Monday, March 1, 2010

Wait... is my meal real?

Paynter's article "The Other Other White Meat" informs the reader about the growing influence cloning is having on our meat industry. Contradictory to what many people may think, cloned meat is as safe to consume as that of conventionally bred animals. Cloning is used to ensure that animals with favorable genes do not become extinct and continue to be survived by a clone - this allows for the continuous production of high valued produce. Paynter also is put under an experiment where he attempts to distinguish clone meat from regular meat, in which he fails; the results of the experiment underlines the fact that clone meat is essentially identical to real meat and that the difference is all in one's mind.

Although there has been controversy as to whether cloned meat should be introduced to the public, I personally feel that cloned meat should not be introduced into supermarkets until it is 100% verified that there are no defects with the cloning process and therefore, the meat itself. We have not developed enough biological advancements in order for us to treat cloning as though it is 100% safe.

A pro to cloning animals with favorable traits is that someday, we might have have cheap high quality meat to eat, rather than fake "trimming" meat. This will reduce the frequency of illnesses from the consumption of unsanitary meat which came from multiple different cows. Nevertheless, a con to the cloning business is that because large transactions of money are involved, cloning scandals and embezzlement can easily surface, which could be dangerous. Mutations of cloned animals can occur as a result and this could have large societal and environmental implications.

Questions which I have are:
- Can a cloned embryo be conceived in different species of cows?
- Is it possible to successfully clone cloned animals?
- Do cloned animals have any advantages over their counterparts?

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