Screw this “Zoos and nature preserves” BS. How about ranches? We hunted the mammoth to extinction for a reason, and it’s got to be that they’re tasty. Like, sooooo much better tasting than cows or deer or moose that primitive humans with sharp sticks preferentially hunted them over smaller, much easier prey. Hunted them so much that they went extinct.
Tell me you don’t want to at least try a mammoth steak.
I think I am with iiandyiiii on this. Sufficient for what? Our cultural and scientific needs? I don’t think any amount of inspiration has been or ever will be “sufficient” for those.
~Max
Sure but for zoos. Same with wooly Rhino.
Many species humans have had a hand in making extinct in the last few hundred years. IF the biome can handle them and the niche is there. For example yes the thylacine.
But the vast hardwood chestnut forests that supported millions of passenger pigeons are gone, and apparently they wont breed in captivity, so no.
Stellers Sea cow would be great but do we have any DNA?
We could likely clear a island of rats and pigs and bring back the Dodo.
Ethics would forbid this.
I offer some detailed ways to address this issue (the answer is “yes, of course they’ll have rights” – Neanderthals were human, after all) in that thread. That doesn’t seem to me to be nearly as difficult a problem as some have suggested.
It is unlikely humans hunted the mammoths to extinction. More climate change.
Mammoths very likely taste like elephant.
I’m not sure about this, but even so – if it becomes scientifically feasible, then some country or even some rich person is likely to try it eventually. Best to at least talk about the best ways to do this ethically before then, IMO.
Without proper controls the next question could be “How much did the deaths of various species and/or ecosystems due to the unforeseen circumstances brought about by introducing these previously extinct species into the world inspire you?”
I’m not afraid to say that I’m in favor of “proper controls”. Anyone against?
Doing something ethically does not preclude others from doing the same thing unethically so again, extremely tight controls is the only solution.
aside, are such obviously necessary controls even possible?
The “oh HELL yeah” is severely hindering my objectivity.
Then I hope "Invasive Species" bolsters it.
I doubt we’ll resolve that in this thread… but I think the discussion would be much more fun if we presume this is possible.
It would be even more fun if the thread was titled “What are some fun species we could bring back from extinction?” and posted in IMHO, wouldn’t it?
All I am doing is bringing up points of debate that I think are valid.
Fair enough. I’ll defer to the expertise of any ecologist Dopers, but ISTM that having a nature reserve with woolly mammoths would pose no more risk to the surrounding environment then, say, having a wildlife reserve in Arkansas with African savannah wildlife (and I’m pretty sure I went to one of these as a teenager in the 90s). Or if that’s too dangerous for us, then something similar to putting elephants in the Smithsonian zoo in Washington DC.
I’m going to declare the Neanderthal thing a hijack.
You can count on it having it’s own Science Fiction Debate thread in the future.
Nope, not mammoths, or giant sloths. Completely arbitrarily, I’m setting it at only species extinct after 1000 CE
You may be thinking of ‘The Wilds’ in Central Ohio, Andy.
They have white rhinos, antelope, zebra, giraffe and other large animals non-native the Ohio. Even cheetah and painted dogs.
Anyway, on with the show. The question here is the ethics of bringing species back from the dead.
If they’re anything like elephant, then no. No, they are not tasty.