Would you eat bugs?
Also do you think that new players will emerge in the market, or will all these startups get bought by Cargill and the like?
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Nah.
I would eat lab grown meat and that sort of thing, especially if it tastes the same or better, and I've had some vegan/vegetarian meat alternatives that taste pretty legit, although definitely not the same, but I'm not about eating bugs for protein.
Shit I'd probably go full vegetarian before I resorted to eating bugs.
Why wouldn’t you eat bugs? They’re not bad lol. I’ve had some crickets before and the kinda taste like cheezits. Bug eating is the future man.
Because it is disgusting
Edit: Y'all weird as fuck for throwing shit at this
lab grown meat
Yes?
Not a fan of of "vegan" meat like Beyond meat / impossible meat. It's basically just textured soy protein (which has been a filler in cheap processed foods for a long time) with some spices and fancy marketing. It tastes worse and costs more than regular meat.
Lab grown meat on the other hand actually sounds interesting. If they can figure out how grow actual animal meat cells I'd totally eat that, the only questions is if the cost will drop to something reasonable. Imo that's more interesting than this vegan fake meat stuff which is really just a gimmick at best.
They have. Multiple animals.
Impossible tastes pretty damn close to the real thing in my opinion but lab grown meat is definitely the future. Why would I eat bugs instead?
It's really the only way we can consume animal protein if we colonize the solar system. It's also probably the only way we can reasonably feed a huge population on Earth. I would definitely eat lab grown meat. I'd even do crickets if it were refined into a powder or, ya know, the protein in a candy bar; that makes sense to me. I definitely wouldn't eat insects straight up.
Thats gonna be a no from me dawg
if you've ever eaten shrimp, crab, or lobster, you've eaten bugs (they're arthropods just like scorpions, centipedes, etc.)
if you've eaten scallops, oysters, clams, squid, octopus, or mussels, you've eaten bugs (they're mollusks, just like slugs and snails)
terrestrial insects gross us out because they're in the dirt, not because they're actually gross. I'd be willing to bet that any arhropod with enough meat to rival shrimp would taste pretty good in thai fried rice, but then again you could sneak in a shoelace and poker chips into khao pad and I'd probably eat it.
Ya boy is allergic to shellfish
Some of these 'bugs' have to be fed pineapple or good tasting foods before eating as they have been eating shit and you don't want to eat that shit.
Aren't they supposed to be super nutritious and potentially solve bunch of food shortage issues in case we fuck up the Earth so much?
On one hand, I don't like bugs so I'm only inclined to try if they're prepared in some fancy restaurant or ground up to paste so I don't see it.
On the other hand, I already love eating shellfish while people from landlocked countries pretty much think shellfish are sea bugs. What that tells me is that whatever food is perceived as "disgusting" is just culturally relative (given that it's safe). So if I'm feeling it, I'd like to break through my prejudice and give it a shot.
Good news is that I heard that tarantulas taste like peanut butter.
I'm not anti-bug, I'm curious since I know you're educated Milton. have any ecologists looked at the potential downsides of using insects as a food source for humans - like what that would do to the food chain, plant life, and so forth? I mean we're not eating mosquitos, bollwevils, or other invasive species, it'd be crickets, grasshoppers, ants, and so forth that I believe have some ecological importance, no?
Hmm... I'm not exactly sure about the ecology of bug farming but what I know is that it has the following advantages.
1) Insect farming is greener than most livestock farming. Supposedly chickens are one of the least resource intensive animals to raise. But most insects take even less water and emit much much less carbon. (75% less carbon emission and 50% less water usage than pultry farming)
2) Apparently crickets and mealworms don't really feel pain? There are other schools of thought when it comes to ethics of eating other creatures though. For example, supposedly certain plants and mushrooms are actually much more intelligent than livestock because plant and fungi colonies can build large distributed models of the weather and can collectively adjust how they grow over long periods of time.
3) Livestock becomes very expensive when you want your animals to live in stress free environments eating all natural grass (which definitely makes it healthier and more ethical). But most insects are free from this issue because they can live under many different conditions and their nutritional profiles won't change much.
Now point 3 night not be true though.
thanks for your thoughts. point 2 is one I always struggle with and that I commented about in the "how can you justify eating meat" thread from 2 years ago. this is philosophical, so I may not fully convey what I'm trying to here, work with me.
