It reminds me a science from the Matrix, when a guard asks "Would you please remove any metallic items you are carrying: keys, loose change..." just instead of weapons - shrooms.
> But first, the team will need to make the leather stronger and determine how to control the chlamydospores’ growth. Otherwise, he says, someone could “walk out in the rain, and then all of a sudden find that [their] jacket is growing, or perhaps [has] mushrooms popping out of it
Well that's not where I expected the zombie apocalypse to come from, but I'll take it!
Imagine accidentally including a fragment of these products in the wash or hanging a belt in a closet without humidity control and coming back to a solid mass of mycelium.
I've worked on enough old houses to have seen my share of basement surprises like shipping crates packed with straw, stacks of newspapers and magazines, and sometimes entire walls being consumed by hearty fungus.
Valid point, while I have no idea how the numbers look. But butchering cows, or other animals that provide hide for leather, and then not using said leather is kind of opposite of sustainability.
Now one can argue about whether meat based diets are good or not, but as long as they exist there will be aources for leather.
There is also the argument that anything we do to provide additional revenue for the cattle industry is an indirect subsidy for beef. If nobody bought leather, beef would have to be more expensive, which might reduce beef consumption and therefore the footprint of the cattle industry. I don't know enough about the markets involved to say how realistic this is, but it is an argument I've seen.
You could also say the opposite: If nobody bought beef, leather would become much much more expensive, so therefore beef is an indirect subsidy to the leather industry. I've never seen this argument made anywhere though.
I've had paragraph 1's thought myself. But yes, if lab-grown beef takes off then paragraph 2 applies too, and then leather becomes more difficult to justify. Does not detract from its utility though.
I hadn't thought of this before, but maybe lab-grown leather is actually a better use of industrially-cultured animal tissue? Seems like, as a durable material, it would be worth more investment (equipment, labor) per unit (mass, volume) of end product. Presumably it's harder to grow cultured leather than just to grow some goop that can be processed into something like hamburger meat though.
Yeah I would imagine so. Meat/muscle seems relatively undifferentiated compared to hide/skin, which has layers and would need gradients to form properly.
Those who eat cow won't oppose leather, so I don't see why there would be more unused disposed cow skin than prior. But on the question of what else could be done with it, I'm not sure. Are people more often opting for plastic/synthetic products owing to cost? There are lots of aesthetic and apparel applications for leather.
>I don't see why there would be more unused disposed cow skin than prior
If the "vegan" product suddenly attains a real value other than "being vegan", for instance self repair, it may decrease the demand for regular old leather.
There is a slowly growing awareness in the public that eating meat is unnecessary for good health, perhaps even a negative. The strain on the environment for meat farming and transportation is massive so I am all for having plant-based options which fulfill and satisfy any need for animal products. If mushroom or plant leather turns out to be better, like cheaper or more durable etc., then there will be much less demand for traditional leather and the price for milk and beef will increase and make alternatives all the more attractive.
I’m a vegan and this sort of stuff is a total win.
And even still being opposed to products made from humans who die naturally is an emotional one not a logical one. I feel like people assume that human leather would look like human skin stitched together but would actually just look like every other leather. Google "leather before tanning" and it's just as creepy.
This is probably not true, vegan meat is progressing very fast (and once it matures has the potential to be much cheaper) and lowering the consumption of meat is important to reduce carbon emissions. I expect that demand for meat will sharply shrink in the next century
tl;dr: Reducing meat consumption should not rely on meat substitutes, it's a losing game. It's much better to explore alternative vegan dishes than to expect plant-based or lab-grown products to replace something that the average westerner consumes almost every day.
I have reduced my meat and dairy consumption by well over 90% and I'd say that vegan meat substitutes are the worst option for people looking to reduce (or eliminate) meat consumption long term in terms of taste, texture, nutrition, climate impact (due to food processing) etc.
At best, you get a 'passable' substitute when you could be having a delicious and nutritious meal instead. You wont ever get the taste and texture of a prime cut, cooked chicken skin, bacon or anything of the sort – so why bother? There are countless great vegan dishes that leave you fully satiated and won't bore you like textured plant proteins (TPP) would if you ate them every other day.
Drastically reducing meat consumption required a change of habit and the way our family looked at food. If we ate meat/poultry every day, we couldn't rely on meat substitutes (aside from vat-grown meat, I guess), because you cannot really substitute the variety of cuts, fat to lean meat ratios, cooking versatility, organs (from pig ears to duck liver and beyond) that people consume. I found that consuming different types of TPP seven times a week, made me much more likely to throw in the towel well before someone who expanded their protein sources to chickpea (humus, falaffel), soy (tofu, tempeh), nuts (peanut and almond flour/butter), ate more mushrooms for the meaty flavor etc.
Eliminating cheese from my diet was the hardest part for me. I am not holding my breath for passable vegan cheese substitutes to appear any time soon. Now, I'd say nutritional yeast and peanut butter scratch the itch for basic fermented cheese for me.
To be fair, there is one meat substitute that I actually like – tofu spreads beat most liver pâtés. What I do is just blend some tofu with caramelized onions and nutritional yeast, add soy sauce or salt.
I assumed they’re referring to “lab grown” meat, not veggie burgers and the like. Literal “vegan meat”, which if successful would put an end to large scale animal farming/fishing, without requiring any change in dietary and culinary habits. The tech is still in its infancy, but it still seems to be moving steadily towards commercialization (I think I saw a post about such fish meat today)
I am not convinced. Until recently I lived with a vegetarian and have been compelled to try most of the meat alternatives available in my market - none have been a convincing replacement for real meat, or compelling by their own merits. The only way I can see this happening is placing a ban on people born after a certain date from purchasing meat, similar to New Zealand's ban on anyone born from 2009 onwards purchasing tobacco.
