Comment by randomchars | Hacker News Reader

Comment by randomchars | Hacker News Reader

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> Vegans I know are not trying to replace meat with manufactured substitutes

"Meat replacements" are rising in popularity, and I'd consider those one of the worst things you can put in your body, just look at the ingredient list[1]

- Soy-protein concentrate

- Coconut oil

- Sunflower oil

- Natural flavors

- Potato protein

- Methylcellulose

- Yeast extract

- Cultured dextrose

- Food starch, modified

- Soy leghemoglobin

- Salt

- Soy-protein isolate

- Mixed tocopherols (vitamin E)

- Zinc gluconate

- Thiamine hydrochloride (Vitamin B1)

- Sodium ascorbate (vitamin C)

- Niacin

- Pyridoxine hydrochloride (vitamin B6)

- Riboflavin (vitamin B2)

- Vitamin B12

It's also not more convenient than real food: I can cook a steak in less than 10 minutes, and it will be way more healthy than this industrial sludge.

[1]: https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-in-impossible-burger...

I think your point here is about processed vs whole foods? The same argument applies to any diet, it’s not specific to a vegan diet. Whether or not one type of junk food is marginally better than the other doesn’t matter. If you want to eat healthily then avoid all this crap, vegan or not.

Yes, that's my point. If you want to go vegan, go ahead, it's probably healthier than a standard american/european diet.

I think the problem starts when people can't let go the idea of certain food, ie. burgers, and try to engineer alternatives that fit their diet. This is what brings is stuff like the GMO meat replacements, which are marketed as a healthy alternative...

I'm looking at the list and see nothing out of the ordinary. Which one of those are unhealthy?

I'd like to reverse the question; which one of those are healthy, especially compared to the real version?

All of them are healthy. Although you may want to define healthy.

Well, all the vitamins and minerals, which are also in real meat, for starters.

And GMO soy leghemoglobin, plus soy leghemoglobin soy protein.

They don’t belch hundreds of pounds of methane into the air, which helps.

Well, that's definitely correct. But they do require soy, GMO soy to be precise, and monocropping is harmful, while on the other hand, cows are grazing animals, which can have a dramatic effect on the fertility of the land.

That aside, I don't believe there's a study about the environmental effect of the manufacturing of this sludge vs eating real foods.

And as an aside, the emission from cows is not as simple as it sounds: https://www.farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk/news/methane-myth-why-c...

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