>Is the list of ingredients containing substances you don't recognize?
This is a bit of a bogus argument. If you had to break down meat into its component chemicals, nobody would understand it then either. We just have a guideline that requires man-made things to list the components which leads to the false argument that seeing lower level chemicals in something means it's bad.
Yes, but my ancestors ate meat from chicken, pigs or cattle, they survived and I'm alive as well. Compared to rats, we don't have to do a trial and error for everything we eat, as culture is part of who we are and we've been eating most of the same meat, vegetables and dishes for hundreds if not thousands of years.
You are never going to see meat being broken down to its components on an ingredients label. The only way you're going to see chemicals on such labels is if those chemicals were added by food processors, for various desired effects, like for improved texture, or taste, or for extending shelf life.
It's usually bad because, as I said, it's meant to fool your senses. Why do you think sugar or HFCS is in everything these days? It's also bad in the case of health claims and fads because reductionist science is applied.
I mean let's be specific. This article calls out Hershey for moving away from polyglycerol polyricinoleate (PGPR) to friendlier-sounding emulsifiers. In exactly what way does a consumer benefit from reduced consumption of PGPR?
Your ancestors also ate a lot of meat roasted over open fires, or in comparatively primitive ovens. Within the next 20 years we're going to come to understand exactly how carcinogenic that millennial-old practice is (cooking, it is going to turn out, is basically carcinogenic), and it's going to make us feel silly about caring about PGPR --- and, I hope, about looking to micronutrients in the food supply as an answer to most of our public health concerns.
>Yes, but my ancestors ate meat from chicken, pigs or cattle, they survived
But they died from cancers, heart disease, and a myriad of other disorders. Some of my ancestors smoked tobacco, which was completely 'organic', and it didn't do them any good.
This is a bit of a bogus argument. If you had to break down meat into its component chemicals, nobody would understand it then either. We just have a guideline that requires man-made things to list the components which leads to the false argument that seeing lower level chemicals in something means it's bad.