# Breeding lobotomized animals for temperament (or how to breed tame tigers)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breeding-lobotomized-animals-for-temperament-or-how-to-breed-tame-tigers/206925>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 11, 2003, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breeding-lobotomized-animals-for-temperament-or-how-to-breed-tame-tigers/206925 "2003-10-11T23:37:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![\_possum\_stalker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/_/b77776/32.png) [@\_possum\_stalker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/_possum_stalker)\
**Post date:** [October 12, 2003, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breeding-lobotomized-animals-for-temperament-or-how-to-breed-tame-tigers/206925/21 "2003-10-12T23:20:34Z")

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A long-term Russian study domesticated silver foxes in something like 30 years using selective breeding. The main result was, as Astro pointed out above, paedomorphosis, AKA making adults more like juveniles: shorter snouts, reduced testosterone production ([www.bsas.org.uk/meetings/annlproc/Pdf2001/016.pdf](http://www.bsas.org.uk/meetings/annlproc/Pdf2001/016.pdf)), cute-as-buttons, etc.

Breeding lobotimized animals won’t make lobotimized offspring- its a (horrible, outdated) surgical procedure. If you break your arm, your children won’t be born with broken arms.

That said- for God’s sake, lobotimizing tigers? for a stage act?! Not only immoral and unethical, but prolly a bad idea- memorize equation 2, below:

smart=trainable=no bite

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