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TigerCloning
BeaverWise writes "Looks like puss and boots is coming back.
The last known Tasmanian tiger, or thylacine, died in captivity in 1936, but a team of Australian biologists believes the animal's extinction may simply be a 70-year hiccup. DNA from a Tasmanian tiger has been found, and cloning is under way."
I wonder if they'll have to repair the Tiger DNA with that from frogs, then we can have spontaneous sex-changes and let them reproduce!
...to what extent do you repopulate the wild? Do you produce three or four for display in zoos, or do you reproduce millions of them (a la the Passenger Pigeon) to put them back into nature at the levels they once were?
This does, of course, assume that the cloning works perfectly. If it does, it'll have a significant impact on the Endangered Species list - don't worry about killing off endangered animals, because "they" can always make more! It might do more harm than good in that respect.
Evan
I didn't read the story very closely so I don't know if it mentions how many tasmanian fetuses (fetii?) they have. If it's a small number, though, this exercise is relatively pointless. Let's say it was one female and one male. They make 50 copies of each and breed the males with the females. The children of these parents will actually be genetic siblings. You don't want to interbreed siblings for well-known reasons.
Two females and two males are only slightly better--the children will consist of three groups: full siblings, half-siblings and strangers. But the grandchildren will be (carry the one, add two) all full and half siblings? Anyway, you can see my point. They need a "breeding population of genetic samples" if they want to do more than a publicity stunt.
I should also note that while the animal produced IS a tasmanian whatever, this extinction/cloning cycle will probably result in long-term speciation. That is, X years from now (for some X less than the "normal" amount) these tasmanians will be a different species than the original. Why? Because we chose a non-random sample AND subjected the new animal to new conditions (unless they plan on releasing them into the wild).
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Actually, we can turn back the clock (i.e., bring back the tiger). You seem to be arguing that we shouldn't because we can't. That's just silly. We can and we will.
Actually, there is no cosmic plan; we learn what we can about the world through own own brains and try to get along as best we can. And humans deal with nature not by adapting (in the sense of passive adjustment), but by understanding and adapting it to us. Tiger extinct? Let's learn to bring it back. Hell, we're close to bringing back the Wooly Mammoth from the last ice age, 10k years ago.
Using science to figure out the universe around us is what we do. This is just one more example--and if it brings back a tiger, then it's a net benefit, so I don't see the problem.
Stevethis technique is actually the scientific basis for the Second Coming
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Oh, that's right, I forgot. If a beaver builds a dam, that's nature; if we build a hydroelectric plant, that's science. Humans are intrinsicly evil and have no place on this planet. [end sarcasm]
All that's happened is that we've got a workable intelligence, so instead of creatures evolving to the environment, we're creatures changing the environment to suit ourselves. I still don't see why this kind of thing isn't considered nature. People seem to act like cloning is against the rules, to which I say, what rules?
I live in Tasmania, and so I feel this is quite close to home. When White Tasmanians came here, there was a thriving population of Tasmanian Tigers, or Native Wolves as they were called back then. It was thought that there population could cope with the amount of hunting that was going on. However by the late 1890s, They were becoming scarce. They weren't as easy to find. The last of the species died in Hobart Zoo in 1936. It was thought that the Thylacine was extinct, as no confirmed sightings have occurred since then. There are many unconfirmed sightings every year. Some people think that there is still a small remainant colony in some parts of Tasmania, mainly the SW World Heritage Area because of it's remoteness. That part of Tassie is still very wild.
The Thylacine would probably benefit from being ressurected. If there is still a wild group, this may help to boost their numbers. I think the tiger should be brought back, not just because it is an extinct animal, or possibly endangered (unlikely tho), but because it represents a group of mammals (I think is) unique to Tasmania, The Carnivorous Marsupials. Most carnivorous marsupials that developed on mainland Australia were squeezed out by the dingo, a close relative of the dog. The dingo did not reach Tasmania and as such its CM populations were left undisturbed. The Tasmanian Devil is also a CM. However the thylacine was the only active hunter. I just hope that enough genetic diversity can be found among the 'samples' to provide a stable population.
Your making the assumption that the "Evolutionary Process" is a process that is heading towards a specific goal. As if the process has some sort of will, some plan.
Natural selection is truely a simple concept, and can be summed up in 2 statments:
1) Change happens
2) Organisms that can survive and multiply better than others, will do so.
The ice age comes, any animals that can survive in extreme cold will survive. They will adapt to it. Animals with genes for thicker fur and better metabolism will survive and pass on those genes more readily than those that don't have them.
Its simply a model for application to situations. You could say that the environment became unfavorable to these tigers, as they had more predators. They were unable to adapt in time to survive these predators.
Thats no moral judgement. That doesn't mean the tigers shouldn't exist because they were unable to survive hunting. It just means that they didn't.
Nature isn't moral. It just is.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
In principle (given sufficiently advanced genetic technology) it might be possible to identify and eliminate the recessive lethal alleles from the tiger gene pool. It would then be safe for cloned animals to interbreed.
I think that, in order to determine recessive lethal genes, you need to have a sufficiently large population ... currently , such genes are discovered through epidemiology ... so this process would be quite impossible.
Anyway, the danger of cross breeding is to the immediate offbringing. After a few generations anyway, provided the first children don't die too early, the problem should go away.
> It's the way things work, and fighting it is only self-congratulatory nonsense.
Not meaning to be rude, but: Utter nonsense.
"Survival Of The Fittest" isn't some great plan - it's a description of a process. You seem to be saying that we should just lie back and take whatever comes; after all, if something becomes extinct then it just wasn't fit enough, and it's somehow right that it should be dead! What if we nuked half of the planet? Oh, "Survival Of The Fittest", those creatures weren't fit enough to survive, and we shouldn't try to save them...
If you really want to base your view on "Survival Of The Fittest" as a big unbreakable rule, look at it this way. That tiger has proven to *be* fit even after it become extinct. By being an interesting creature, it is fitter than others that we might bring back. Another example: furry seals get more protection than slimy eels. Why? Because they are *fitter* (cuter).
best wishes,
Mike.
Tales from behind the Lagom Curtain