2. Humans haven’t been eating cow (or meat generally) on this scale ever before in history.
3. Even despite the above, we genuinely don’t know to what extent baseline human health is dependent on traditional diet. It’s not impossible that there exists a modern radical diet that greatly improves health and longevity without including any “natural” foods.
No, I don’t think so. Most of my beef has a single ingredient: grass. Some have two ingredients: grass, grain (there may be different grains though).
Even if you listed the molecules, the ingredient list for beef is much shorter than beyond burgers.
It would be better to focus on making veggie burgers better. Not making a terrible copy of cow.
> Slowly over generations is really not the approach we need for tackling climate change though.
I'm certainly not arguing that climate change does not need immediate action, and I am certainly not undermining that it has helped even a little bit. I hope that came across in my statement.
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/eating-...
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7256495/
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/eating-less-red-m...
You're going to need to put more effort into that assertion.
The thing is, a lot of have been making plant based patties for years using almost no ingredients. All you need for a convincing non-meat burger is quality mushrooms in the patty. Sure, it might not taste exactly like beef but once you consider it like any other meat it's not an issue (pork burgers don't taste like beef, chicken burgers don't taste like pork, vice-versa).
I understand that they have to have some preservatives, but some other products are only there for the novelty or to attract meat eaters. We don't really need to have an entire formula that adds fake blood.
For example, my favourite store-bought one is from Good Butchers and it's simple ingredients that are very similar to what you would make yourself at home:
Wheat gluten, Onion, Organic black beans, Organic mushrooms, Barley, Apple juice, Organic carrots, Organic beets, Water, Organic sunflower oil, Organic celery, Tahini, Oats, Organic garlic, Nutritional yeast, Apple cider vinegar, Organic mustard, Natural smoke flavour, Salt, Balsamic vinegar, Natural flavour, Dried shiitake mushrooms, Dried porcini mushrooms, Herbs, Spices.
Meanwhile some other brands have a lot of additives, preservatives and chemicals.
If you listed the "ingredients" in a cow, you'd also have a list that was as long as the proverbial limb. Proteins, fats, sugars, enzymes, hormones, antibiotics (quite likely with factory farming), microorganisms... it's just our labelling laws that mean they get to be lumped together as "meat". They're still chemicals assembled by organic nanotech.
We know some of them are bad. E.g. there's a link between red meat consumption and colorectal cancer, and nitrites in bacon etc. also increase cancer risk.
> Slowly and over generations it could change to be predominantly.
Slowly over generations is really not the approach we need for tackling climate change though.
> You can’t just shove a fake meat product down a meat lovers throat and call them a bad name if they hate it.
And I don't think anyone is doing that.