You are what you eat

The fortunate few (compared to the global population) that we enjoy an abundance of food we might discover that we have not been so lucky in the long run. All those fancy packed delicacies that we find on the supermarket shelves come with a wide range of chemical substances, that not so long ago were not even to be found freely in the nature. It is obvious that technology has evolved much faster that it took our metabolism to adapt to the new chemical challenges.
Most of these substances were supervised by specialized agencies and are supposed to be safe for consumption. However, I tend to believe that it is very difficult to properly asses the kind of imbalances that certain supposedly safe substances produce in the human body, especially in the long run. Moreover, intensive farming lead to the development of new and more lethal diseases on animals; these can fairly easy be passed to the humans, through consumption of contaminated meat.
All these shortcomings are in place because of the huge increase in food demand, and it will be impossible at this stage to feed an entire city without the aid of the adequate preservatives, anti-oxidants or sweeteners added to food. People started eating many substances discovered in the last decades. The body is bombed with these chemicals, and the long run effects are difficult to be predicted even by the most elaborate studies. Probably some of us will adapt and survive fairly well with the “new food”, while there will be a lot of casualties as well. It is part of the evolution process.
Now, related to evolution here is another issue. I think humankind should stop feeding with other living creatures. Not immediately, probably, but when this will be accomplished, we will probably move a step further on the evolution’s ladder. While there already are people that avoid eating food derived from animals, I do not suggest that we should all become vegetarians. Proteins are important building blocks of our bodies, and are vital for their proper functioning. The other alternative that I see and I think it lays within our grasp with the actual technologies even, is to try to grow animal-like tissue in an industrial manner. These will be the stakes of the future. Benefits of this kind of food are obvious: we will avoid ingesting other poisonous substances naturally found or artificially added in the animal meat. The new “meat” will be virus free and it can have the texture we most enjoy. Most important, the new food will be freed from any guilt of having to destroy another precious creation of nature (a life) to feed ourselves. I am sure that things will evolve in this direction and the actual farms will become industrial factories for growing artificial tissue that we can use for consumption. I just think we need to speed up the process a little bit. It will help our evolution as specie both physically and morally. The new food will probably not taste the way it does today, but tastes can be easily re-educated. I am sure our nephews will find it as disgusting to eat a living creature as we find it today to eat human meat.