Getting Cats Vegan is Possible and Imperative

I wrote a new piece, “Getting Cats Vegan is Possible and Imperative“.

I started this journey wondering why it was so hard to raise my cat vegan. First, I noticed there needed to be more clarity about what carnivore means. Carnivory stems from classification, not diet requirements. We could use more scientific studies to make this point more pronounced, but there’s enough evidence. Second, I note how the United States’ regulatory conditions make it hard for alternative cat food to enter the market.

The amount of flesh cats eat is a big issue. Cats in the United States eat nearly as much meat as the human population of Canada. Transitioning cats away from animal products would do much good for the planet, animal-kind, and even the cats’ health.

The Significant, Unalloyed Goodness of Replacing Animal Agriculture

When we consider problems solved, replacing animal agriculture will be one of the most triumphant milestones in history. It’s water desalination, dozens of vaccines, electric cars, drought-resistant crops, the elimination of widespread misery, carbon capture technology, and more rolled into one. I hope this article changes how you think about the importance of the alternative food effort and the sheer good that it can do. 

I submit that replacing animal agriculture does more good than renewable energy or curing cancer. Let me know if you agree or not.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/significant-unalloyed-goodness-replacing-animal-karthik-sekar-

“Processed”​ is a Useless, Empty Descriptor of Food

I posted this last week to LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/processed-useless-empty-descriptor-food-karthik-sekar/

I’ve seen some profoundly twisted takes on alternative foods and how “processed” they are. In this article, I clarify some confusion, explain the chemistry and biology behind food digestion, and argue why “processed” is a meaningless food descriptor. 

If we genuinely want tasty, affordable, healthy, kinder, and more sustainable food, we should use the better metrics and concepts already out there. 

Shifting to a Better World

Happy Friday! I’ve written some “new” content on LinkedIn.

I argue that other than donating effectively, practicing unabashed, hardline veganism is the most tractable, impactful good we can do. I claim this through the lens of the tipping point phenomenon and counterfactuals: We can measure our good by the area shift of the S-curve, which is massive. 

I hope the piece adds to your thinking and motivation for a better world!

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/shifting-better-world-karthik-sekar

What’s the financial gain of replacing animal agriculture? [Work in Progress]

I’m working on new content to roughly calculate the societal financial gain of replacing animal agriculture. Meat from microbial bioreactors solves not just ethical and environmental issues, but, as I argue in After Meat, also solves technological, biosecurity, and food security issues too.

Consider biosecurity. Most pandemics are of zoonotic origin because animals have similar physiology to humans. And the best evidence we have suggests the same for the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. Covid-19 is estimated to have costed humanity on the order of ten trillion dollars. Replacing animal agriculture with microbial and plant-based food would drastically diminish the risk for pandemics–I would estimate more than 90%. Therefore, we’d get at least 9 trillion dollars in benefit (0.9*10 trillion) by averting the next Covid-19. And strikingly, this figure is only factoring a sole pandemic. Replacing animal agriculture affects all future pandemics. In other words, 9 trillion dollars is the floor.

Consider environment. Climate change is anticipated to cost the world tens of trillions of dollars per year if there’s no intervention. And replacing animal agriculture is one of the best interventions to stem climate change because we get dual benefits: a bathtub-sized bioreactor can replace nearly 10,000 cows, thereby diminishing the greenhouse gas emissions and freeing up troves of land for sequestration. One paper suggests that replacing animal agriculture and rewilding land may be mostly enough. Using a present value calculation, I estimate roughly 40 trillion dollars in benefit.

Conclusion and Next Steps

So just considering two problems, we see that replacing animal agriculture is worth around 50 trillion dollars in benefit, or more than half of the world’s GDP in 2020. There are other factors too–namely suffering, technological, and food security–that will add to the total. So if it costs mere billions to develop replacers, then it’s an absolutely fantastic return on investment for governments and non-profits.

I hope you’re piqued. I’m still working on these calculations. If you would like to collaborate, or you know someone who would, then please let me know!

The Tipping Point Case for Vegan Advocacy

Finally some new content! I’ve written a post arguing that vegan meal-choice and advocacy are highly beneficial and impactful. Avoiding a beef burger for one meal is not just saving 1/1600th of a cow, it’s potentially saving thousands more by shifting the curve. The post is on the Effective Altruism Forum linked below. Moving forward, I’ll upload all written content there, but I’ll indicate here when I do.

Abstract

Animal agriculture is the most exigent problem of our generation. Diminishing animal agriculture would have the primary benefit of reducing colossal suffering as well as adjacent benefits such as improving biosecurity and significantly mitigating climate change. The good news is that a transition away from animal products will occur, but we can compel a tipping point sooner. An S-curve transition model suggests an underappreciated, significant benefit in advocating for steadfast veganism in consumers and institutions. Modest intervention can lead to substantial good, vastly more than the superficial consequences would indicate. When considering the tipping point case, vegan advocacy should be a foremost thrust for Effective Altruism because it can shift up the timeline for the vegan transition.

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/aMFFWhiQX5DvaZSDp/the-tipping-point-case-for-vegan-advocacy

Media Roundup – 01/14/22

Happy New Year! Some noteworthy media since the last post:

  1. Reddit AMA – This was a lot of fun, and I’m honestly so gladdened by the reception, even after my veganism was outed. The Internet is generally unkind to vegans, but sensibilities were strong here. That tipping point seems tantalizingly close.
  2. Interview with Gary Anderson of Night Dreams Talk Radio – Gary and I discuss the health benefits of a plant-based diet, the splendid options cropping up at our grocery stores, and John Wayne’s ignominious autopsy. Note: I admit that I’m having a hard time separating fact from fiction regarding John Wayne and the supposed amount of undigested meat in his GI tract.
  3. Interview with Karina Inkster of The No-Bullsh!t Vegan podcast – Karina and I discuss the technological argument against animal agriculture and how it’s important to instill the intuition into a wider audience. We then examine how the environmental and ethical issues follow from that. Further on, we touch on the inevitability of a world where plant-based foods exceed animal-based products completely.

Released!

After Meat is now released and available at most online retailers! Here are some links:

The audiobook version is coming along well, but it’s going to be at least a couple of weeks before it’s available publicly.

Two pieces of noteworthy media developed since the last post:

  • The Kirkus Book Review – The reviewer summarizes the book and its appeal quite well. I love the penultimate line about how this transition is really another tech upgrade. That’s a beautiful and succinct way to couch the overall takeaway. This review is now the default link I send to explain After Meat to someone.

    The poor Multiverse chapter has yet another detractor. Even in the Appendix, he couldn’t escape the reviewer’s wrath.
  • “Technical Outrage” – This is a post I wrote for Faunalytics to summarize some key points of After Meat. It’s a solid TL;DR for chapters 3-4, i.e. the heart of the technological argument against animal products.