop cost-competitive clean meat within the next 5 years, it will probably take another 5-10 years before fast food chains start serving them (and may take longer in the US because the USDA may have to approve it first, which could take a long time). So I don’t think there’s a high probability that fast food chains will adopt clean meat by 2021, although this has little to do with my beliefs about when it will achieve cost-competitiveness. Even if it were cost-competitive as of right now, I still wouldn’t expect to see clean meat in fast food chains within 5 years.
Betting on fast food chains increases more dependencies in the bet—instead of just betting on when clean meat will be cost-competitive, we’re betting on how quickly it will achieve widespread acceptance and production will scale up to a national level. I would prefer to make a simpler bet that’s purely about cost-effectiveness.
I am willing to take bets on the following proposition:
I may accept alternative propositions as well.
Caveat: I have spoken to some of the people involved in clean meat work which may have given me access to information that is not available to the general public.
(Edit: Changed bet wording.)
Supermeat (cultured chicken producer) in Israel now has a test kitchen open to the public, but they have not started charging yet and it appears that they may need to scale up production somewhat before regularly serving cultured animal tissue.
I now think it’s more likely than not that you’ll win the bet, but it looks like it’ll be fairly close.
Nick Beckstead and I have agreed to bet $1000 at even odds on the proposition
Buck Shlegeris has agreed to bet his $2800 against my $2000 on the proposition
Update: I’ve agreed to be the arbiter of the bet with Buck and Michael. My current working definition of “regularly” is something like
There should probably be a stipulation on to what extent buying cultured meat is rate-limited as well.
Let me know if any EA forum reader reading this hears of something that might plausibly fulfill the bet resolution.
This bet resolves positive.
Woop, thanks for following up on this! I am always very happy when long-term bets like this get resolved.
I don’t know if this meets all the details, but it seems like it might get there: Singapore restaurant will be the first ever to serve lab-grown chicken (for $23)
-
If we develop cost-competitive clean meat within the next 5 years, it will probably take another 5-10 years before fast food chains start serving them (and may take longer in the US because the USDA may have to approve it first, which could take a long time). So I don’t think there’s a high probability that fast food chains will adopt clean meat by 2021, although this has little to do with my beliefs about when it will achieve cost-competitiveness. Even if it were cost-competitive as of right now, I still wouldn’t expect to see clean meat in fast food chains within 5 years.
Betting on fast food chains increases more dependencies in the bet—instead of just betting on when clean meat will be cost-competitive, we’re betting on how quickly it will achieve widespread acceptance and production will scale up to a national level. I would prefer to make a simpler bet that’s purely about cost-effectiveness.