I bristle at the notion that we can understand pain for any organism outside of our particular branch of the animal kingdom. how do we "know" that certain animals don't feel pain? we assume that we know because of their CNS, lack thereof, or that they don't have the same pain response that mammals or other vertebrates have, but that's because we're looking at it through that lens, rather than asking the broader question of "what is pain?" and I have to believe that pain is different things for different organisms
the argument comes from a good place, because people want to maximize nutrition while minimizing suffering, and I think that's noble, I just question the premise that removing suffering is even a noble cause. (rhetorical questions) how do you define suffering? by the quantity of lives you take? by the method with which you take a life? I'm of the opinion that given the fact it's impossible to take zero lives (even if you don't eat anything, you take your life), so rather than avoiding suffering for our own nutrition, we should attempt to minimize the impact. I'm not here to try and convince you that it's more ethical to eat one cow or elk for 3 months rather than kill tens of thousands of crickets and grasshoppers, but that's where this argument is going, I'm just suggesting that we think more broadly about our food choices rather than automatically demonizing beef, pork, and poultry.
your point about fungi and plants being intelligent is another good one. what's more ethical? killing a dumbass bird or disrupting an intelligent complex ecosystem, whether thats ants, fungus, or something else? impossible to answer but I do believe it's not as simple as just saying "don't eat meat, it's not ethical"
on your point #1, have you looked into regenerative farming? done the right way (and admittedly the meat is more expensive), livestock farms can be net carbon sinks. this brings me back to the broader question of why are we arguing about specific types of meat if the entire ag system is broken? again, not a question you & I can answer via WSO, but I say that so others will hopefully realize that this argument is more complex than simply meat/veg/vegan.
always appreciate your thoughts Milton
For the pain argument you're right that it's difficult to define what it is.
There's a philosophical element to it like the "suffering" part you mentioned. This one I don't really buy. And I honestly think it's a BS sanctimonious reason for not eating meat. Whenever a lion hunt its prey, the prey freaking knows! Imagine all the suffering and fear the prey has to go through until the lion bites makes the kill. Anyone who watched nature documentary knows that a fairly long chase is involved.
Also some animals won't even kill the prey first but start eating the animal while it's alive. If nature does it, why is it wrong when humans do it?
Then there's a more scientific aspect to pain and how release of certain chemicals might make the meat unhealthier or less tastier. This perspective makes a lot of sense and is the driving factor behind free range poultry farms, grass fed beef farms, and what not.
On the intelligence part, I have no problems. All creatures have some form of intelligence and the matter of how complex that intelligence is just too much to consider when picking food.
Whenever I pick food sources I only really care about 2 things - Is it healthy for me & is it sustainable? I would like to care about labor practices too but that's also a very complex issue so I try not to over-complicated things (ie. People criticize overseas manufacturing and unfair labor practices but the reality is while those jobs have terrible conditions, for the people working those jobs other choices are objectively worse. So boycotting such products might actually end up disadvantaging them even more.)
I have absolutely no idea how regenerative farming works but that sounds like the future. Thanks for the introduction! I suppose that through combination of visionaries, market forces, and risk-taking capital behind regenerative farming might actually become cheaper than whatever non-sustainable version we have. Renewable energy is already cheaper than fossil fuel energybin some cases so why shouldn't the same thing happen for sustainable food?
Glad to talk to you as well.
These are interesting points. I'm not sure I agree with the nature argument. Non-human animals don't have moral agency like we do to tell right from wrong in the same capacity and they also eat for survival (i.e. a lion eats meat because they need to in order to thrive and be healthy, whereas humans don't). Also, we don't use the actions of animals in the wild to justify any of our other actions so why do so here?
I also don't believe plants have the capacity to suffer or feel pain in any of the same ways humans, pigs, cows, dogs, chickens, etc. do and even if we cared about plants suffering, it takes roughly 100 calories of crops to get 3 calories of beef (the number varies by animal product but this is a rough estimate), so we're using far more plants to product animal products.
I will admit I'm not fully vegan but it's something I have given a lot of thought to recently and I am striving for (primarily for ethical but also partly environmental reasons). Lab-meat is certainly the future in my opinion
Definitely good points on the pain and animals hunting for survival.
But I'd like to caution against thinking "meat =environmentally unfriendly" and "plants=environmentally friendly". Apparently that's a myth spread by vegan and vegetarian propaganda.
Many plant based food sources are very high in carbon foot print (he. chocolate) while many more actually devastate the surrounding environment, ruin the soil, or decimate local ecosystems. Palm oil is particularly terrible because much of it is produced in farm lands created by burning down rainforest in South East Asia. Same is true for soy in Latin America. Also apparently almond farming, way it's done in California, take up so much water that it takes away from the soil and damage the local plant population and animals that depend on those plants.
Of course that doesn't mean that all the plant foods I mentioned come from environmentally unfriendly sources. The same goes for meat.
