In vitro meat seems to be not too far from being a feasible food product. Since it’s tissue grown in a lab and there are no animals involved. Would this product be acceptable to vegetarians and vegans?
Sign me up for the politically correct in vitro tortured baby cow spedini please. mmmmm in vitro meat.
woah i just thought of a creepier question too… would eating human tissue grown in vitro be considered cannibalism.
I sure hope not, as I really want to eat human flesh sometime, but I don’t want to have to do any of the things that obtaining such flesh would currently entail. 
TMI? Hmm maybe TMI.
Anyway even if it’s just synthocow in the vats of the future, that’d be sweet.
I’m a vegetarian, and I would never, ever, ever touch the stuff. It’s creepy. :eek:
But then, I’ve never once eaten meat in my entire life, so the whole idea seems weird to me anyway. Obviously I have no ethical objections to growing a steak in a lab, but it’s the aesthetics of eating flesh or simulated flesh that freaks me out.
Then again, sheer curiosity might drive me to try lab-grown human. 
So if it were a great source of vitamins and nutrients and you liked the taste and texture you wouldn’t have a problem eating it?
It’ll probably just end up tasting like soylent green.
As a certified grade A meat-eater, I have to admit that I would have the same reservations that Stealth Potato mentioned. 
Some responses:
If the cell cultures came from cells that originally came from an animal, it might not be considered vegetarian.
But, even if it were considered “vegetarian”, I think some (or a lot of, or few, or zero, etc) vegetarians would argue that - just like veggie burgers are symbolic of a desire to eat meat-like burgers - in-vitro meat may further the idea that people still have an inherent desire to eat meat, and in-vitro meat would only strengthen the omnivore stance. As such, a lot of vegetarians would reject eating in-vitro meat, as a means to express their vegetarian views.
I’m not sure I understand that stance… Why would anyone care if we are omnivores? Why is the desire to eat meat (or a meat-type substance) seen as a bad thing?
My bad, good catch. In that particular response, replace “vegetarian” with “hardline vegan” or “PETA”; basically any person or group that rejects the omnivore ideal.
Ethically I think it likely wouldn’t be a problem. But I wouldn’t eat it anyway. It gives me the creeps a little bit, and I enjoy not eating meat.
I’d definitely eat vast-grown meat. It can’t be any stranger than Spam. But I don’t have any particular interest in tasting synthetic human flesh.
I have my doubts that they will be able to replicate the texture of a great steak, but I’ll be will to try their best efforts. I love beef, but realize it’s the greatest percentage of my carbon footprint.
“It’s luncheon meat. We don’t know what animal, it was dark. All we know is it’s some kind of meat, and it should be eaten around noon.”
They need to come up with *pre-grilled * in vitro steaks, thus further reducing carbon emissions.
You must have meant vegan here as well? Dairy and eggs come from an animal, but they are considered vegetarian.
As a vegetarian I would find this “acceptable” but I don’t necessarily know if I would like it or eat it regularly. I definitely would give it a try though!
Could they just make whatever kind of meat they wanted from the animal cells? Because if they could, that means they could create bald eagle meat, spotted owl meat, panda meat, rhinoceros meat and other meats from endangered species without having to actually, you know, endanger the species.
I could finally try eagle and not have to feel like a goddamned anti-American Communist.
Logically, it would depend on why they don’t eat meat. If they just don’t like it, have health reasons against it, or have some ideological conviction against meat it’s unlikely to matter where it comes from. If they avoid meat due to moral objections about killing animals, on the other hand, why not ?
Yes and no. It’s human meat, but not from a human. So it’s cannibalism in a sense, but not in the sense that really matters.
My sister is a vegetarian, but she says it’s because she doesn’t want to eat anything with a butt. As long as they don’t make artificial rump roast, I guess she’d eat it.
-Eben
p.s. I don’t mind eating things with a butt, they taste good!
I’ve asked many a vegetarian friend and most of them give some variation of the “eww!” answer. I’ve also noted that, in my cohort at least, there’s a vast overlap between the “vegetarian” and “anti-GM / anti- chemicals / anti-laboratory food” circles on the Venn diagram. (The fact that many of them say this while chowing down on a lab grown Boca burger washed down with a shake from McDonald’s just makes me shake my head and walk away so I can log on here to talk with rational people.)
So someone opposed to “chemically engineered Frankenfood” is going to shy away from vat grown meat on those grounds, not necessarily the vegetarian grounds. The fact that they’re also a vegetarian just obscures the argument.
I’ve been a vegetarian for ethical–no kill–reasons for decades. I’d welcome in vitro meat being available because it would avoid the suffering of sentient creatures, especially with some farming practices I don’t agree with. (Please don’t go all off on that tangent; know all the arguments and “zingers”. For me it’'s a personal decision, and I never push that on other’s choices.)
I’m practical with the applications. It doesn’t squick me out. I would hope that it might go a long way toward solving hunger in the world; again, with less miserable conditions for animals. But, I’d really want to understand the process, and know that it was proven healthy for eating.
I probably wouldn’t eat it myself, as my diet serves me well, health wise and economically.
Modifying vegetables to be more meat-like seems like an easier course than growing meat in the lab. Like eggplants that will grow beef protein. Might have an even higher “ick” factor.
I don’t have any moral objection to killing and eating cute and fluffy animals. Cute and fluffy animals are delicious. I’m a vegetarian because of environmental concerns, and because the meat-packing industry is notorious for labor-law and worker’s rights violations (the latter is the biggie for me). So, if the cultivation of in-vitro meat would remove both of those concerns for me, I might eat it.
You’re going to get a full range of responses, since there are many types of vegetarians. Vegans will reject it, as it’s still an animal product. Organic/natural food enthusiasts will reject it. Aesthetic vegetarians will reject it. Vegetarians for health reasons will likely have a mixed reaction. Anti-bioengineered food veggies will hate it. But casual vegetarians and vegetarians who are just against animal cruelty might go for it.