Besides, the worldwide consumption of cattle is somewhere around 300 million per year [1] - if we aren't eating them to keep their numbers down the land will soon be overrun by a tide of beef.
Have you ever noticed that native cultures are commonly praised for not wasting any part of the animal, yet the modern meat industry is vilified for not wasting any part of the animal ("pink slime", sausage, leather industry, etc)?
I think this sort of contradiction is evidence of emotionally compromised reasoning.
You're right, but I think you're conflating arguments.
Meat eaters should be proud to wear leather, eat byproduct, etc. Anything else would be waste, and it's shameful to act as you describe.
But vegans want all of it to stop. There's nothing to waste to the animal isn't killed. Well, until it does naturally. There's nothing to waste if the animal isn't born though. And it wouldn't be born if we didn't have a culture of harvesting their bodies.
If you were a visiting alien and saw one species that covers itself almost entirely in living organisms of a different kingdom, walks around, is protected from wind and UV radiation, and helps maintain thermal equilibrium, what characteristics would determine whether that was "clothing" versus "symbiosis"?
I had written a whole reply about how the pedestrians are in total control of the relationship rather than the fungus, but then I realized it's irrelevant. Symbiosis is a broad term; it applies to parasitism as well as host cleaning. So in the case where a pedestrian creature is wearing another living creature for protection, it is symbiosis.
59 comments
[ 1.7 ms ] story [ 168 ms ] thread(Terry Pratchett)
Some other mushrooms are edible, but will be the last thing you ever eat.
Get it yet? ;)
Well that's not where I expected the zombie apocalypse to come from, but I'll take it!
Apocalypse averted.
During winter it's a small coin purse, warm it up and you have a briefcase.
I've worked on enough old houses to have seen my share of basement surprises like shipping crates packed with straw, stacks of newspapers and magazines, and sometimes entire walls being consumed by hearty fungus.
Embrace the fungus. Wear the fungus.
So what you are saying is that I never have to buy clothes, or materials again. Long live growable clothes!
Mahalo.
Always ask for the mushroom sandwich fully cooked.
I still wear my leather jacket that I bought 20+ years ago when I started riding motorcycles. I've replaced the liner but the leather is perfect.
But leather as in cow leather is a great resource that would otherwise go unused if it wasn't for the market.
People will probably always eat a lot of cow, what else should we do with its skin?
Now one can argue about whether meat based diets are good or not, but as long as they exist there will be aources for leather.
You could also say the opposite: If nobody bought beef, leather would become much much more expensive, so therefore beef is an indirect subsidy to the leather industry. I've never seen this argument made anywhere though.
If the "vegan" product suddenly attains a real value other than "being vegan", for instance self repair, it may decrease the demand for regular old leather.
I’m a vegan and this sort of stuff is a total win.
Using animal skin for clothing and accessories is obscene.
Organ donation rates are still pretty poor and funeral practices in the west are needlessly inhibitory to decomposition.
There's been rumours of human leather forever, I reckon some people would quite like to be a jacket or suitcase!
Some disturbing historical precedent
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Under_the_Skin_(novel)
This is probably not true, vegan meat is progressing very fast (and once it matures has the potential to be much cheaper) and lowering the consumption of meat is important to reduce carbon emissions. I expect that demand for meat will sharply shrink in the next century
Even Star Trek writers didn't seem to think replicator food would be as good as livestock shows it's significance
I have reduced my meat and dairy consumption by well over 90% and I'd say that vegan meat substitutes are the worst option for people looking to reduce (or eliminate) meat consumption long term in terms of taste, texture, nutrition, climate impact (due to food processing) etc.
At best, you get a 'passable' substitute when you could be having a delicious and nutritious meal instead. You wont ever get the taste and texture of a prime cut, cooked chicken skin, bacon or anything of the sort – so why bother? There are countless great vegan dishes that leave you fully satiated and won't bore you like textured plant proteins (TPP) would if you ate them every other day.
Drastically reducing meat consumption required a change of habit and the way our family looked at food. If we ate meat/poultry every day, we couldn't rely on meat substitutes (aside from vat-grown meat, I guess), because you cannot really substitute the variety of cuts, fat to lean meat ratios, cooking versatility, organs (from pig ears to duck liver and beyond) that people consume. I found that consuming different types of TPP seven times a week, made me much more likely to throw in the towel well before someone who expanded their protein sources to chickpea (humus, falaffel), soy (tofu, tempeh), nuts (peanut and almond flour/butter), ate more mushrooms for the meaty flavor etc.
Eliminating cheese from my diet was the hardest part for me. I am not holding my breath for passable vegan cheese substitutes to appear any time soon. Now, I'd say nutritional yeast and peanut butter scratch the itch for basic fermented cheese for me.
To be fair, there is one meat substitute that I actually like – tofu spreads beat most liver pâtés. What I do is just blend some tofu with caramelized onions and nutritional yeast, add soy sauce or salt.
Besides, the worldwide consumption of cattle is somewhere around 300 million per year [1] - if we aren't eating them to keep their numbers down the land will soon be overrun by a tide of beef.
[1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/02/chart-of-the-day-this...
I think this sort of contradiction is evidence of emotionally compromised reasoning.
Meat eaters should be proud to wear leather, eat byproduct, etc. Anything else would be waste, and it's shameful to act as you describe.
But vegans want all of it to stop. There's nothing to waste to the animal isn't killed. Well, until it does naturally. There's nothing to waste if the animal isn't born though. And it wouldn't be born if we didn't have a culture of harvesting their bodies.