I’m all for steak-oid, myself.
I figure, why go to the trouble of trying to find just the right cut of meat for a good steak, when they can clone it up and give me a filet the size of a hubcap, if that’s what I want.
That would certainly be a new twist on Beefsteak tomatoes. 
Really?
I would try it. I’ve thought about this since the early Star Trek series. It would be great if we could grow meat that was uniform in texture and fat content.
I’m curious why several people are ruling out vegans as possible eaters of this meat. Like vegetarians, there are a variety of reasons why people choose a vegan path, and some of those reasons would no longer be an issue. No animals would be mistreated (once they’ve finally nailed the “starter”, no animals would necessarily be involved at all, mistreated or otherwise). No more vast tracts of land usage by corporate ranches. Basically, environmental and animal-rights reasons would be out the door. Heck, I’d bet that even the ones who wouldn’t partake would be tickled that those of us who like a good hunk of the red stuff would no longer be indirectly responsible for all of the things they object to about the current process.
Many vegans don’t want any use of an animal-- regardless of whether the animal is harmed or not-- in their products at any point in the development chain. (I’ve seen this extended even to the use of manure on crops, mind you, so an ethical conclusion one vegan might find extreme, another vegan would whole-heartedly follow.)
As you point out, the initial “seed” for test-tube meat must necessarily be an animal. This would be enough to keep some vegans from using such meats. I do wonder how many of them would try test-tube human-sourced meat; for many vegans concerned about animal rights, the ethical problem arises from the lack of will on the part of the animals-- they cannot choose to be used by humans. If a human being willingly, happily even, donated a tissue sample to be used as seed material for manufactured meat, it wouldn’t violate that ethical principle.
As for me, an “aesthetic vegetarian” (thanks for the handy term, jackdavinci!), I wouldn’t eat any of it. I just don’t like the texture or taste of meat, so its source is unimportant.
Technically true, although I suppose since we’re still talking about future tech, it could be argued that the source material can be obtained and cloned from shed skin flakes or something - not requiring the animal to even be touched.
I (as an aesthetic omnivore) wouldn’t be too keen to eat it either.
I agree that some (many even) would still have a problem with it. I was just pointing out that vegans, like vegetarians, arrive at their position for various reasons, not all of which would be showstoppers with this process. Some in the thread seemed to think all vegans would automatically not eat this meat, and I disagree.
For the vegetarians who are icked out by this, what’s your opinion on quorn? Both seem to be quite artificial foods specifically bioengineered to taste like meat. Apart from quorn already being prevelant and therefore, less strange, I don’t see too much of a leap to go to in vitro meat.
For this, and DMC’s post, as a long term vegetarian, for personal ethical issues, It bears some good thought. (As was my original decision to be a vegetarian, decades ago). I do eat Quorn, but it’s really an expensive treat, mostly used in stir fries, for the past couple of years. Not at all a mainstay of my diet. As said before, I am practical with it, and want to avoid suffering of animals.
So, bioengineered meat holds promise in avoiding that, and I’m very open to it for commerce. I’d like to know that the product was safe and fit to eat, simple as that. So, proper research protocol done before introduced to the market, I think it a better alternative. I do want all that research to be done with a new, important foodstuff though, very thoroughly.
News Flash: PETA offers $1 million to the first person to produce commercially viable meat-in-a-test-tube, despite saying that doing so is causing a “civil war” within the organization.
As an ex-vegetarian who scarfs down the meat now and feels a bit guilty every time, I’m wholeheartedly behind PETA on this one.
Daniel
I wonder about what sort of resources this meat would require. Would it be radically more efficient than just raising animals? I can see that it would be all meat, so you wouldn’t waster energy creating the other parts of the animal. Beyond that, are there any large advantages?
If there was a more efficient way to make meat, and the cost was reasonable, that would be a great thing. It could lower carbon emissions, free up farmland, and improve the nutrition of the poor.
I think that the pollution would probably be a lot less. For one thing, a fair amount of animal tissue is, if not wasted, not highly desirable: it’s the muscle that we are seeking through animal husbandry, not the bone, blood, lungs, etc. Those might get used, but only because we already have them. If the energy put into their production could instead be put into the production of more muscle, I think that’d be far preferred.
In addition to the potential environmental benefits (and I say this from North Carolina, a state that’s had some pretty serious problems with pollution from hog farms), there are the humane benefits. I eat meat, but I recognize that there’s a fair amount of suffering that goes into its production, and I’d be thrilled if there were a way to continue eating meat while eliminating that suffering.
Daniel
I’m really excited about test tube meat. We just need to engineer it to excrete salt and sugar and grow in rectangular prisms, thus creating instantaneous SPAM. I’m actually going to go and make some Korean fried rice with SPAM and kimchee, unfortunately, I’m so cheap, that I’ve bought some PREM at the dollar store, which I think stands for PRepared Entrails and Meat.