Hacker News Reader

Comment by skybrian | Hacker News Reader

Why "no doubt"? What's your basis for that?

I'm no expert, but I expect land is different in different places. There are different sources of feed. Someone changes a supplier or a farming practice, and it changes a number in a spreadsheet, and you'll get a different answer.

Accounting gets complicated enough with money. When you're doing science it's much more difficult.

This sounds like the sort of thing that scientists and economists can debate for decades. I'm certainly not going to trust some unsourced numbers in a press release.

View on HN

The burger is made primarily from Soy. Soy accounts for 2/3 of global protein feed. Humans eating directly from livestock's primary food source is likely to be much more efficient at a global scale.

Where did you get soy is the primary food source for cattle?

This article recommends no more than 20% soy in cattle’s diet. The article is from last year. [1]

>Researchers have found that when the oil content of the ration exceeds 7 percent, it can be toxic to the microbes in the cattle’s rumen and decrease digestibility. Too much oil in cattle rations will lead to scours (diarrhea), cessation of rumen fermentation and, eventually, death.

“Because of these limitations, the recommended upper limit of feeding would be about 20 percent of the ration,” Hoppe says. “Practical feeding levels are probably more like 2 to 3 pounds per head per day. At this low rate of supplementation, soybeans provide an excellent source of protein and energy.”

[1]https://www.drovers.com/article/soybeans-may-be-viable-cattl...

Interesting, this might be why soy is pressed for its oil before being used as cattle feed. The resulting patties are used as feed and the oil byproduct is sold.

I don’t think that’s the case.

It is not feasible for a farmer to buy feed during the lifetime of the animal. It’s the reason they have huge pastures for grazing during warm months. During winter they are usually fed hay.

All beef is grass fed period. Some are finished at the end with corn or other dense grains (your soy patties).

Here’s an article from a Meat Scientist.

https://meatscience.org/TheMeatWeEat/topics/raising-animals-...

> All beef is grass fed period. Some are finished at the end with corn or other dense grains (your soy patties).

Visit the Harrison Ranch (on I-5, south-east of SF), and see for yourself how they're treated.

I am not sure about california, but I can confirm that Texas beef is essentially all grass-fed. This is from observation and from speaking with ranchers I know. Grass-fed also has a better taste, in my opinion.

There is nowhere near enough grass to feed nearly all Texas cattle to marketable size in Texas. Nearly all commercial cattle are bred and born in Mexico from US genetic stock and transferred to the US for fattening with cattle feed because it is cheaper to breed in Mexico and feed in the US. Last I checked only about 3% of US beef was fully grass fed. So it's fully possible you know some grass fed ranchers, but it's unlikely that the second biggest export in Texas is possible without massive amounts of cattle feed. Grass fed beef tasting better is subjective but the costs associated with the process appear to dictate that to consumers it's something they are willing to pay for.

*mostly grass fed but with other supplemental feed.

Mad cow disease propagates from feeding cows the ground up bits of other infected cows.[0]

[0]https://www.fda.gov/animalveterinary/resourcesforyou/animalh...

There has been 6 cows infected with mad cow disease in the US[1] and only 4 cases in humans.[2]

[1]https://www.cdc.gov/prions/bse/bse-north-america.html

[2]https://www-m.cnn.com/2013/07/02/health/mad-cow-disease-fast...

Except when the feed is actually sheep.

It takes energy to process soya into an edible patty. It does for meat patties as well, so I am curious about the comparison (eg. a soy patty takes x Kw to make, a beef one takes y Kw).

Where I think meat has an advantage is that "we" don't need to use energy to make the patty taste good, the cow does that naturally using the feed. But a soy patty needs all sorts of things added to it and we need to use energy and water to actively process it into something edible.

If we were just eating the soya beans as we pulled them out of the ground, it would be far more sustainable. But beef tastes great right off the cow! Soya is quite bland.

You have to include all the energy that went into feeding the cow over the period of its life.

Except much beef is raised on grass. Some of that isn't even watered. This is effectively solar-based.

It's more efficient to ship grain than cattle, and most cattle still requires feed to get to market size. The whole mythos behind cattle drives was to get them to a location for slaughter and shipping. The same exact thing you said about cattle is the same as grains, except cows require more water external to the grass.Cows also require maintenance above what crops typically do as well. Ranchers are very good at what they do, however it's still a ton of work. Farming is slowly becoming significantly more automated, which is a good thing as less people are interested in becoming farmers.

Your parent is employed by Impossible Foods based on their post history.

This appears to be right. It’s a valid disclaimer to note in such a discussion.

Your right I probably should have disclosed that I previously worked there but it's fairly clear from my post history so I figured it didn't matter. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Now we have to go back and look at everyone’s post history in every thread?

Only if you want to argue about the person rather than about the points they are making.

> Soy accounts for 2/3 of global protein feed.

This may be the current case, but it doesn't, indeed shouldn't, be so. It just happens that in the US, CAFO's are the best (financially) way to raise beef cattle.

In any case, livestock's primary food source should never have been soy beans.

Soy contains phytoestrogens which certain populations (e.g. women pregnant with male fetuses) may be advised to reduce intake of or avoid. Something to keep in mind as meat replacements become more popular - that it may not be a one-size-fits-all solution.

I recently looked into the literature and I think the evidence is ambiguous [1] If you've found some clear evidence supporting your case, could you point me in the right direction?

[1]https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Shourong_Shi/publicatio...

