Spencer Yan

Scientific and Technical Writing

N. Reda

White Paper

The problem I chose to address was the subject of artificial meat, also known as synthetic

meat, in vitro meat or cultured meat. Artificial meat carries with it the promise of solution: as it

stands, it is cleaner (May, 2012), healthier (Wright, Kuglinski, 2008) and more environmentally

friendly (Tuomisto, Teixeira de Mattos, 2011) to produce than traditionally slaughtered meat, and

exists in nearly every way as not just a viable, but better alternative to the meat industry itself.

The problem, however, is with cost, and cultural context (Levine, 2008): where it stands

currently, artificial meat not only is more expensive to produce due to technological limitations

and limited consumer interest; but also carries with it a certain cultural stigma due to its

supposedly unnatural origins. What Im proposing is that attention should be focused on

generating and establishing public interest in artificial meat as a viable alternative, and

eventually replacement for slaughtered meat. By highlighting its advantages over traditional

meat preparation techniques and demonstrating its vast culinary potential, public interest and

support can be generated, which will in turn help fund the pursuit of relevant technologies which

can reduce the costs of producing the meat itself, making it more economically viable and

available through a positive feedback loop.

Previous attempts at addressing the issue of introducing artificial meat have mostly been

targeted at first, the meats status as a gustatory novelty, and second, the meats status as a

technological curiousity (Fountain, 2013). Both of these paradigms exist under the

presupposition that the meat itself is a novelty and an innovation rather than a solution; whats
being stressed is not the meats viability, but its strangeness, which inherently undermines any

attempts at assimilation within a larger cultural context. The first step that must be done is to

escape from these paradigms, and to convince people that artificial meat is neither strange, nor

abnormal; it must be naturalised as a concept before it can even be considered to be introduced

as a disruptive replacement on a mass-scale.

The most widely-used argument against artificial meat is the appeal to nature; or, in other

words, it was grown in a lab, therefore it must not be as healthy as something that was found in

nature. This is a fundamental misconception that stems from a widespread yet implicit distrust

of science as a practice; and it is the first, and most difficult obstacle which must be overcome in

convincing people that artificial meat is a viable alternative to slaughtered meat. The most

obvious and superficial solution to this would be to present people with statistics: production of

artificial meat produces 4% of greenhouse gas emissions compared to the 18% which traditional

cattle farming alone produces; it supports the genetic insertion of healthy elements such as

omega-3 fatty acids, and does not require artificial growth hormones; and so on (Tuomisto,

Teixeira de Mattos, 2011). However, statistics can only speak so much; people process the world

fundamentally through an emotional and instinctual level and thus all these statistics can only go

so far. Hence, in order to convince them, efforts must be made to target them on an emotional

level: the most effective way to do this would be to demonstrate that the meat itself is

comparable in taste and texture - the things which matter most to us when we eat, after all - to

traditional meat; and then introduce to them the statistical framework which supports it.
Works Cited

Fountain, H. (2013, May 12). Engineering the $325,000 In Vitro Burger - The New York Times.
Retrieved February 13, 2017.

Levine, K. (2008, May 20). Lab-Grown Meat a Reality, But Who Will Eat It? Retrieved February
13, 2017, from http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90235492

May, A. (., & August, R. In vitro meat: protein for twelve billion?: a thesis submitted in partial
fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science Communication, Centre of
Science Communication, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand (Unpublished doctoral
dissertation).

Tuomisto, H. L., & Mattos, M. J. (2011). Environmental Impacts of Cultured Meat Production.
Environmental Science & Technology,45(14), 6117-6123. doi:10.1021/es200130u

Wright, K., & Kruglinski, S. (n.d.). March 2017. Retrieved February 13, 2017, from
http://discovermagazine.com/2008/oct/22-ill-have-my-burger-petri-dish-bred