I'm really not sure what you mean by "semantic nonsense" but you're ignoring the key issue here. Meat as people know it isn't just muscle cells, its a collection of various cells, compounds (nutrients, etc) and fatty acids. Your claim here is like suggesting a bike tire is equivalent to a bike because it has the same type of tires on it.
This isn't true, a conventional hamburger patty is just ground beef. I'm sure you can find ones with fillers, additives, etc but it would all have to be listed on the ingredients.
Except that cultured meat doesn't mimic the texture of whole chicken or whole beef. Its a mush like substance that can be formed in ways that can mimic processed meat products much in the same way you can do with plant-proteins.Lay Vegan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 08, 2018 5:44 pm Most start-ups are focusing on chicken or beef which have textures that are relatively easy to mimic in labs. You're "cellular mush" comment alludes to this. It's easier for researchers to produce ground beef than it is to produce chicken wings with bones and all.
Why would convincing them to eat some fortified, flavored, etc lab-created meat product be any easier? As I said earlier, to really address this issue you first have to understand why people are driven to eat meat in the first place. Is it purely taste? Is it merely a cultural preference? Is it about power and status?Lay Vegan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 08, 2018 5:44 pm If you can convince billions of staunch meat lovers to switch from meat to legumes, go for it! The more rational alternative would be to create a nearly identical product sans all of conventional meat's disadvantages. Plant-based proteins are getting close, as I mentioned earlier in the thread, but most of them do not taste enough like meat to convince non vegans to become vegan. These products exist largely for current vegetarians.
And its by no means just vegetarians that buy mock meats.
Also there is a dubious premise here, namely, the idea that people need alternatives that taste just like what they are currently eating. Why would that be the case?
And this is based on what exactly? The cost of meat is, in general, expensive compared to whole plant alternatives. Meats have to be cooked carefully so aren't very convenient. And taste is subjective and cultural. Its pretty obvious that there is more to the story than this but I don't pretend to have the answer, why people eat meat and how they think about it is an anthropological question that would have to be rigorously researched. I don't know of any work that has really done this, just various articles that address some topics (e.g., the book "Human diet - Its origins and evolution").
There are already alternatives to both that are cheaper, leather and silk clothing are largely purchased for status so the "real thing" would likely always be in demand.
For example look at the market for gems, many gems can be created synthetically but there is still a large market for the real thing. People prefer natural gems despite not being able to tell the difference. In fact the average person cannot even tell the difference between a diamond and cubic zirconia yet they are driven to pay dramatically more for diamonds.
I think its very relevant, you need expertise in a field to be able to meaningfully survey and understand the current research and findings. As such when I read books on areas that I don't have strong expertise in I want to make sure the person writing it has strong credentials in the area and doesn't have any obvious bias.