Complete bogus, please abstain from spreading this misinformation. Unlike animal products which contain actual hormones active in humans plant products have an negligible effect and you would have to consume impossible amounts for the smallest of effects. Further, phytoestrogens actually benefit humans

  ...you would have to consume impossible amounts for the smallest of effects

  Further, phytoestrogens actually benefit humans

Maybe I'm not parsing things well, but these 2 statements seem contradictory.

From what I understand, the phytoestrogens take the place of real mammalian estrogen, but our bodies don't process it like real estrogen, so its actually good for men who want less estrogen. It acts almost like an estrogen blocker.

Whereas drinking cow's milk, for example, is high in estrogen because its from it comes from a large female after giving birth.

Not contradictory, but working to different ends.

"You shouldn't worry about this because phytoestrogens aren't present"

"You shouldn't worry about this because phytoestrogens are beneficial"

Both can be true at once, and support the end argument, it's just not particularly helpful or harmful if both are true at the same time.

I mean, that's true with meat, too.

The estrogen in beef is actual, mammalian estrogen. Which would you expect your body to interact most within digestion? Of course it’s going to be the stuff that’s closest to it.

The FUD being spread around soy is ridiculous.

Other nutrients that tend to be harder to find in plants than animals also tend to be more poorly absorbed than their animal counterparts. B12, iron, d, zinc, etc.

I would not expect a better reaction from actual, mammalian estrogen. It doesn't work that way with opioids: carfentanyl is a whole lot more powerful than dynorphins, enkephalins, endorphins, endomorphins and nociceptin.

Also, quantity matters. Plants might produce a lot more than mammals do.

In any case, the breast growth on males is no joke. That is just the affect on adults, who are far less susceptible than babies. However it works, soy is a serious hazard and should have the GRAS (generally recognized as safe) status removed.

It sounds like you didn't read the report or check the references on page 26.

I recommend reading this paper and coming to your own conclusion about "almost no doubt". Within sustainability science, there is little debate about the lack of efficiency to produce protein via cows.

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...

That's more impressive, and yet, as a non-expert, I still don't know how to evaluate whether the calculation is bug-free. Do you? I guess I'd have to track down all the references and build my own spreadsheet? There are some spreadsheets listed in the references, but it seems like a complicated task.

Just to nit-pick one little detail, it seems to treat all land the same: "Significant decreases in land occupation also follow from a shift away from animal-based foodstuffs. The VEG and VGN occupy 70% and 79% less land than the MUD, respectively (VEG = -63% and VGN = -74% for isocaloric diet comparison)."

But, prime farmland and grazing for grass-fed beef aren't the same, so adding them up and taking a percentage seems dubious. (I'm also skeptical of estimates with no margin of error.)

Given that no single scientific paper is definitive (you need to read the literature) I don't see how to come to a conclusion on any of this without a whole lot more work than I'm going to put into it for an online discussion.

Juse because "we can't be absolutely sure" doesn't mean the evidence doesn't point in a direction.

There doesn't seem to be ground to overwhelmingly doubt to evidence to the point where the conclusions are radically reversed.

It's a known cognitive bias (assuming you don't know what you're doing) or sophism (if you do).

See: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/GrDqnMjhqoxiqpQPw/the-proper...

While I don't have a basis for saying the most common take on things is wrong, the way I think of this is: what's the likelihood that we'll see a new study that proves the opposite of what most non-experts (or even experts) currently believe?

In the case of nutrition, economics, and ecology, my rough answer is "rather high". (Consider Piketty and spreadsheet errors.) And answering this question combines all of them. If being right matters, I'd hedge my bets.

Most people aren't heavily invested in Impossible Foods, so bet-hedging basically means letting them do their thing and seeing how it turns out. I look forward to trying their new product.

I'm just quibbling with "no doubt". Just like being an expert in most subjects is unnecessary, being doubt-free is unnecessary for most people in most subjects, and I think most conversations would go better if the true believers (and radical cynics) backed off a bit and acknowledged uncertainty.

While I take your point that there is always some uncertainty involved sometimes it is just not that productive to reinforce doubt... otherwise we would never move forward.

Look at climate change... are we 100% certain? Of course not but there is overwhelming evidence that is just prudent to act even for the faint possibility of being wrong.

Same here... logic (how could be creating a living thing to slaughter it and eat it be more effecient than processing and eating the feed itself? That would mean raising an animal with all its (unnecessary) complexity was more efficient than our focused industrial processes...) and evidence (e.g., scientific studies and calculations) very much point to the direction that production of meat alternatives would be much more environmentally friendly (at scale).

I don’t think this is so much about “true believers” but there is simply a lot of evidence pointing in the direction that this is really something that could improve the world in many dimensions.

But you are certainly right that like any other pursuit this should be done dillegiently and with care. If you have specific criticism of some evidence that should be discussed... However, there is no need to be overly sceptic and lay bricks on the road if there is no credible evidence pointing in that direction (In this case baseline skepticism doesn’t seem to hold up against the available evidence at this point). Change will be difficult and reinforcing doubt might delay the development and roll out of viable products at high costs to environment and animals.

Until we stop wasting farmland growing crops for cows their is zero difference between crop land and farm land.

Scrub land filled with cows is obviously terrible for the environment, but so is the wasteland traditional farming creates. We call it insecticide but it really kills off entire ecosystems. Minimizing impact means minimizing the land we use.

The original comment wrote off the report as "some unsourced numbers in a press release" - I aimed to show it was more than that. Impossible has quite the academic rigor.

Agreed - there's plenty of room to interpret the specific numbers.

Sure it's less efficient when compared to high protein crops, but there are vaste acres of land that can't be farmed and can only sustain grazing animals (and then some of those are more feed efficient than others, say, cows vs sheep)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com