Meat and science

An article in the Australian today "Cloned Animals miserable, but safe to eat" says the US has decided that it is OK for consumers to eat meat from cloned animals. I can't see the economics in cloning animals for meat, but I suppose if there is an extra dollar to be made in animal exploitation then someone's going to do it. To me there doesn't seem to be any ethical difference in killing and eating a cloned animal as opposed to one raised normally. Though in the meat industry there is really no such thing as raised normally.

If science is going to be used in meat production I think In Vitro meat, whereby meat is grown from a culture outside of any living sentient animal, is a potentially much better route to take.
There are strong moral arguments made about the process and most Veg*ns seem to be opposed to it, but I think that it has potential moral uses. However unhealthy/unethical/expensive/environmentally damaging meat is, some people for social/cultural reasons are never going to become vegetarian. If this remains the case, artificially grown flesh would be a much better way of providing meat, as here potentially no animal has to die for its flesh.
The point of being a veg*n is to not eat meat as in that way we can help to stop the cruel raising, housing, transportation and killing of other animals. If there was a way in which the original cell deliverer was not harmed and all subsequent meat was grown from those few cells, then that would obviate most veg*n arguments. But there are those who believe eating other animals is morally wrong, no matter in what circumstance the flesh was gotten. For those who think all animals should be afforded the same rights and considerations as humans, the eating of any animal is the equivalent of cannibalism, which all sensible people believe is both morally wrong and repugnant.

If In Vitro meat ever becomes commercially viable the arguments will certainly become interesting.