Maybe hundreds of years from now we can synthesize nutrients without involving any living cells. At that point, it could be seen as unethical to enslave, murder and eat billions of microbial cells. For the time being, our life still depends on other living things, so better get comfortable with having mixed feelings about survival.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Technically we can, it's just so expensive as to be completely out of the question.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago

Doing chemistry by mixing chemicals is like fumbling in the dark. You tend to have ridiculously low yield, because you can’t really control which reaction takes place. It’s just a game of probabilities, which makes this gamble really expensive.

Living cells are doing chemistry the right way by combining specific materials and making specific products. Enzymes are very picky, but with them you can actually control the reactions. Making enzymes is just next level complexity and a story for another time.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago

But they're working on it!

Personally, I'm still just waiting on lab meat.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Isn’t that basically what nutritional yeast is?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

No, yeast is fungi.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago

Same concept, though. Grow microbes in a vat and eat them.

[–] elbarto777 1 points 6 days ago

Bacteria already release stress chemicals when their food is lacking, so...