Food production clip from Samsara.

architectureofdoom:

Quite literally architecture/design of doom.

thenoobyorker:

Dish of the day: breeding and mutating food species may be the only convincing plan anyone has for feeding the world Photograph: Victor de Schwanberg/Science Photo Library

From Inside the meat lab: The future of food

Could ethical concerns ultimately drive public acceptance of the new food technology? Cor van der Weele, Professor of Humanistic Philosophy at Wageningen University, is convinced that’s the case, with artificial meat at least. “People will see the moral benefits of cultured meats. Taking stem cells from a pig rather than killing millions of pigs in factories is already a more attractive idea to consumers.” She quotes studies of the viability of growing meat in sunlight-fuelled “bio-reactors” placed in desert areas: the reduction in resources is staggering. “It would require 1% of the land and just 2% of the water that traditional meat production does. And it would involve a 90% reduction in greenhouse gases,” she says.

Eating real meat in 2035 could be as morally questionable as eating foie gras – and about as expensive. As Dr Mark Post says: “A meat-eater with a bicycle is much more environmentally unfriendly than a vegetarian with a Hummer.”

Sign me up.

OK, I’ll do it. I’m going to commit to eating only humanely raised pigs, or ban pork when in doubt. I don’t eat a lot of pork, so it should be easy, hopefully. I was just talking about this with an acquaintance over dinner the other night. We were in the Deer Cafe in Vesterbro, Copenhagen and I ordered baked cod with mustard sauce. It was garnished with two slices of thick bacon.

Lars, a shy Swede and nerdy computer programmer, told me that he only eats wild hunted swine (aka wild boar). It was more natural, he said, and better for the conscience.

He explained that Denmark is one of the largest producers of pork in the world, and that factory farming of pigs was a terrible, horrible business that he couldn’t support. He talked about how pigs are highly intelligent, have personalities, and can feel happiness and pain.

I listened intently while munching on thick bacon strips in between swills of some dark ale. I didn’t think it was that big of a deal, perhaps even overblown since the EU supposedly is very strict with respect to agriculture and factory farming. Even though this video was shot in the states, and is a horrible nightmare to watch, I fear that the 22 million pigs(!) that are slaughtered each year just in Denmark do not live anything but short, brutal lives. I am so confused at why this happens in 2012. Wikipedia has an entry on intensive pig farming in the U.S., here.

revkin:

(graphic) @HumaneSociety reports pig abuses at @walmart pork supplier Seaboard and a second pork producer, Prestage — both in Oklahoma.