Can robots debone a chicken?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303879604577410433686070506.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

by diminish • 14 years ago

31 58 14 years ago

online.wsj.com

amalag2• 14 years ago

So this will increase the slaughter and inhumane treatment towards other sentient creatures. Put another blind eye to slaughterhouses. Better people should get graphic reminders of where their meat comes from than put another layer on the plastic packaging through using a machine.

Losing empathy towards living creatures means reducing empathy for humans as well. A controversial statement, but i am sure one can search that out within themselves.

rdl• 14 years ago

I really don't think having some poor people working in slaughterhouses, treated slightly better than the animals they butcher (but only slightly) really improves anyone's sense of empathy for animals (or humans). That ship sailed a long time ago, around when we got factory farming or really once any family didn't contain at least one farmer (1800s?)

gurkendoktor2• 14 years ago

To anecdotally confirm what you said: There was a "scandal" in Germany last year where a school slaughtered and barbecued a hare. (Students were around 10/11 years old) Parents were outraged, basically arguing 'it should be everyone's choice to either know or ignore where meat comes from'.

tomp2• 14 years ago

Did you read the article? The robot just separates the meat from the bone of chicken that are already dead. Robots won't increase the number of kills - consumer demand will.

Interestingly, robots might even reduce the inhumane treatment towards these animals, which is, if I understand correctly, most often the result of cost-saving.

corin_2• 14 years ago

More meat from each chicken could lead to less chickens killed, on the other hand cheaper production could lead to cheaper prices which could lead to a rise in demand...

But as a non-vegetarian I'm pretty indifferent to which animals we eat more of.

nitrogen2• 14 years ago

So this will increase the slaughter and inhumane treatment towards other sentient creatures.

When did chickens become sentient?

justsee10• 14 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentience

icebraining• 14 years ago

My grandmother, who raises chicken, likes them as much as most people I know like their dogs, and yet she has no problem killing and eating them.

Your view of reduced empathy is simplistic and wrong.

amalag2• 14 years ago

So you are saying your grandmother is very compassionate?

gurkendoktor2• 14 years ago

The good news is that less chicken will have to die for the same amount of meat.

But it's sad to see the amount of sophistication in deboning when the actual slaughtering still seems to be a "mostly works" thing. I wish they'd invest the time and money in lab meat instead.

jlgreco6• 14 years ago

As far as I know, chickens are still slaughtered by cutting their necks. The failure rate of that is probably about as low as you could possibly get in the entire meat industry.

Regardless, money being spent on deboning technology is not automatically money that lab meat research missed out on. Research is not quite that zero sum..

reitzensteinm• 14 years ago

I'd expect a paradox of thrift situation to apply here; if prices go down due to efficiency, consumption will increase, likely to a point where the number of slaughters would actually increase.

protomyth4• 14 years ago

Or at least restaurants / fast food will use it in more dishes. Look at how McDonald's brings back the McRib when poultry prices go down[1].

1) http://www.theawl.com/2011/11/a-conspiracy-of-hogs-the-mcrib...

netcan• 14 years ago

I'd expect lab meat is a different kind of beast altogether when it comes to who is funding the development of it.

This robot has an obvious business/marketing plan: the moment its better & cheaper than humans, it'll start to replace them everywhere. Hit that point and it'll sell in more or less known quantities. Don't hit it, it's (at best) a technology looking for a problem.

Lab grown meat is who-the-fuck-knows R&D. How cheap does it need to be to sell how much of it/ How do we know when it tastes good enough. Who will buy it when it just hits the shelves. Who will buy it ten years after. etc. etc.

Two completely different and probably non-competing buckets of time & money.

corin_2• 14 years ago

Agree with you apart from "non-competing". They may not compete in terms of who wants to fund the research, but if both are successful then they would very much be in competition with each other.

crikli• 14 years ago

American markets will not accept lab meat.

I say this based on the reaction to what was dubbed "pink slime" and about which the media and the public flipped out. The result is that a completely safe and efficient process to increase yield came under fire because of hysteria grounded in not a whit of logic.

People are also whipping themselves into a frenzy about genetically modified organisms. They're also convincing themselves that organic food is what they should have been eating in lieu of food treated with chemicals(1).

So if a public that is generally ignorant about food production is (over)reacting to existing scientific enhancements it follows that the reaction to a completely scientificly generated product would not be met with acceptance.

Disclaimer: I'm part of a fifth generation farm family. We farm corn, soybeans, and milo. No livestock.

(1)Certified organic food is often treated with chemicals, sometimes the same chemicals as non-organic, but at different dilutions and with different application methods.

sp3322• 14 years ago

I don't understand the pink slime thing. I'm pretty sure the only reason people freaked out was because of Jamie Oliver's campaign against it.

johnchristopher2• 14 years ago

> Certified organic food is often treated with chemicals, sometimes the same chemicals as non-organic, but at different dilutions and with different application methods.

This would be considered non-sense where I live (Belgium). Could you provide american examples of well-known certified organic food that is often treated with chemicals ?

justsee10• 14 years ago

You falsely portray all opposition to industrial food production / GMO as unscientific / irrational / illogical?

It certainly seems to be a favoured industry angle (esp. in regards to Genetically Modified Organisms): portray opposition as ignorant, anti-progress, unscientifc, luddite etc

Some cursory examination into any of these issues uncovers reasoned, rational, scientific concern behind much opposition.

The 'pink slime' issue originated with a US Department of Agriculture microbiologist who was disgusted that the USDA approved it for human consumption. Hardly 'hysteria grounded in not a whit of logic'.

ealloc• 14 years ago

Pink slime is gross. A once-bacteria-laden mush of animal leftovers? No thanks. I don't eat food purely for nutrition (it's easy to get enough nutrition) but because it is appetizing too. Pink slime sounds tasteless and textureless. Health wise am not too worried about the ammonia itself, but by the implication that the meat is so full of bacteria that it requires a relatively large dose of ammonia to make it edible.

On the other hand, I have no problem eating lab meat, 'chemically treated' and genetically modified food in principle, depending on the exact chemicals used. For example, I would like to avoid food coated with dangerous pesticides (including if the plant was GM'd to produce the pesticide). Benign pesticides are fine.

I imagine lab meat could be even cleaner and more appetizing than normal meat, once the process has developed enough.

swedenborg• 14 years ago

why debone . its tastier cocked with bones, and while eating you debone ...

sp3322• 14 years ago

It's useful when you're using chicken as an ingredient in prepared foods.

ralfd• 14 years ago

I was about to comment, that I would love to see a video of the robot-machinery. But then I clicked back to the article, and alas, there is!

protomyth4• 14 years ago

"We did not understand the science of cutting," says Mr. McMurray, rubbing his hands together. "This is when you appreciate what a human can do."

The above is probably that hardest step engineers / programmers have to deal with when doing this type of thing. It comes sometime after the realization that some things human's do are pretty hard.

tomp2• 14 years ago

I think that one of the main "techniques" that humans use is continuous feedback - we don't decide exactly what path to use before we even start cutting, we just start cutting and see what happens and adjust as we proceed.

protomyth4• 14 years ago

Probably, we are after all is said and done really high-end pattern matching machines and we keep thinking about things. I just wish more schools would teach what amazing pieces of work humanity is and save engineers a lot of startup time on new projects. It would be better if people started new projects with a respect for what humans can really do.

Can robots debone a chicken?

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