Is Lab-Made Butter and Robot Pregnancy the Future? Or Just Flat-Out Weird?

00:00 Welcome to the Insight Out Show

Hi and welcome to the very first episode of the Insight Out Show. I'm Devin Almonte, and yes, you did hear this right. What has really started as a podcast with all our Anchor Point Daily Devotionals and once a week news moments that I've kind of thrown in there as well, we're getting a little upgrade. So Thursdays are turning into more of a show format where we'll have a once a week stop for encouragement, insight, news, and connection.

I hope that every episode gives you something real to hold onto, something that will lift you up, something that will help you live with joy and confidence as a believer or somebody that's curious about faith. And more than that, I pray that it helps us really see the world that we live in through kingdom eyes, and help us live out our faith in action in our every day.

00:57 The Evolution of the Show

So why the change? Well, honestly, I mean, I guess it's been months of prayer just asking God as I always do, you know, what do you want this to be in service to you? How do you want this to look? So I felt like this was the next right step. Because I love encouragement, and my heart, I think, is on encouragement.

But I also love to research and see what's going on in the world. And I like to inform and keep us curious about the world that we live in.

And there is so much out there today. I mean, we have information overload and critiques and analysis on all the things happening in the world, but without a lot of spiritual grounding or action. So my hope is to get what we have in our heads and bring it into our hearts as well.

01:46 Shoutout to Irish Listeners

Also, before we get into things here, I've gotta give a quick shout out to my friends listening in Ireland. We've got a lot of listeners that tune in from Ireland, which makes me so happy. My grandparents were from Ireland. My name Devin is Irish, comes from Gaelic roots.

And also this, I, I actually didn't know this for a long time, but Devin means little poet. And back then, being a poet wasn't just about writing. Poets were the keepers of knowledge. They were storytellers, historians, and even advisors. So I love that it's a big name to live up to and I will try my best to live up to that,

But it definitely makes me smile because in some small way, that is what I get to do here. Share stories, encouragement and truth.

Pretty cool. So if you are in Ireland and you are listening, please come say hi on Facebook in my Facebook group called Insight Out Community. I will leave the link for you in the show notes. Everybody's welcome to join. I'd love to have you there. It's really a place where we can live out what we're doing throughout the week here with encouragement with the Thursday show, talk about the things going on and just really start to engage in realness, which, uh, sadly we're losing in this modern age.

So to recap, don't worry, the Anchor Point Devotionals aren't going anywhere. You'll still get those every day. And now you'll also have this weekly show on Thursdays. To go a little bit deeper, we're gonna look at stories that shape our culture.

Some are serious, some are fun, some are just plain bizarre because I like bizarre stories. And always with the goal of thinking more deeply about things. That critical thinking, growing in discernment and figuring out how we actually take the knowledge that Christ gives us and how we live that out in practice in our every day.

Because here's the thing, it is one thing, hear the news or even God's word, but then what do we do with it? So that's what this space is for, clarity for our minds, joy for our hearts, and truth for the times that we live in.

03:52 Exploring Bizarre News Stories

Now, coming up today, just to kick it off, yes.

Some of those wild stories, butter made from thin air. Yep. This is a thing. Bill Gates is behind it. We're gonna talk about a pregnancy robot that is blurring a whole lot more than just ethical lines. Wait to hear this story. And then later on we are going to crack the mystery and the craziness behind expiration dates.

Use, buy, sell, buy best buy. These things drive me absolutely insane and I don't know what to do with them. And I end up probably throwing out a lot of food that I don't need to.

And of course, we will end with our Anchor Point, our encouraging devotional, and a scripture to help carry us through the rest of our day. So let's get started.

04:37 The Carbon Butter Controversy

Okay, so here we go with what is happening in the world.

Bill Gates is backing a company that makes butter. It sounds fine, sounds interesting, but the only thing; it's not from cows, it's not even from plants. This one is made entirely from thin air. The company is called Savor. On their website, they describe themselves as a group of farmers, oh, sorry, not farmers, scientists, and nature lovers. Now you can see where I'm going with this. They said they're looking toward a future where we can all enjoy the foods we love without consuming the planet.

How do they do this? Well, they're basically creating food without, oh, you know, the old-fashioned traditional things that make food like cows or plants, and their latest invention is butter, except that it's not butter. It's what they call carbon butter.

