Bringing Giant Tortoises Back From Extinction

fizzysister writes "The BBC reports that scientists at Yale are intending to resurrect an extinct species of Galapagos tortoise, the Geochelone elephantopus. Unfortunately, not in the style of Jurassic Park, so no tortoise-based theme parks just yet. They will, however, be using genetic profiling of living tortoises that carry some of the elephantopus genes, to select the most appropriate of these to mate and thus eventually (after a century or more) create a generation of 'pure' Geochelone elephantopus individuals."

Comments

TFA doesn't mention

[antifoidulus]

any plans on training these resurrected giant tortoises in the art of Ninjitsu. What a gip.

Re:TFA doesn't mention

[Cow Jones]

any plans on training these resurrected giant tortoises in the art of Ninjitsu.

Dude, those giant turtles are scary enough without Ninjitsu.
In fact, one of them is so huge and powerful that four elephants couldn't manage to keep it down, unless they in turn were weighed down by a huge disk-shaped rock.

CJ

Re:TFA doesn't mention

[Hognoxious]

There's where you're wrong, it isn't just one turtle.

Re:TFA doesn't mention

[BarryJacobsen]

There's where you're wrong, it isn't just one turtle.

That's right! It's turtles all the way down!

Re:TFA doesn't mention

[R2.0]

"What a gip."

It's "gyp", derived from "Gypsies". Please get your culturally insensitive references correct or the PC police will run out of work, and we don't want that, now do we? Otherwise they might get involved in more important things, like changing housing policy to provide loans to unqualified applicants.

Oh, wait...

(This offtopic flamebait brought to you by the letter Y and the number "I paid off my fucking loans why can't everybody else?!")

Re:TFA doesn't mention

[lpangelrob]

The original poster may have been referring to the fact that Ronald Reagan, the original Gipper, also failed to fund the U.S. Ninja/Giant Tortoise Defense Initiative.

Re:This could redefine the term species

[scorp1us]

I thought the definition rested on the the ability of the offspring to procreate successfully.

Which, I am told, does happen occasionally for jack-asses.

useful study animal

[damn_registrars]

Can someone explain the value of these giant tortioses in objective, real terms?

There are a few things that would be useful about bringing back an extinct tortoise.

For one, it allows the animal to reclaim its place in the ecosystem. I don't have information on what caused the extinction of this tortoise, but I know of certain mammals that are fond of killing slow-moving things. If the tortoise went extinct not by natural selection, then it may have left a void in its natural ecosystem that could have downstream effects on stability of the same.

Though perhaps more tangible is that some of these tortoises could live 150+ years. If we want to study aging and what mechanisms could prolong a healthy life, then something that lives extraordinarily long would be quite valuable. Of course we could study old trees, but we have more in common with other vertebrates.

Re:useful study animal

[damn_registrars]

What is behind your assumption that extinction by natural selection (as opposed, I assume, to human activity) is better for an ecosystem?

Generally natural selection takes out a species when it either no longer fills is niche in the ecosystem, or the niche no longer exists. If external forces (such as humans) knock a species out of existence, then the ecosystem is out of balance due to the loss of that species.

Isn't evidence of ecological catastrophes of all sizes common in the fossil record?

Ecological catastrophes are a good question. However, when something like that happens (be it asteroids, volcanoes, plate tectonics, etc), there are usually a very large number of species eliminated from an area at once. Yes, the ecosystem will come back, but it generally re-emerge with much different flora and fauna than what it had prior.

Catastrophes happen in the record, yes. But individual extinctions of species due to non-natural events are of a different scale and could have dramatic effects on a delicate, semi-isolated ecosystem such as the Galapagos.

hold it ... Geochelone elephantopus is NOT extinct

[neonprimetime]

gct says one species, Geochelone elephantopus, with 14 different races or sub-species, three of which are believed to be extinct.

So just to clarify, several races are extinct and this discusses bringing them back to life. The species itself though is not extinct ... it's alive and well.

Re:This could redefine the term species

[Hognoxious]

So a bunch of logicians and linguists are telling everyone that they are speaking the language incorrectly.

Not everyone. I for one use the term properly, or I don't use it at all.

This usage is widespread.

So is using "it's" as a genitive. So is the use of "loose" as an antonym of win. If the belief that the Moon is made of cheese was widespread, would it make it correct?

The "common mans bastardization" of the phrase has lead to a new meaning

I've seen plenty of people shoot themselves in the foot, but you've plumbed new depths there.