Resurrecting Extinct Animals

[marksound]

Did anyone see that spot on Discovery last week where they were releasing that seal back into the wild and the shark jumped up and ate it? Yeah, that was awesome.

Humans are at the top of the food chain, and we do what we do. But nature does what nature does. If a species is strong enough to survive, it will survive regardless what humans do to kill it off. We have successfully saved a few species from extinction, but for how long? We don't know. We can't know, because we can't see into the future.

I'm not suggesting that we start killing things all higgledy-piggledy just to find out. On the contrary, I was taught to conserve nature, taking only what we need.

But if we become so arrogant as to think that we can control the destiny of lesser species, bringing them back from extinction at a whim, well, that's a recipe for disaster. Look at what has happened when we have introduced non-indigenous animals into the wild. With no natural predators, they ran amuck and nearly destroyed the environment for other species. We can't possibly think that we are so smart that we can dictate the natural order of things.

I like to throw a particular quote into discussions like this one:

"History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men ... GODZILLA!"

 

[thestrangequark]

some people just hate progress, scared, sad, cowards

Progress at any cost, eh? Some people think before they speak and act.

No one here has advocated progress at any cost. You're attacking a strawman.

 

[EmoBorg]

Reintroducing the quagga, moa, dodo, tasmanian tiger and other recently extinct animal is not a bad idea.Their natural habitat and food source are still there. They are just returning back to their natural surrondings. It is not like we are introducing alien animal species into another environment like the way humans introduced rabbits into Australia or pythons into Florida. The mammoth, wooly rhinoceros and other large ice age mammals would be harder.where would you put them?

 

[Miss Chicken]

The quagga is an interesting case. It is now known that it was a subspecies of the plains zebra and it is believe that the gene pool to recreate the quagga still exists in the plains zebra.

However there is some debate if the new animals will truely be quaggas rather than just quagga-like.

It might also be possible to breed back the Barbary Lion and the Auroch.

I posted an article the other day about a woman in New Zealand who reported that there was a baby moa in her garden but it turned out just to be a feral emu. If emus can exist in the wild in New Zealand than I have no doubt some of the smaller species of moa could.

 

[scotpens]

. . . We can't possibly think that we are so smart that we can dictate the natural order of things.

It's a bit late for that sentiment. We've been altering, modifying, manipulating, and yes, improving on the "natural order of things" (a meaningless concept in any case) ever since Homo erectus began making and controlling fire 400,000 years ago.

True, sometimes we push nature a little too far and nature comes back and bites us in the ass. (The Dust Bowl of the 1930s comes to mind.) But we learn from those mistakes.

BTW, I'm still waiting for that mammoth burger.

 

[TheSubCommander]

I can see cloning animals that are still alive but on the endangered species list, or are recently extinct as a direct result of humans. That is basically restoring something humans caused, but bringing back extinct species that were caused by nature just seems wrong to me.

 

[EmoBorg]

I can see cloning animals that are still alive but on the endangered species list, or are recently extinct as a direct result of humans. That is basically restoring something humans caused, but bringing back extinct species that were caused by nature just seems wrong to me.

How about the mammoths. They became extinct due to human actions and climate change.

 

[Data's Cat]

It might also be possible to breed back the ... Auroch.

That's what we need! A giant cow!

 

[JarodRussell]

I can see cloning animals that are still alive but on the endangered species list, or are recently extinct as a direct result of humans. That is basically restoring something humans caused, but bringing back extinct species that were caused by nature just seems wrong to me.

How about the mammoths. They became extinct due to human actions and climate change.

Climate change, yes. Human cause is still in debate. Mammoths didn't adapt to the climate change, had a hard time and went extinct. Of course predators that adapted well to the climate change killed them. Humans weren't the only thing that hunted Mammoths.


If you brought back the Mammoths, you would put them into a climate that is even more different than the one they were adapted too, because - as SubCommander said - too much time went past. There's also no habitat for them, where would you put them?

There's no problem with preserving currently endangered species using cloning. But the better way to preserve them is to stop fucking with their living environment. Otherwise it's like "Let's burn this forest, we're cloning those animals and put them into zoos. And then they are preserved." That's the wrong way.