And instead of coming from a cow, it comes from the air. So instead of finding a cow, they decide to take some carbon dioxide from the air. They stir that up and mix it with some hydrogen. And then from that voila, they build some fat molecules that mimic real butter.

Doesn't that sound delicious? Even Bill Gates said, oh, okay. Yeah, this is a little strange. Yeah, I'd have to agree. Strange. Definitely strange, and also terrifying.

People are reacting. Chefs are reacting. Andrew Gruel is a celebrity chef, and here's some of his thoughts. (clip)

The whole thing just feels off. Now, granted, I have butter in my refrigerator. That's not actually butter. It's plant-based butter. But the thing about plant-based butter, which again. I'm kind of not a hundred percent certain how great that is either, but it's made from things that are technically edible.

Carbon butter. I don't think that fits the same category as a plant-based butter.

So one would think, well, there must be this extreme butter shortage if we are going to these great lengths to create butter out of air. Well, no, that's not the case. We have really great butter. We have really great cows. The whole reason behind this carbon butter is environmental, no cows, no farmland, no palm oil.

It just uses a fraction of the water of what traditional dairy uses.

All supposedly better for the environment. Okay? But here is where I struggle with this. Like I said, we already have butter. We don't have a butter shortage.

And saying our planet would be better off if we didn't make butter.

To me that is kind of like saying, okay, well, you know, how our planet would be a whole lot better if we didn't cut down trees to build houses. Our planet would be a whole lot better if we didn't have cars. Our planet will look a whole lot better if we didn't have washing machines, toilet paper, dryers, microwaves.

At this point, why don't we just get rid of people too, for the sake of the planet.

I hope we don't lose sight of the fact that we are human beings and because we are human beings, we use resources.

I'm all for protecting the environment, being smart about how we're using our resources.

But personally, I would rather those resources be natural and as close to the way God designed them.

And then there's the whole health side of this carbon butter. It's new. And we've been down this road before with margarine for decades.

Margarine was sold as, oh, it's this healthier alternative to butter and we're all buying it. I grew up on that. That's what we bought. But then we found out that it had all the trans fats. Trans fats are harmful.

Just to clarify, I don't think the margarine that we have today has the trans fats that it did years ago, but when somebody says, oh, don't worry, margarine is totally safe, it turns out it wasn't. So now that we have this lab butter that is, I think being promoted as, oh, it is totally safe, I think it's wise for us to just slow down a little bit because food is, not just about what we can create or mimic in a lab.

It's about what our bodies were designed to process and thrive on. And I think most of us know the difference because. go just spend a week eating whole foods and then spend a week eating something that is overly processed with ingredients that we can't even pronounce.

And tell me how you feel.

Even if this butter tastes exactly the same, and I probably would try it just because I'm curious like that.

What I know science cannot do. While it might be able to provide the taste, it is never going to provide for the soul.

Food is not merely fuel. It shapes our health, our whole body health, our rhythms and our relationships. And honestly, in this world that is already leaning so heavily on these processed shortcuts, maybe what we need isn't more engineered food, but a return to simpler food, real ingredients, things that we cook at home, shared with the people we love.

Just because we can create it doesn't mean that we should.

Psalm 104 says He makes grass grow for the cattle and plants for the people to cultivate, bringing forth food from the earth bread that sustains their hearts. So maybe the butter that we already have is enough.

Okay.

10:24 The Pregnancy Robot Dilemma

This one feels straight out of a crazy, somewhat dystopian, awful sci-fi movie, but it's all real. A tech company in China has announced plans to build what they are calling a pregnancy robot.

We're not talking an incubator or just a machine with all these wires and things like that, but we are talking about a humanoid robot with an artificial womb inside of it.

The idea is that by: 2026

They're already far enough along. They've figured out kind of a price tag for this. If you're interested. It's around $14,000. Here's a little bit more about these special humanoid robots. Listen, this is Fox five, New York.

We're talking about a mechanical mother.

Well, actually I, maybe it's genderless who knows these days, but with a synthetic uterus, artificial amniotic fluid. Tubes delivering nutrients through an artificial umbilical cord.

So why are we doing this? Like what is the point? There are many people that are on board with this. Part of the reason, well, infertility is rising. This is a big deal in China, but not just China. This is happening globally in China. I think it's something like one in five couples that are dealing with infertility.

