Oh sure, itās mammoths today - but pretty soon weāll all be fleeing from saber-toothed tigers.
We so limit the space for existing animals now, and give them such little consideration. Although itās an interesting scientific idea, I wonder how ethical it really is in the context of how people see themselves as the only important living beings.
Iām for the passenger pigeon, as there is an ecological niche, and a need, for such a creature. The woolly mammoth, mmm, errr, I dunno. With elephants already on endangered lists, that one doesnāt seem like such a good idea. I mean, we can learn something from āJurassic Parkā, canāt we? As in āonly bring back speciesā whose butts we can kickā?
Mid-90ās I believe there was a push to introduce the elephant into the American midwest in order to bring back megafauna like the bison and, historically, like the mammoth. So there is, technically, an ecological niche in terms of the biology of the area, but the room? Maybe not so much.
Letās get robust protections and restoration of habitat for threatened and endangered species going, and then weāll talk.
Good idea? I donāt know but DO IT. I want pet dinosaurs the size of small dogs and as intelligent as parrots. In the mean time I would settle for some wooly mammoth steaks.
Honestly I donāt quite understand the ethical question here. If we were talking about an intelligent, self-aware species like the neanderthal, then I could understand the debate. But, for example, if we brought back a couple woolly mammoths, what would be the big deal? Iām questioning sincerely, enlighten me. -Edit- I mean, I guess I could read the articles and links, but if anyone wanted to respond anyway, that would be cool.
There must be some room in Siberia or thereabouts. Iām pretty sure mammoths fall squarely within the āanimals whose butts we can kick if we have toā category, considering our ancestors took them down with little more than pointy sticks.
What if mammoths are incredibly efficient methane producers and were responsible for ending the ice age with their byproductsā¦
If we are going to bring back prehistoric creatures, I vote for Sophia Loren from One Million Years B.C. (a good proof of concept since we can get a living tissue sample).
That was then. Mammothās would now have access to modern weaponry, which would allow them to turn into sub-zero machine gun platforms.
The other side of the coin would of course be that mammoth is delicious, and we would get to eat them into extinction all over again.
Do we really need the wool that much, or is this a niche market thing?
If thereās a reason to buy more guns then America is all for it.
According to many researchers who have observed them, elephants lead very emotionally rich lives and demonstrate social attachment behaviors that appear to be every bit as genuine as those in great apes (that includes us!).
Theyāre also pretty good painters.
The current evidence strongly suggests that elephants actually are self-aware. That statement comes straight from a well-respected veteran researcher in animal cognition, and heās not alone in his position. I had the opportunity to take one of his classes and I got the impression that heās pretty conservative about these sort of things, so to hear him say that definitely grabbed my attention.
Given that elephants are descendants of wooly mammoths, itās plausible that their wooly ancestors would have similar consciousness and social behavior. Hence, the ethical concern.
Pretty sure technology has changed enough since prehistoric times to make mammoth hunting a much easier task should we ever need toā¦
(on the list of things you couldnāt pay me to shoot)[both this gun and mammoths]
Not quite.
I think the best and most evil use of this technology would be to bring humans back long after weāre extinct. Set up a time capsule to 3D print a human when the container has detected that the next ice/ash/petal age has passed then out pops some new dudes to ruin our rock again. I wonder how many people are thinking small time about this, like 3D print resurrecting Walt Disneys or Hitlers.
Oh yeah, I vote that we make Jurassic Park a reality if we can even though the failure of itās security is inevitable.
The scale of the hunting was incredible: hereās an introduction to the kind of gun that was used to shoot passenger pigeons and waterfowl. They could fire over 1 pound of shotgun pellets at one time and take down 50 birds in one shot.
Thatās true, I did neglect that elephants, and possibly mammoths, are a little more advanced on the emotional level. But Iām not convinced thatās the main ethical reasons theyāre talking about here. And weāre talking about the passenger pigeon as well. Sometimes it seems the conversation centers around āif they went extinct once, then itās for a reason, and it would be unethical to try and bring them back, because they went extinct for a reason.ā
Thanks for the clarification. The way they discussed wooly mammoths in the short feature made it sound like they were ancestors. I shouldāve been curious enough to research that myself. And now that Iāve done just that, Iāve learned something else new: pachyderms? Not a monophyletic groupā poly, in fact.
