Temple Grandin
Animal scientist and livestock facility designer, Colorado State University; autism advocate
On the podcast
On the record
In May 2020, as meat-packing plants were shutting down nationwide, Grandin argued on the show that the industry's problem was concentrated, efficient-but-fragile supply chains rather than lack of raw capacity — generalizing the point to internet infrastructure, semiconductors, and generic drugs. Widespread meat shortages and plant closures in the following weeks bore out the fragility argument.
In their own words
“Imagine your body's a military base... the virus comes in and my immune system goes out and fights it... but then my soldiers just go berserk and instead of protecting me, they burn down the barracks. That's the cytokine storm.”May 2020, on the Vance Crowe Podcast, on the Vance Crowe Podcast
“When you concentrate a network into a few large nodes, you make that network efficient, real low cost but fragile. You distribute the network, it's more expensive. But when something breaks, it's more robust... Big is not bad. Big's fragile. There's a big difference.”May 2020, on the Vance Crowe Podcast, on the Vance Crowe Podcast
“One of the big mistakes they made in the schools is taking out theater, art, sewing, woodworking, auto shop, welding... we're losing skills.”May 2020, on the Vance Crowe Podcast, on the Vance Crowe Podcast
Where this conversation traveled
Moments in later episodes where Temple Grandin's ideas and work resurfaced, drawn from the show's transcripts.
Discussing market concentration in cattle pricing, guest Ashlee Mortimer mirrored Grandin's "big is fragile" framing from a pricing-power angle rather than supply-resilience.
Listen →Ashlee Mortimer, May 2020
Guest Kate Vogel referenced Grandin's observation that farming is especially resistant to outside "why" questions, using it to explain why the industry is often more receptive to outside experts than insiders.
Listen →Kate Vogel, July 2021
In a later keynote, Vance recounted Grandin telling him "you're never a prophet in your own land," a line he has since used to describe how expertise is often better received from outsiders than from someone's own community.
Listen →Vance Crowe keynote, December 2023
If you valued this conversation
- Kevin Folta — discussed one of Grandin's books on animal domestication in a separate episode
- Ashlee Mortimer — extended Grandin's concentrated-supply-chain critique to cattle market pricing power
- Jayson Lusk — covered COVID-era meat and food supply-chain disruption from an agricultural-economics angle
Link to this page
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I spoke with Vance Crowe on the Vance Crowe Podcast. The full conversation and transcript are here: https://articulate.ventures/podcast/guest/temple-grandin
This page is maintained by Articulate Ventures as part of the permanent record of the Vance Crowe Podcast. Quotes are drawn from episode transcripts.