So they wanna be able to address that. And pregnancy can also be really hard on the body. Nine months of potential health risks. It can take a physical toll time away from work. As odd as that sounds.

And a robot surrogate sounds like it could fix all of those problems. But I didn't actually know that being pregnant was a problem. So I guess some people view that differently. I don't know. Also in China, surrogacy is banned.

And so this could be a potential way around the legal issues with that.

Zhang Qifeng, I don't know if I'm saying his name right, but he's the CEO of this robotics company, and I'm quoting him here. He said “Some people don't wanna get married, but they still want a wife.

Some don't wanna get pregnant, but they still want a child. So one function of our robot wife is that it can carry a pregnancy”. That was in an interview with Newsweek.

Many layers of dysfunction here, but we are seeing little shades of this with our technology machines taking over roles that used to be. Deeply human experiences, everything from reading, writing, creating like, I, I, it's sad, like are we seeing these things disappear because of AI caregiving? I mean, we're seeing babies in strollers and they've got their smartphones or parents are busy and they just hand kids the iPad just to kind of be their caregiver, their babysitter.

And now with the deepening of AI, it's starting to drastically affect relationships. People are starting to prefer AI relationships to the real thing. Just like the CEO said, I don't wanna get married, but I want a wife or I don't wanna get pregnant, but I would like kids.

This is so sad. This is not good for society. All this technology that is claiming to save the world, modernize the world, it's, it's going to destroy the world. It is managing to strip away every part of us the parts that make us human, the parts that help life flourish.

Just like Bill Gates and the butter, right? Food is so much more than just the fuel and the nourishment. It's about the rhythm of living and the communal aspect of meals. Pregnancy. It's not just, you know, it's way more complex than just keeping a fetus in fluid.

I mean, every stage, the emotional bond, the implantation, the growth, the hormonal shifts, the delivery. It is all interconnected. And then we've got the further huge ethical dilemmas. Because what happens here, if this becomes mainstream and becomes a thing, then what are babies like? What is the value of human life? Because the baby is just a product. If a robot can carry them. Then what's to stop us from mass producing children for an army?

Like why don't we just have the government own a couple of these humanoid robots and whatever they need, just produce, you know, a dozen kids here and a dozen there and, and they will serve the government. How about that? Or on the personal level, we can start to just, uh, mail order the child we want with the traits that we want.

It's like the worst movie ever, except it's not a movie. This is the reality that we are living. So as a Christian ,ugh, here's where I land with this. Children are not commodities. Like maybe we just start with that. Psalm 1:27 says, “Children are a heritage from the Lord. Offspring, a reward from Him”.

Pregnancy and birth are not just science. They're not just biology. They are relational.

It's emotional, it's spiritual. The bonding that happens during a pregnancy that is irreplaceable and it's a blessing and it's also image bearing.

Christ over a family, family over science, outsourcing this risk, turning something so holy and sacred into a transaction, and I think Christ is ready to turn over a few more tables with this.

17:02 Understanding Expiration Dates

Now let's switch gears and look at what's happening with expiration dates.

Not our expiration date, but the expiration dates on our food and medicines and cosmetics. All of these things. Are usually stamped with some type of expiration.

Starting in July of: 2026

that bans all the vague, confusing expiration labels that you've seen on store shelves. So no more sell, buy expires on freshest before, or whatever else brands come up with when this law goes into effect, they can only use two terms used by, which is for food safety and best if used by for quality.

That's it. It's meant to be simple, clear, and probably long overdue because I get so confused over all of these different little sayings. I don't know what to do, and then I just throw it out because it's confusing.

So, we'll see how all of this goes, because that's just in California. What happens in the rest of the states? I don't know how our retailers and food producers gonna figure all this out by state. It's a little confusing. So I don't know if it's really gonna clear up the matter.

But what I thought we could do today is at least start to understand the labels that we see right now, like what they mean, why we have them, what we do about 'em, if anything. Because they don't actually mean what I think we think they mean. And all of this confusion is probably costing our families a lot of money.

It's costing the country a lot of money and it's creating a lot of waste as well, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council, 90% of Americans misread these expiration dates. So yes, my hand goes up for that, and that contributes to nearly 40% of our food supply being wasted every year.

