Should the Wooly Mammoth Live Again?

Should we be cloning Wooly Mammoths?

  • No, They died for a reason.

    Votes: 73 28.5%
  • Yes, we could learn a lot from studying a live one.

    Votes: 117 45.7%
  • No, Momma elephant doesn't want a hairy kid.

    Votes: 8 3.1%
  • Yes, I want my own pet Wolly.

    Votes: 48 18.8%
  • Beats me, what is a wolly mammoth?

    Votes: 10 3.9%

  • Total voters
    256
According to recent findings, those people who are not of pure African origin have from 1% to 4% Neanderthal components in their genome. They speculate that inheritance most importantly helped to 'acclimate' the immune systems of those early homo sapiens moving from Africa to a new environment. Interesting stuff. So you aren't alone.
 
I like the idea of a real-life Jurassic Park without the chaos/security breaching aspect. I presume we would only gradually and in a calculated manner release them unto the wild, if ever. If we can, there's the issue of their interaction with species in their chosen habitat. No sense in bringing back an animal if it must only be held in containment, though.
 
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odswge5onwY

I'd love to see these fellas brought back so I can update my avatar and learn to spell it properly. They were absolutely unique and were hunted to extinction by the early settlers. So yeah, by the same token I would like to see selective genetic "corrections", including the mammoth. Emphasis on selective though.
 
Jurassic Park? Movies have always depicted what could and, without fail, always goes wrong. I'm sure there were scares about some "mad" doctor grafting body parts from one person to another. We do it all the time with success (liver, kidney, lung transplants). You don't hear about a pancreas that took over and reeks havoc to a small town. We went to the moon and no to many aliens there. We go out to sea and rarely do giant squid take down our naval ships.

There are plenty of endangered species that are having trouble surviving as we speak. Black-footed ferrets may make a comeback. Pandas are slowly thriving and Ocelots. I don't think the Giant Panda and ocelots are wimpy creatures that have many predators, yet they can't seem to get the population stable.

If we have trouble with endangered species from going extinct, I highly doubt trying to keep 5 or so Mammoths from getting out of hand. I say "about 5" because you can't expect to clone two mammoths (each male/female) to breed. What if you picked the "Audrey Hepburn" and tried to pair it up to the dumb "mouth-breather" mammoth. How's the phrase go?:

"I wouldn't even if you were the last Wooly Mammoth on Earth"......

also....would the phrase "let's address the Wooly Mammoth in the room" trump the elephant idiom?
 
So Simi, are you in your philosophy phase of life? If we bring them back, ya better protect your vegetation...............
 
I think you may need to create a 'herd' as they may well have been 'social creatures', like elephants.

Ready for a herd of Wooly Mammoths ?
 
Who even knows if what they ate is available now? There are already a bunch of invasive species that have gotten away from us. You say they can't run very fast? We can't even stop Kudzu, and that's a PLANT!
 
The scientist figure they could do it but don't stop and think if they should.
This wasn't just some random idea. Considering they been studying the possibilities since the 1990s I'm guessing they've put quite a bit of thought into this.

cubdog
 
How about "toy" Wooly Mammoths ... breed some cute little jobbies maybe 2-3 foot tall ...
let THEM have their way with the kudzu and that damned Virginia creeper weed in the backyard -
maybe they'd take out that invasive bamboo that some dummies keep planting around here!
 
YES - Eating a Wooly Mammoth burger is on my "Bucket List". Rumour has it they taste like chicken....a BIIIIIIG chicken.....
 
Just like the Bison, mammoths are large, easy to count, slow to breed and relatively speaking, didn't die out all that long ago. Jurasic Park really doesn't apply here.

What's really scary is a species that is so sucessful that they cause mass extinctions of untold thousands of species small and large. More extinctions happen every day in persuit of resources. So sucessful they may even threaten the ability of the planet to support life some day.

We have a problem far, far worse than any Jurasic Park scenerio. Jacques Cousteau in the 1960's was asked by a reporter "What do you see as the world greatest problem". The reporter was expecting him to respond with an answer regarding mans impact on the oceans, but rather got the response "The greatest problem facing mankind is his own success. The earth cannot sustain the growing population of human kind".
 
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