For those vegetarians/vegans who refuse to eat meat out of moral conviction, would you start eating meat if it came from a replicator?
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I look at it this way: if my eating the meat will in any way create conditions that might lead to more animals being slaughtered, I don’t want anything to do with it.
If I eat a conventional piece of meat, then chances are I’m contributing to market demand in some way, directly or indirectly. The market will respond by increasing supply which, in the meat business, means that more animals will be raised for slaughter.
According to the article you tried to link to, the “replicator” in question can’t produce a living being, so there’s no question of it making, say, a cow that would then be slaughtered. But it could create a steak from another steak. If I eat that replicated steak, I haven’t created a supply void that the market would then try to fill by slaughtering another animal. If anything, I’ve demonstrated that there’s a demand for meat that doesn’t involve slaughter, and encouraged suppliers to divert resources away from conventional butchery.
I don’t actually miss eating meat, so it’s not as if this would be some dream come true. But yeah, I’d consider eating it.
Probably, as long as it was just creating say a rib roast, and it wasn’t creating a living sentient being, capable of suffering, and it was 100% safe to eat, then probably yeah.
(just so you know, @Kardamom , nothing is 100% safe to eat.)
I don’t eat that much meat, but not because of moral reasons. Although, if replicators were available, I would rather eat replicated meat than cause an animal to die for my taste buds.
I would lurve some velociraptor meat.
Dutch scientists have already built a meat “replicator”. Artificial hamburgers will be available in September this year.
Oh, okay. That sounds plausible. But it also sounds expensive.
The first computers were expensive too ;-)
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