Also, what is the game plan here? To sell GMO exhibits to zoos? To try to do a Jurassic Park, but without dinosaurs?
Releasing wolves in Yellowstone stabilised the ecosystem there. Releasing direwolves on Wall St might stabilise the economy.
They are making game of thrones real. Lots of whores and titties, big ass wolves, religious cults taking over government, zombies, crucifixions, people being eaten by dragons.
In an ideal world, it’d be to de-extinct fairly modern things that filled a niche that is no longer being filled. This is far from an ideal world though, and the reason in this world is to make press releases to get people talking about it so they can raise more money while not creating anything of actual value.
Okay let’s play that out… Everyone gets excited, they make big strong wolves and get funding… Now what?
They’ve got a pack of extra big wolves raised under human care. Do they kill them? Do they sell them? Do they open their own park? Do they just keep them for study? Do they just leave the gate open and let them go?
I don’t think you read my comment. They wouldn’t bring back dire wolves that don’t have a niche in the current ecosystem. They’d bring back things that have gone extinct in the last century or so, or maybe artificially modify existing creatures to fit niches that are no longer filled. This project isn’t doing what would happen in an ideal world. It’s only making garbage to sell to investors to make a bunch of money and bail.
The point is to get people excited so they can get funding to keep developing the technologies that will make this kind of genetic engineering commercially viable
I just watched some youtube video and they were talking about how the CIA and big moneys people are heavily invested in this company. Makes me think they’re in it to make genetically modified animals or even people for “national security” or something.
I wouldn’t call it de-extinction unless they made something that is 100% identical genetically to the thing they are bringing back.
And they don’t have 100% of the dire wolf DNA sequenced, nor do they have DNA of the dire wolf’s extinct ancestor between it and Canis lupus. It’s a grey wolf with genes from a dire wolf added in.
Same question: If a species evolves to adapt to a changed environment, is the original species extinct?
Yes, yes it is. That’s why a species ‘going extinct’ doesn’t always mean that it suddenly died off.
Nah that’s a great way to start a conversation
Love this one
