We don’t know what we don’t know. And impossible doesn’t know why there would be side effects. Or they do and you’ll not know.
Buy grass fed organic meat and eat less of it. We already eat too much.
I can understand vegetarian cultures surviving, since they can acquire essential nutrients through the animal products found in diary, but would be intrigued to find a vegan (plant-based only) culture. Was there perhaps one in the distant past or ?
The Jain's diet is largely plant-based. It allows for dairy, but only in the case that the cows aren't hurt as part of the process.
Except for the fact that it is too expensive for most to afford, meaning only the upper class can eat the stuff and feel good about it; also it produces much more methane per pound of meat than the corn-fed and hormone-injected equivalent; and finally it requires MUCH more space -- space that could be used for more sustainable agriculture like soy farms or chicken factories.
Environmentally and economically it seems like America should be engineering it's meat. Ethically, this is a different story, especially with the torturing of animals that often accompanies this meat engineering process.
The reason that I personally stand behind the development of meat alternatives like the impossible, and cultured meat, is that these are attempts to continue increasing the environmental and economic viability of meat while simultneously eliminating the ethical issues completely.
Yes the alternative meat field is young and not effective right now, but that's no reason to abandon all hope that cheap sustainable meat-like sustenance is possible. Impossible should be lauded and encouraged to improve their product. Their very name is a clue that what they are trying to do is not easy, but I think if successful, it could pay off big for society.
We've been playing god with our food supply since forever (salting meats to preserve them [salt is bad for you! right?], agriculture, the list goes on...)
Eat meat or don’t (I do), but don’t kid yourself about some historical or dietary imperitive, and don’t ignore a couple of million years of our and our ancestors’ omnivorous history. It’s also unwise to argue from a historical precedent that has little or no relevance unless you’re cranking out kids in your teens, hunting and gathering, and dying young. We’ve spent a lot of time and energy removing ourselves from the demanding lives of our distant ancestors, and plenty of them ate mostly plants and thrived. Remember gladiators? https://archive.archaeology.org/0811/abstracts/gladiator.htm...
Yeah, eating meat is a choice we make, and only one some of us are lucky to be able to make. History is full of us eating meat, and full of us (especially the poor in all ages) eating mostly or exclusively grain, pulses, and vegetables with some diary I’d they were lucky.