40%. Like that's, that's a lot. And it's also heartbreaking, especially when we see so many people that are food insecure and food banks and homeless shelters are often forced to toss out perfectly edible items due to these label liabilities.

Again, this new law only applies to California for now, but maybe this will spark a shift across the rest of the country because California estimates just this little change could save over 70,000 tons of edible food every single year just by fixing the wording on the packaging kind of funny though. We had a, I had, I bought like a generic loaf of bread, just white bread because my kids like to fish with bread. It really works for a number of fish. But we just get whatever's cheap and we have the bread. I, I got this. Like maybe a month and a half ago. Okay. The loaf of bread is still in the cabinet, and I'm looking at this thing.

There is no mold or anything on the bread.

It looks like the day I bought it. Which is a concern. There is an expiration date on the bread, which was like a week after I bought it.

And so we're not eating it, but I thought, oh my gosh, what is in this bread that it's not getting moldy? Like, could you still actually eat this?

That's probably more of a what's in our food issue than an expiration date issue. But then, there's like the other thing, I ordered a sunscreen, just suntan lotion, like an aerosol spray. And when it arrived, I saw they have expiration dates on it and it had expired a year ago, even though I just got it.

So I called or emailed customer service and I said, you sent me expired suntan lotion. They said, oh, that's okay. It's still good. And I was like, okay. But I mean, I just paid full price for something that's expired. Like, is it though, is this going to work, especially in the sun?

Don't these things kind of degrade?

We've gotten so used to labels today and all kinds of, uh, nutrition labels. Remember there was a time we didn't have any of this information there was no such thing as a nutrition label and there weren't expiration dates on things, even medications. We didn't always have a label. We didn't really have anything like this until the seventies, particularly with food. Grocery stores started using these labels to help them rotate through their stock and their inventory.

And then as customers, we get used to this thing and then we're like, oh, everything has a date, so I need to buy this, buy this date, I need to use this, buy this date. That was like in the eighties,

But the dates were really more of these sell by dates, which were for store use, not necessarily for food safety. And the only food, this is interesting, the only food item that is required to have an expiration date on it is baby formula.

Everything else is up to the manufacturer.

There is a gigantic list of all types of different expiration date label descriptions. I'm gonna give you four of the main ones and just explain what they are when we see sell buy. Okay? Like I said, , that one is for store use. That's not about safety

use by…

I'm also generalizing just a little bit here, but just to give you the overview. Use by that is about quality. So use by peak quality, you want to use it by these dates. For the best quality, it's still probably okay after. Best before is more about the taste and the texture. It's more of a suggestion

and the one that we probably wanna pay the most attention to for food or medications, things like that, it'll say expires on or something of that nature. And that is mostly for, like I said, regarding food, baby formula and medications.

So even though I have explained all of this and I have seen this now, just having done some research on it, I'm never going to remember this. Like it's confusing. No wonder people are confused. And so when I see sell by used by best before expires on like whatever is in the fridge, I just plop it in the trash

And that is not how we're to steward our resources. Wasting good food, tossing out perfectly fine products because of a label. I don't wanna say it's made up by the manufacturer, but it is suggested by the manufacturer.

And then we always wonder if they're doing this, at least I do. Like I was skeptical, like, are you like upping the date and keeping a very conservative date? Because then I'll throw it away and then I have to buy it again. So then we're spending money to replace things that are still very much usable and good.

So what do we do about this? Well, because it probably isn't changing anytime soon. The best thing is just to, I don't, maybe we memorize what all these different terms mean, but also these printed dates. Remember, don't let them make the decisions for you. I have to tell that to myself because I am a rule follower, so the second I see that, like we're over the date that it says like, I feel like as a rule, I have to get rid of it.

But no, we don't have to do that because God has given us our senses. He's given us common sense, and most importantly, he's given us wisdom and discernment. Proverbs 3 21 says, do not let wisdom and understanding out of your sight, preserve sound, judgment, and discretion. That's not just theology.

This is life. That is our refrigerator, that is our sunscreen, that is our wallet. God has given us all these good gifts. And I think part of honoring him is being thoughtful and intentional about how we use them and not being wasteful, not being fearful, just being wise when it comes to really these, these are our everyday things.

re iffy. If it says it's from: 2002

25:54 Anchor Point Devotional and Conclusion

Maybe you found yourself in a place that feels totally mismatched, just over your head, outta your league, with people that are stronger than you, smarter than you, better looking, than you, whatever. And we're just left wondering why, why on earth am I even here?

