I know who my money would be on if vegans decide they want to try and overthrow the country.
> we can't pretend forever that (negative) externalities don't exist.
I agree but like I said, I think petri dish meat is the answer which would most likely be even less resource intensive than plant based alternatives when perfected. You only use the exact resources you need for each Petri dish and you can literally build a meat factory for every city. Next to zero transport emissions.
There is a good reason why those farming subsidies exist. It does not end well when people are hungry en masse.
If we'll succeed in making them, it may take decades. Like finding the bugs to eat the plastics. That also takes forever.
And meanwhile the show goes on ... and on ...
Obviously all the death will significantly reduce the population so that’s one way of temporarily solving the problem. Although the loss of brain power might set back finding the actual solutions that we’ve already mentioned so swings and roundabouts.
Plus there is more that a cow is used for than just ground beef. 99% of the cow is used for things. You'd have to bring a capable alternative to market for each and every part of the cow that currently sees a use if you want to end pasturalism, and right now even coming up with an alternative to the most common use people think of when it comes to a cow is hard enough.
I suppose with sufficient vegan base the political will to remove (huge) subsidies for meat/dairy industry will materialize.
It simply doesn't make sense that meat burger/milk is cheaper than plant-based burger/milk now.
You need 100x more land to produce same amount of calories (beef vs. peas). Removing subsidies will drive prices of meat/dairy up, and plant based food prices will go down (as seen now with increasing competition and growing vegan movement).
With higher prices of meat/dairy many more people will switch.
As things are now, we need to remove subsidies for all unsustainable stuff, meat/dairy/oil/plastics/agri poisons ... we can't pretend forever that (negative) externalities don't exist.