I think you have to research into who the growers, logistics, and processing people are and whether their practice is green or not. You might be buying the same food product but they might have drastically different environmental impacts.
In that regard, transparency requirements are one regulation I support when it comes to food.
I'm curious about the ethical side of your argument. and so you know my bias going in, I do not agree with the premise but I don't know what I don't know. also, it's possible we'll just entrench ourselves so I'm not out to change your mind, just have a discussion.
the first part of your argument about suffering/pain is that you don't believe plants have the capacity to suffer or feel pain in any of the same ways as the placental mammals you list do. I ask you this - what definition of suffering do you have? how do you "know" that plants do not experience suffering or that there are other forms of suffering that humans cannot fathom? further, when crops are grown and harvested, is suffering not occurring through pesticides (even organic uses pesticides) killing insects and farm equipment killing all sorts of things (insects, rodents, maybe birds, etc.)? part of my issue with the ethical side of veganism is that often times (not saying this is you) they place the feelings of a cow or a pig above that of a rodent, fish, or insect, and I don't think that we understand enough about animal consciousness to be able to accurately make this argument nor do I think we can ethically say one life is more valuable than another purely based upon species (this has tinges of racism embedded within). another question I have is about volume of death. say I feast on one chicken for 4 days and in the interim I could have eaten vegan meals for that same time period, how many insects got run over by farm equipment for all of those salads? say it's only 10. what's worse - taking one life to satiate me or taking 10?
the second part of your argument I don't fully understand. are you saying that because we already use more plants than animals that it's a moot point? that it's more ethical? if you could please expand on that point I think I'd understand your perspective better.
and lest I sound too aggro here, I realize that all people who are thoughtful of their diet be they vegan or whatever are trying to simply improve their health and have a clear conscience so I applaud you for being mindful, I just think we have a difference of opinion.
Those are fair points and no worries about sounding aggressive lol - just having a discussion like you said.
My understanding of the science is that yes, plants can sense things in their surroundings but they don't have the capacity pain receptors/nociceptors that humans and other non-human animals do to actually turn any of those senses into actual pain. They also don't have a system for pain processing, a brain, or neurons. Science is always evolving and I will admit that I'm not expert on this. This is just my understanding.
The pesticide, insect, and small animal point is a totally fair one though and I partially agree. I'm sure we can both acknowledge that our existence alone will inevitably cause harm on some outside party at some point. That's inevitable. The question is how can we minimize it as much as possible. This is where the second part of the argument comes in. When you consume animal products such as beef, the process is more complicated than just raising and killing an animal. Tons of crops (corn, soy, etc.) has to be produced to feed those cows for months or years so that people can in turn eat them. That is why something like beef will require the production of roughly 100 calories of crops to get just 3 calories of beef. Now imagine if you just ate those crops directly. So my point is that if you're eating those 100 calories directly, you could feed significantly more people with far less land, water, pesticides, unintentional deaths of small animals and insects, etc. Animal agriculture from my understanding is also one of the biggest causes of land clearing.
Hope this helps and interested in hearing what you think
I think that second paragraph is that we'll have to agree to disagree. I agree that plants and other non human animals don't sense pain the same way that humans do, I'm just unwilling to believe that because of that, they don't feel pain at all. and regarding a brian/neurons/intelligence, I'd argue that many plant/fungi systems as well as insect colonies have far higher intelligence than some animals we eat which have central nervous systems.
on your last paragraph, this is why I believe that sourcing is the answer, not banishment of meat. I believe that the total amount of suffering from an animal that's lived on a regenerative farm is less than factory farmed meat and likely less than factory farmed vegan stuff. your argument is factual, however the studies do not discern between meat sourcing, and there's a huge difference there.
for the record, I'm not saying all meat is good, because it's not. sustainably sourced meat, however, can be more beneficial for the environment and the ecosystem as a whole, which is why I advocate for a nuanced relationship with meat. there are huge problems with the meat industry in this country, but the answer isn't simply "don't eat meat" it's "we need to change the way we harvest meat" and it'd most likely lead to lower per capita consumption, the end of hamburgers and hot dogs, higher prices, better quality and a better environment.
I had some cricket protein bars. They were ok. Would eat again
Yeah I saw the guy on shark tank with this product.
Do crickets have a particular taste?
If you are it without knowing what it was initially, would you be able to figure it out?
I knew what it was. My wife brought some home thinking correctly I'd be mildly curious. They were like blueberry and vanilla flavored so that's mostly what I tasted. I'd say it's even more neutral than like whey protein though. I think isolated, it would taste like super dry beef jerky.
When I lived in the Middle East for a bit, I had a friend from Pakistan I want to say that brought them to school once and I remember them being ok. Grasshopper tacos are the shit though, definitely recommend.
