Cloned Meat
The EU Food Safety Agency declared meat from cloned animals safe for consumption.
“It is very unlikely that any difference exists in terms of food safety between food products originating from clones and their progeny compared with those derived from conventionally bred animals,” the report said.
Europeans get all worked up over genetically modified organisms, and many take pride in only buying non-GMO products at the supermarket. This has always struck me as a little loony given that no solid evidence of health risk has been discovered.1
That said, I find the idea of cloned meat troubling. Upon a fair bit of reflection, I think it has to do with the variability I expect in my food. I enjoy having a good steak, and the idea of having, at least on the conceptual level,2 the same damned steak over and over again, upsets me.
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The rejoinder, that we just don’t know what kind of bad things GMO’s might be doing to us strikes me as childish. I just don’t know that there isn’t a horrible drooling monster in my closet when the lights are out. How can I be sure that a monstrous race of teleporting drooling aliens hasn’t started invading Earth right this very second? ↩
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Practically, of course, much depends on the environment the beeves are raised in. Not all steaks will actually be the same, even if they are all cloned from the same perfect cow. ↩