Well, let me tell you a quick story. This is our anchor point devotional today. I've been there years ago. I had just gotten sober. Alcohol is part of my story. 25 years sober since I was 19 through the grace of God.

And making sure to exercise your body, especially in early recovery, is a really, really good thing to help your mind. And I was always a runner. Like I, even through all of that, I was still a runner, but I was not into weight training. I didn't do the gym thing. But I wanted to get stronger and I just wanted some of that clarity from my brain and my thinking. And so I signed up for an exercise class at the local gym. Again, this is all new to me and by accident I, I guess I managed to sign up for like the really advanced class, more weight training, harder moves. It felt choreographed.

So I'm in this class, I felt so ridiculous. Everybody's in tiptop shape and I'm like, oh my gosh, like I'm trying to recover from addiction and I'm not sleeping, and I'm just a mess. And I was like, I am never coming back here again.

Except that after that class, the instructor came over to me and all cheerfully and smiley and asked like, oh, are you gonna be coming back? And I was like, uh, no, I don't think so. I thought this was an intro class,

But she didn't let me off the hook. She said, no, no, no. She's like, come back, you'll get it. I promise you. Just stick with it. It's gonna be hard at first, but I promise you it will get easier. I will help you and I think you're actually gonna like it.

that class. That probably was: 1999

And that moment taught me something that I have never forgotten. Sometimes the places that feel the most uncomfortable. Are the very places that God wants to grow us.

They're the places where he wants us to be. And I was ready to throw all of that away because it felt too hard to advance too beyond me.

I was clearly different from the rest of the group there, but none of that meant it wasn't where I belonged. And so maybe you felt that way too. Like you're just surrounded by all these people who seem way more equipped, they're more confident, they're more together.

And we start to wonder, why am I even here? Why am I here?

But instead of asking ourselves that maybe we need to ask God,

God, why am I here? And trust that he is got a reason. Trust that he'll carry us through it. Trust that he is stretching us one purpose.

We don't know how all these stories will end or all these experiences and the people and places and things where we are in life. But here's the thing. That class for me played a significant role in leading me to a career in broadcasting.

I've done all types of broadcasting, TV broadcasting for many, many years, and so years later from that class, I found myself on air at QVC selling of all things fitness equipment, fitness products, all things wellness. That's not an accident.

God doesn't waste a single uncomfortable moment. And what a sad day is when we limit ourselves to what's comfortable.

So where do you feel out of your league right now? Maybe it's at work or in parenting at church, or even just trying something new. Maybe we are comparing ourselves to the place we are in and the people around us feeling, thinking, why am I here?

Whatever that thing is for you right now, instead of backing out, what if we lean in and ask God,

Lord, why am I here? What are you showing me? What are you doing, Lord? What can you show me today? And he might not reveal the whole picture like I shared before. I mean, I didn't know till years later what that exercise class would be about, or at least partially about that class. I almost quit… built more than strength that built resistance and stamina and confidence and open doors that I never even imagined.

So this week, let's pick one uncomfortable place that we have been trying to get out of. Maybe we're avoiding and take one step back into it and show up again.

This is where we ask God for strength and not an escape route

Because maybe that very place, the one that we are just so wanting to get out of is the one that he's using to prepare us for what is next.

Let me give us a verse for our week to encourage us. Second Corinthians 12:9 says, “But He said to me, my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.

Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ's power may rest on me”. This verse reminds us that we don't have to be the strongest in the room.

God's power often shows up best when we feel the weakest.

Alright, well I hope you enjoyed the show today. This was a lot of fun for me. I hope you really got something out of it. Please, uh, join my Insight Out Community Group on Facebook. It's a private group. Again, I will leave all the links for you in the show notes. I'd love to see you there and get your feedback.

If you have ideas, uh, questions, things that you'd like to talk about, that's what the group is for. Be sure to subscribe and follow and just hit the little bell on some of these podcast notification platforms so that you get updates when I've released a new episode. And don't forget to share this with someone that might need some encouragement.

Thanks for listening and let's remember to choose wisely and let's live our lives in sight out.