 

[EmoBorg]

Climate change, yes. Human cause is still in debate. Mammoths didn't adapt to the climate change, had a hard time and went extinct. Of course predators that adapted well to the climate change killed them. Humans weren't the only thing that hunted Mammoths.


If you brought back the Mammoths, you would put them into a climate that is even more different than the one they were adapted too, because - as SubCommander said - too much time went past. There's also no habitat for them, where would you put them?

There's no problem with preserving currently endangered species using cloning. But the better way to preserve them is to stop fucking with their living environment. Otherwise it's like "Let's burn this forest, we're cloning those animals and put them into zoos. And then they are preserved." That's the wrong way.

We had many animals that became extinct in recent centuries, whose natural environment still exist. The Tasmanian tiger, Quagga, Great Auk, Moa, Dodo, Passenger Pigeon, Liverpool Pigeon, Golden Toad, Caribbean Monk Seal, Pyrenean Ibex, Bubal Hartebeest and others are good examples.

The Barbary Lion, Atlas bear and North African elephant are also recently extinct species and humans were the cause of it.

The Mammoth is gone and so is the environment they lived in. Too bad we cannot say what caused it's extinction.

 

[Davros]

The Mammoth is gone and so is the environment they lived in. Too bad we cannot say what caused it's extinction.

I doubt it had a single cause.

 

[Mr Awe]

If it can be done humanely, let's do it! And for as many species as possible. There's no telling what we might learn!

Mr Awe

 

[Miss Chicken]

One thing not mentioned in this thread is the need for suitable surrogates. Not much of an issue with thylacines where the babies are born extremely small and it is possible to use Tasmanian devils or quolls though even then one couldn't use devils until the survival of that species is at first guaranteed.

But what surrogate would you use for a mammoth? I assume that a mammoth new-born would be significant larger than new-born elephant?

Edited to add - just read the a new born mammoth was about the size of a new born elephant so maybe no problem there.

 

[scotpens]

^^ That raises the question of cloning extinct birds like the dodo, great auk and passenger pigeon. How would the process work for oviparous species?

 

[B.J.]

One thing not mentioned in this thread is the need for suitable surrogates. Not much of an issue with thylacines where the babies are born extremely small and it is possible to use Tasmanian devils or quolls though even then one couldn't use devils until the survival of that species is at first guaranteed.

But what surrogate would you use for a mammoth? I assume that a mammoth new-born would be significant larger than new-born elephant?

Edited to add - just read the a new born mammoth was about the size of a new born elephant so maybe no problem there.

One TV program I saw a few years ago was all about the possibility of cloning a mammoth. Apparently you would have to go through several generations before you'd get close to a full mammoth, because the way they showed it would have to be done, is the first baby would be half mammoth and half elephant. I don't remember the specifics, but I think it had something to do with the surrogates.

 

[Miss Chicken]

Good point - so far only mammals have been cloned. I imagine birds, reptiles, amphibians etc would be far more difficult becuase an egg would have to be created. Maybe an embryo could be injected into a newly laid infertile egg?

 

[Data's Cat]

Maybe an embryo could be injected into a newly laid infertile egg?

My memory may be faulty, but I *think* I've read about something like this being done with bird eggs in laboratories. (quail or chicken eggs or something).

 

[flandry84]

All the while trying our best to make whatever wildlife we have today extinct.

First of all, nobody is trying to make existing wildlife extinct; there are, however, many people trying to preserve existing wildlife. Second of all, if we had the technology to clone extinct animals, that would mean we would have the technology to clone existing animals, and would therefore be able to save them from extinction.

So the poaching of elephants,tigers,leopards etc. doesn't happen?
There is no trade in exotic animals/birds/fish?
There are no game ranches where for a price you can slaughter imported animals?
Please give me directions to the alternate universe you live in.

 

[Miss Chicken]

He didn't say that those things didn't happen.

The hunting of animals does not equal a wilful extinction of animals even if their extinction is the end result of hunting. The motive is to make money, to feed humans, the taking of a trophy or the protection of farm animals etc not to rid the world of the species completely.

 

[RJDiogenes]

^^ Exactly.