Are food replicators possible?
Like those machines that make the food food for the star fleet crews in the Star Trek spin offs.
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24 Answers
With the rise of the 3-D printer, I don’t think that they can be far behind.
I’m still waiting. It would be nice to get unlimited food.
Just like 3D printers . . . if you don’t mind your food being made out of coils of wax or plastic.
Even in Star Trek (TOS anyway), the replicator food wasn’t the best. But there are some foods that can be made from powders and water and artificial flavors.
So ya, I think it depends on how high your culinary standards are.
Probably no crawdads, huh.
We have nanotubes. There are 118 known atoms. I guess you could rebuild haggis one atom at a time.
The potential of science is nigh infinite.
If it were possible, it would solve an awful lot of the world’s hunger problems… and cause an unprecedented human population rate increase.
We have them now. They’re called fast food restaurants.
Eventually we will have them. It’s possible, just not yet.
Probably about as possible as turning lead into gold.
Possible and probable.
Such an item would mean a tremendous paradigm shift for western civilization. Decreased need for food production, manufacturing, transport, distribution, no more need for all the packaging that goes into the movement and sale of food and food stuff, less need of paper and cardboard for the packages means less need for the harvesting of trees, fewer plastics and polys mean less need for petroleum products, fewer trucks and trains to move goods, fewer parts for said vehicles, fewer grocery stores mean less construction, not to mention all the materials needed for the construction, virtual elimination of the fast food industry and the materials, equipment, transportation that make it possible. Decreased need for huge storage warehouses, all of which means fewer jobs for an increasing population. Society will have to come to grips with the fact that many people will not be able to be employed even if they wanted to work.
Of course fewer or no work hours mean an increase in recreational time, activities, supplies and equipment so maybe they could find work there.
Yup, food out of thin air. Sounds really great doesn’t it? A perfect utopian, post-scarcity fantasy. And at what cost do you think it would come at? Even if such a thing were possible what do you imagine the energy costs would be? I cannot imagine anything less than several orders of magnitude more than the energy costs of normal food production now.
I’m sure we’ll have food replicators as edible 3-D printers soon. How long it will take them to go from novelty to actual “food” (if ever), is anybody’s guess.
I imagine it will be a lot like microwaves. When microwaves were new, 1,000s of cookbooks and recipes came out and it seemed like there was nothing, food wise, that you couldn’t do in a microwave. Wellll….that’s sorta true. The quality might be crap and it may take longer than conventional methods, but you _can cook nearly anything in the microwave. Like water.
Microwaves are invaluable for heating and re-heating food. I imagine that basic food replicators will find a similar niche.
They could probably start with nachos, then move on from there.
I hope so! I would really look forward to this.
I’ve always wondered why they don’t make a senior feed for seniors. haha
We have puppy and kitten formulas, senior formulas for pets and we feed Equine senior to one of our horses here, so why not a ‘Hominid senior” formula. It could be in a soft pelleted form like Equine senior, chock full o’ things for lameness like glucosimine and MSM for the old gray mares that ain’t what they used to be. One scoop in your feed bucket morning and night. lol
@ARE_you_kidding_me
You seriously don’t think the reshaping of matter would have a huge energy cost?
@Coloma
I think they call it ‘Ensure’ (along with other competing brands). Granted, it’s not in a pellet form, but a shake is probably more enjoyable anyway.
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