Lab-Grown Meat and Veganism: A Virtue-Oriented Perspective

Abstract

The project of growing meat artificially represents for some the next best thing to humanity. If successful, it could be the solution to several problems, such as feeding a growing global population while reducing the environmental impact of raising animals for food and, of course, reducing the amount and degree of animal cruelty and suffering that is involved in animal farming. In this paper, I argue that the issue of the morality of such a project has been framed only in terms of the best consequences for the environment, animals, and humans, or in terms of deontic principles. I argue that to appreciate how deep and difficult this issue is, it is necessary to consider it in terms of a virtue-oriented approach. Such an approach will reveal aspects that are not apparent, not contemplated by typical approaches, but are essential to our understanding of the morality of lab-grown meat. As I argue, evaluating the issue from a virtue-oriented perspective suggests that the project of in vitro meat should not be supported because it stems from unvirtuous motivations.

Analysis of Scientific and Press Articles Related to Cultured Meat for a Better Understanding of Its Perception

“…Other names: craft meat, victimless meat, cruelty-free meat, slaughter-free meat, Frankenmeat, unnatural meat, shmeat Metcalf, 2013;Welin, 2013;Marcu et al, 2015;Wilks and Phillips, 2017;Siegrist et al, 2018;Alvaro, 2019;Bhat et al, 2019;Bryant and Barnett, 2019;Burton, 2019;Mouat et al, 2019;Ong et al, 2020 a Names/keywords' number of citations in titles, keywords, and abstracts of articles. b This reference list is not exhaustive: the articles indicated as examples are those mainly discussed in the Results section.…”

The Myth of Cultured Meat: A Review

“…Actually, some vegans have been avoiding animal food because of the meat taste. Others would consider eating it if it was produced in a cruelty-free and friendly environment (66).…”

“…Whether painful or painless, animals must be reared so that their cells can be harvested to produce in vitro meat. "Consequently, lab-grown meat still involves animal exploitation, which is what the proponents of artificially grown meat want to avoid" (66).…”

Microalgae as Future Superfoods: Fostering Adoption through Practice-Based Design Research

“…] Despite the cultural barriers related to their consumption, scientists and policy makers concurred in considering insects as one of the best opportunities to cope with the need of feeding humanity in the future" [12] (p. 11). Several studies are also being conducted on lab-grown meat, an innovative form of cellular agriculture for producing meat in vitro rather than slaughtering animals (this meat price is still high-despite a quick price fall in recent years-and its production raises several ethical issues, interesting especially to vegans) [13]. Consumers are also rediscovering natural ingredients with excellent properties such as algae and microalgae.…”