Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

cell.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 91 posts

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#41

Post by ozim »

AlexandrB wrote: post #19
cmh89 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally don't want to live in a bland, dead world. To me its like climate change. The climate change, just like species go extinct. But humans are exasperating both processes in a ways that will ultimately make living on earth worse for future generations.

It won't be a dead world - but I sure hope everyone likes rats, cockroaches, and jellyfish - because these are the species that seem to be well adapted to living in environments where other animals have been driven out.

Well there will be crabs as well because of carcinisation

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#42

Post by DennisP »

leidenfrost wrote: post #18

I don't see the point of de-extinction other than naturist nostalgia. The problem around de-extinction is that you can't just shoehorn a new species into a habitat that already filled the void left by a past extinction. If some marsupial in Australia got extinct because it was replaced by feral cats, then that habitat won't welcome that marsupial anymore. And there's nothing we can do about it. Even if we somehow peo…

Sometimes the holes don't get filled. Mammoths in northern steppes are one example, and getting them back would actually be pretty helpful.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/can-bringing-b...

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#43

Post by mc32 »

leidenfrost wrote: post #18

I don't see the point of de-extinction other than naturist nostalgia. The problem around de-extinction is that you can't just shoehorn a new species into a habitat that already filled the void left by a past extinction. If some marsupial in Australia got extinct because it was replaced by feral cats, then that habitat won't welcome that marsupial anymore. And there's nothing we can do about it. Even if we somehow peo…

It's unlikely these resurrected species will inhabit their ancestral habitats but rather, like Jurassic Park, satisfy human curiosity and entertainment for nature itself does not care one way or the other.

Just think, eventually and extinct species zoo garden, not unlike JP, except more tame species... maybe. It would be a destination attraction for sure.

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#44

Post by ElevenLathe »

leidenfrost wrote: post #32
Ensorceled wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The habitat wasn't destroyed nor hurt in anyway. It just changed. That's an interesting way to describe the massive effect humans are having on pretty much every habitat on the planet ... "It just changed."

Because in the end, that's really it. Even if it's due to human intervention and even if that makes us feel sad. At some point, a new habitat will reach a new balance with our introduced species and there's no going back. And yes, there may be less diversity in species all over the world (for the time being) thanks to that. But once the new species learn to reproduce and survive in a new place, then that is the "new"…

I can imagine de-extinction and other genetic engineering techniques being useful to increase the amount of diversity in many habitats, which will theoretically give them a better chance of weathering huge environmental changes (as natural selection has a broader base of genes to work against). Since we need the biosphere to continue existing in a pretty narrow range of configurations in order to keep us alive (for example, we probably don't have the technology yet to sustain our civilization in the face of the whole planet becoming a desert, or not providing enough oxygen to breathe without artificial assistance), this might be a useful technique.

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#45

Post by andrewclunn »

leidenfrost wrote: post #18

I don't see the point of de-extinction other than naturist nostalgia. The problem around de-extinction is that you can't just shoehorn a new species into a habitat that already filled the void left by a past extinction. If some marsupial in Australia got extinct because it was replaced by feral cats, then that habitat won't welcome that marsupial anymore. And there's nothing we can do about it. Even if we somehow peo…

Rich people spend money on a fancy boat, nobody gives a damn. Rich people spend their money on some charity or philanthropic endeavor, "Shame! You should spend that money on THIS charity instead!"

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#46

Post by BurningFrog »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #5

>Critics say that Colossal’s money would be better spent in protecting existing species, rather than de-extinct animals that have been dead for thousands of years. Maybe that’s true, but it’s extremely unlikely that this $150M would have gone to conservation otherwise! If rich people want to spend their money on de-extinction, and bolster reproductive technologies in the meantime, then we say “let ‘em.” There's a Fre…

Protecting existing species is a different goal though.

It's always true that if you have different goals you'd spend resources differently.

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#47

Post by anonymous_sorry »

leidenfrost wrote: post #32
Ensorceled wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The habitat wasn't destroyed nor hurt in anyway. It just changed. That's an interesting way to describe the massive effect humans are having on pretty much every habitat on the planet ... "It just changed."

Because in the end, that's really it. Even if it's due to human intervention and even if that makes us feel sad. At some point, a new habitat will reach a new balance with our introduced species and there's no going back. And yes, there may be less diversity in species all over the world (for the time being) thanks to that. But once the new species learn to reproduce and survive in a new place, then that is the "new"…

Human societies are coming to value and protect biodiversity. Extending your argument this is just another change in the habitat, one for which native species may be better adapted. Judging by the rules on what you're allowed to bring in to the country, Australia now appears to take invasive species very seriously.

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#48

Post by joshuahedlund »

leidenfrost wrote: post #32
Ensorceled wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The habitat wasn't destroyed nor hurt in anyway. It just changed. That's an interesting way to describe the massive effect humans are having on pretty much every habitat on the planet ... "It just changed."

Because in the end, that's really it. Even if it's due to human intervention and even if that makes us feel sad. At some point, a new habitat will reach a new balance with our introduced species and there's no going back. And yes, there may be less diversity in species all over the world (for the time being) thanks to that. But once the new species learn to reproduce and survive in a new place, then that is the "new"…

> At some point, a new habitat will reach a new balance with our introduced species and there's no going back.

> And yes, there may be less diversity in species all over the world (for the time being) thanks to that. But once the new species learn to reproduce and survive in a new place, then that is the "new" state of the habitat.

Yeah but won't that be just as true of a re-introduced de-extincted species? Mammoths / mammoth-ish elephants might change the new equilibrium in Siberia just like it changed when they were extincted in the first place... maybe the change could even be for the good. Why is the latter just accepted but the former is not?

There's this weird status quo bias that seems to say "ecosystems re-adjusting if humans deliberately re-introduce a species is artificial and must be bad" while also saying "ecosystems re-adjusting when humans literally do everything else that humans do is somehow natural or fated"

Re: De-Extinction? Surely You’re Joking

#49

Post by Robotbeat »

DarkContinent wrote: post #33

Is there someone on HN who can speak to how fast gene editing technology is improving? I was a bit skeptical of the author's claim that construction of a mammoth genome would require 5000 years, but I couldn't find any information in a cursory search on what the technology improvement speed is.

Well it used to take ~infinity years as the technique didn’t exist to do it at all.

Claims like “it’ll take 5000 years” are always funny because they’re so incredibly status quo biased, without the least bit of self consciousness of how remarkable the progress has been in the last 50 years on things like this.

Humans overestimate progress in the near term and underestimate progress in the long term.

Post reply on HN