At Thanksgiving dinner, I talked a bit about this article on mapping the genome of Neanderthals (and the eventual possibility of cloning them). I bet this won't be too controversial.
No, but it will end evolution as we know it. Species flourish not by any 'survival of the fittest' (or seredipitous unfittest, as it should have been called), but by the whim of man. What species are doing well? Roses, flowery annuals, medicinal plants and possibly Neanderthals, if we wish.
To Sean and Jim. First of all, if we start bringing back species there's no reason to start eliminating existing species to make room. Human encroachment on habitat and just plain hunting to extinction has already eliminated too many species to name. Maybe to atone for our sins we could bring some back.
Second, although Jim claims that we have reached the end of evolution, I think that the same princples of natural selection will continue to operate. We humans are just part of the nature that selects. And a good thing, too, for those wolves which had a genetic dispostion to hang around humans way back when. In North America, today, there are some 50 thousand wolves, but there are over 1 million dogs.
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The folks from GEICO must be excited.
Eh? I mean if we can bring back neanderthals... will that end the idea of creationism?
No, but it will end evolution as we know it. Species flourish not by any 'survival of the fittest' (or seredipitous unfittest, as it should have been called), but by the whim of man. What species are doing well? Roses, flowery annuals, medicinal plants and possibly Neanderthals, if we wish.
*chant* U S A, U S A, U S A... I mean H S S, H S S, H S S, H S S, H S S (H.S.S= Homo sapiens sapiens)
Well if we start bringing back species at random, we most certainly must kill species in the same manor. My vote deer.
Two thumbs way up!
To Sean and Jim. First of all, if we start bringing back species there's no reason to start eliminating existing species to make room. Human encroachment on habitat and just plain hunting to extinction has already eliminated too many species to name. Maybe to atone for our sins we could bring some back.
Second, although Jim claims that we have reached the end of evolution, I think that the same princples of natural selection will continue to operate. We humans are just part of the nature that selects. And a good thing, too, for those wolves which had a genetic dispostion to hang around humans way back when. In North America, today, there are some 50 thousand wolves, but there are over 1 million dogs.
Well you didnt let me say which animals would go next....
mangy mutts...
I'd go for the wholly mammoth, just one, for the national zoo, give the pandas back to China, forget about elephant ethics.
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