Animals can be deserving of Personhood

Life:"This is not currently the case and may not be so for decades."Con appears to think that I said replacing factory-farmed meat with in-vitro will occur overnight. That is incorrect. It will indeed take time, and there will be a period where FF meat is competing with IV meat until IV wins. As Professor Mark Post at the Eindhoven University stated "You could take the meat from one animal and create the volume of meat previously provided by a million animals.""Given the current technology, it would cost $1 million to turn out a 250g piece of beef."As of now, IV meat is indeed expensive. However, science is always progressing forward and prices will go down. On top of that, there is the fact that FF meat isn't completely cheap either. The fact is the meat and dairy industry absorb 63% of all government food subsidies that greatly reduces the price of meat in the market. Moving those same subsidies to IV meat would have a similar effect."Large scale production of in vitro meat may require artificial growth hormones to be added to the culture for meat production. No procedure has been presented to produce large scale in vitro meat without the use of antibiotics to prevent bacterial infections. The cost to mass produce this type of food with the use of other costly chemicals."Is Con really trying to argue that FF meat doesn't have any of these? Hormones and antibiotics are pumped into livestock at an alarming rate. That's why there's a difference between organic and normal meat.If in vitro meat turns out to be different in appearance, taste, smell, texture, or other factors, it may not be commercially competitive with conventionally produced meat.Everyone can adapt to minor changes, human taste buds change every 7 years, and I have faith that science won't let us down here.The lack of fat and bone may also be a disadvantage, for these parts make appreciable culinary contributions.Isn't KFC marketing boneless chicken as the new fad? And since when does anyone deliberately want fat?I'm going to ignore Con's entire paragraph dealing with kitchen-incubators as 1) It appears to be support for my argument if anything and 2) He appears to be arguing for small-business, which is not what this debate is about.Econ: Con is making a very poor assertion here. For starters, he is assuming that all 3 million jobs in the meat industry are slaughter and packing. The truth is that most jobs involving the meat industry are in fact service jobs; you know, like working in fast food. It's hard to find worldwide statistics, but for the US, of the 487,600 workers involved in the meat industry, about 89,100 are the packers/slaughterers that would lose their jobs. Divide the two numbers and we have a little more than 18% of the workforce unemployed.There's also this fact- once life is gone, you can't get it back. Once a job is gone, you can almost always find another one. If we're honestly going to argue life v. a job, I'd side with life anyday. Also, an 18% impact would hurt the US economy if it was a sudden, radical change. As I said, the transition to IV meat would be a much slower one than what Con is trying to argue.---Liberty;My opponent did not provide any sources for his claim that "Zoos currently circulate animals in their zoos, releasing them back into the wild every so many years". It's understandable given that it isn't true with regards to the minority.The truth is most horrible havens. Now don't get me wrong, I know that not all zoos are like this, but the truth of the matter is that the majority are. There is no government agency regulating the existence of zoos and as such most zookeepers are free to do as they please.Here's a quote from PETA's site. Now, while I don't support PETA personally, I do believe they have valid arguments on the Big 5 Issues of Animal Rights. "Most zoo exhibits provide animals with few, if any, opportunities to express natural behavior or make choices in their daily lives. Animals are closely confined, lack privacy, and have extremely limited possibilities for mental stimulation or physical exercise. These conditions often result in abnormal and self-destructive behaviors, also known as “zoochosis." Voters shouldn't ignore liberty as Con has failed to present a valid argument against my own statements.---Property:The Pro must define what he means by "homes"Homes as in habitats suitable for any said species. Yes national parks and forest reserves exist, but we are all aware that they are being replaced by other products of industrialization such as new urban settings and/or roads.And the setting up of habitats for animals does not extend to just non-domesticated species, but domesticated ones as well. Case in point dogs, whom currently outnumber the number of available owners. This is where animal sanctuaries can come in under the right to property. Same with organic farms for livestock.Con has failed once again to provide accurate arguments for his position. Despite this, I will look forward to his final rebuttal in the 4th round before closing statements.=Sources=http://www.meatami.com...http://www.bls.gov...http://www.peta2.com...http://www.treehugger.com...http://www.new-harvest.org...