This is a good point. I don’t want anyone to write off cultured meat on the basis of my argument alone, but I do want to push us toward much more nuanced conversations. Ideally, discussions of feasibility will include an evaluation of all relevant systems and the ways in which they could improve over animals, weighed against their limitations. I’d refer anyone who is interested in a more rigorous and technical evaluation to the Humbird report.
That said, for me the relevant question isn’t whether it’s strictly possible to make cultured meat competitive in the long run, but whether pursuing cultured meat as a strategy is the best/most cost effective use of money and talent. I think arguments of the style I made can be very helpful for quick comparative evaluations. For example, plant-based meat looks far more promising than cultured meat through this lens, because it is a fundamentally different approach that circumvents many of the limitations of mammalian and avian biology.
This is a good point. I don’t want anyone to write off cultured meat on the basis of my argument alone, but I do want to push us toward much more nuanced conversations. Ideally, discussions of feasibility will include an evaluation of all relevant systems and the ways in which they could improve over animals, weighed against their limitations. I’d refer anyone who is interested in a more rigorous and technical evaluation to the Humbird report.
That said, for me the relevant question isn’t whether it’s strictly possible to make cultured meat competitive in the long run, but whether pursuing cultured meat as a strategy is the best/most cost effective use of money and talent. I think arguments of the style I made can be very helpful for quick comparative evaluations. For example, plant-based meat looks far more promising than cultured meat through this lens, because it is a fundamentally different approach that circumvents many of the limitations of mammalian and avian biology.