Scientists Aim to Revive the Woolly Mammoth

live Science ^ | 11 Apr 05 | Bill Christensen

[BigEdLB]

nuke r.

We send the cat to Florida, and point to George Felos' office... See kitty... Behind that door... DINNER!

[sportutegrl]

Are you sure this isn't the plot for Ice Age Two?

[The Great Yazoo]

Does anyone on this planet have any concept of the Law of Unintended Consequences?

Good point! What now long-dormant diseases were hosted by Woolly Mammoths? No one knows.

[incredulous joe]

Sounds like they must have a lot of extra dough laying around there in Japan. God love 'em. They better not come arounfd asking Uncle Sam for a handout to revitalize mammoth sperm.

[orionblamblam]

> Immanuel Velikovshy thought otherwise.

Velikovsky was a goober. Ranks up there with Van Danniken.

> The mammoths became extinct when Siberia was suddenly thrust into the artic circle

Hogwash. Mammoths ranged over the entire northern hemisphere... Europe, Asia, North America. Last species of mammoth to go extinct only did so in the last 5000 or so years (a dwarf species on some island or other).

> Whatever killed mammoths must have happened suddenly.

Individuals, yes. Eat some daisies, go for a walk on a frozen lake, break through the ice, die and get frozen. Pretty simple, no need for Jupiter to spit out Venus as a comet to explain it.

[Professional Engineer]

Ice Age Park ping

[PBRSTREETGANG]

Does anyone on this planet have any concept of the Law of Unintended Consequences? Anyone?

I believe that was the job of the Jeff Goldblum character in Jurassic Park.

(Nobody listened to him either.)

[incredulous joe]

Ask an Australian Rabbit.

[lmailbvmbipfwedu]

It would seem to me that if evolution is the way of the world it would work both ways. It should be possible to de-evolve our DNA to the starting point and we would have all of the missing links plus our ancestors.....Want a T.Rex; de-evolve a bird, or what ever........

[orionblamblam]

> What now long-dormant diseases were hosted by Woolly Mammoths?

Irrelevant. A genetically recreated mammoth would not bring those diseases with it (apart from genetic diseases, of course, which are no threat to others), anymore than it would bring its memories or the mud stains on its fur.

[ckilmer]

so jesus promised that at the end of the age he would return and raise from the dead in the flesh all those who believed in him.

/////////
he didn't say anything about wolly mammoths.

[Luddite Patent Counsel]

Surely there are better things to spend money on, no?

Surely there are better things to do than to fret about how other people spend their own money, no?

[NeonKnight]

Direct cloning would never work...perhapse the interbreeding concept may.

A direct clone of a 10,000 year old wooley mammoth probably wouldn't last 10 days outdoors. There are so many new and evolved viruses that his immunity system just wouldn't be up to the task.

[Richard Kimball]

I don't know about Jurassic Park, but it would make a great episode of South Park.

[orionblamblam]

> Want a T.Rex; de-evolve a bird, or what ever........

Already been partially done. Chicken (IIRC) DNA was tinkered with, and some dormant genes were re-activated, producing chickens with teeth.

[tfecw]

Hmm for JP I'd say the law gets fuzzy. Certainly it applied to the dinosaurs mating, definitely didn't see that one coming.

Now for the dinosaurs getting loose and eating a bunch of people, well it doesn't take a rocket scientist or a DNA scientist to see that one coming.

[The Great Yazoo]

Eat some daisies, go for a walk on a frozen lake, break through the ice, die and get frozen.

Yes. Simple, except that:

as many as ten million mammoths are believed buried in permanently frozen Russian soil.

That's a lot of walking on frozen lakes, breaking through ice, dieing, and getting frozen!

[Red Badger]

...10,000 years ago as warming weather reduced their food...

Glo-BULL warming without George Bush's fault?.........

[PatrickHenry]

EvolutionPing

A pro-evolution science list with over 260 names. See list's description at my homepage. FReepmail to be added/dropped.

[GOP Jedi]

"Woolly mammoths became extinct about 10,000 years ago as warming weather reduced their food sources"

Warming weather would be, um, global warming? Is there a reason they don't use this perfectly accurate term to describe a process industralization had nothing to do with?

BTW, Kinki is a prefecture in Japan near Osaka. Dated a girl from Kinki Dai (university) once...