Prior to even reading this article from the New York Times, I’m put into a flashback of a tangent from freshman year of high school in health class: The Great Mamut. We were discussing the resurgence of these creatures from the Ice Age, but my teacher was a bit silly in remembering the details of it making that a pretty big inside jokes between my friends and me (nerdy, yes). Looking at the year The Mammoth Cometh was written (2014), I wouldn’t be surprised if this was exactly the root of that conversation so long ago.
“Bringing extinct animals back to life is really happening — and it’s going to be very, very cool. Unless it ends up being very, very bad.” Nathaniel Rich, The Mammoth Cometh, The New York Times, 2014
I find it inspiring that what triggered part of the de-extinction of animals was the beauty and aesthetic of the passenger pigeon, seemingly so arbitrary. Further than bringing back animals just for beauty, scientists are working to bring back animals to help regulate our biosphere once again.
Reintroducing 100,000 mammoths to restore the step in the arctic is considered a success with this innovation.
These scientists are not raising passenger pigeons from their graves, rather are attempting to manipulate the DNA of other pigeons to mimic that of the passenger pigeons. I do however find it always frightening when scientists become incredibly talented at genetic modifications, as the line in those ethics must be set before things go too far.