Only if I get paid.
For food, lab meat is the future, probably gonna be higher margin than present day meat (once it's manufactured in factories) and actually tastes like meat unlike those veggie substitutes.
As long as they taste good, sure.
I'll eat almost anything if it is fried.
yeah def - okra is best fried
Just wait until you start getting called racist for not eating bugs. You’ll eat them, and you’ll love them.
I have eaten crickets at a nice restaurant in Chicago and it tasted like crunchy air with legs. not gross, but not memorable. only remember it because it was a bug.
I am NOT a fan of alternative meats, fake meats, lab grown meats, etc. I think the answer is rethinking agriculture in total and moving towards regenerative farming, eating zero fast food, and so on. to preempt the ensuing arguments about the environment/ethics, we had a nice discussion on this here, my first comment: https://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/how-can-you-justify-eating-meat#…
Had toasted grasshoppers at a baseball game a couple years back and they weren't too bad at all
Yes, eat the bug burger goy.
I'm not eating the bugs nor living in the pod libtard
Will put that non-dairy milk (oat or coconut only) in my protein tho
Oat milk is for betas and women only. Same with soy shakes. I personally stick to whole milk or maybe almond milk. Less processed = better
What if you're lactose like ya boy? Almond milk tastes like ass IMO
You will eat ze bugs. You will take ze drugs. You will live in ze pod. You will wear ze mask.
You will own nothing and you will be happy.
Username checks out
No. I'd rather start a war with anyone who tries to force me to.
Why do far lefties/deep establishment want to push eating bugs and fake meat? I've done both to try. Bugs can range from decent snacks to really shitty. All fake meat I've tried is shit. And I hate the idea of eating "lab grown meat." Sounds too sus for me. I've taken to a paleo inspired diet recently, I figured the less processed/fake a food is, the better it probably is for you.
Fuck this weird globalist agenda of "eat bugs, live in pods, don't own anything, and don't ask questions." The establishment and far left are on some weird stuff rn.
serious question - what is meant by "live in pods?" do you mean actual pods like that show tiny houses?
I'm not sure about bugs, but I really don't think the issue of consuming animal products is a left vs. right thing. I have both conservative and liberal friends who are vegan/vegetarian. It's true, avoiding processed foods is definitely a plus but I think there's a reason that there is a good scientific consensus that the healthiest diets are whole-food plant-based (basically vegan but minimizing processed foods) and mediterranean (which is primarily plant-based with some fish).
I can pull studies showing carnivore diets are best too. I think almost any diet can be proven to be successful with a few basic criteria (low processed foods, lower sugar). And the left vs right thing is mostly establishment/elites vs the typical person. Of course the elites want to tell us that we'll be happy living in pods and renting everything from them while we eat bugs and synthetic meat. They want that power. I say left because i think the majority of this establishment is comprised of those who push liberal ideologies, not because they believe them, but because they tend to rest to giving control to more powerful people
Google ''typical xxx food'':
Spanish: Jamon
Italy: cotoletta, braciole, cotechino, prosciutto, scaloppe, salsiccia
Grece: grilled meat and moussaka
Turkish: kebab, kofte
Lebanese: kibbeh,kafta, kanafeh
Israeli: kachapuri, shakshuka, shawarma
Egyptian: kebab, kofta, shawarma, pigeon
Algerian/Moroccan: cous cous with meat stew, kefta
You should received a life-long ban from the Mediterraean for your claim and I'm not even touching the laughable vegan supremacy combined with ''studies show'' nonsense. It's outright ridiculous. The healthiest diets are the ones of top athletes. Those are high protein. Athletes who choose a vegan lifestyle take supplements to compensate.
''Who radicalized you?''
I don't get being against lab grown meat. It's literal, real, actual meat. You just don't need to feed and water a large animal nor do you need to kill it.
Is it the name? Lab grown meat obviously requires a re-branding, but getting passed that, I don't see the objection. I'm a conservative Republican and I don't love the idea that humans kill something like 56 billion animals each year for food.
Fascinating proposition. When I was in my gifted program in elementary school, we took a field trip to a science museum - it was an extremely fun experience. In the gift shop, they sold candy apple covered crickets. Several of my peers opted to purchase and consume this protein packed sweet snack, but I could not fathom why they would choose to embark on such a crazy endeavor. So, to answer your question... no. I would not assuming a normal operating environment.
“Bugs are the food of the future.”
I would legislate so that anyone attending or member of the WEF and corporate media are obligated to eat bugs instead of meat. If they are caught eating meat, they get their tongue chopped off.
Skin in the game or die.
SA recruiting must be getting intense this year...
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