A Hence of Incompetence

Haley Lloyd
Sep 28, 2015
3 min read

Week 3 Blog

“Are you crazy!?” Is all that I can fathom when discussing the controversial topic of de-extinction. We discussed the possibility of bringing the passenger pigeon and the wooly mammoth back to life. De-extinction is a bad idea for many reasons. When any animal is reintroduced into the wild, we must take into consideration the effect it may have on the food chain. Once a species goes extinct, gaps must be filled in the food chain or else other species may become extinct as well. Ecosystem services may also become altered when a species goes extinct. Depending on how long ago an extinction occurred, greater niche specialization may have already progressed. After taking these examples into consideration, I’m not sure that the scientists at Harvard have thought through all of the possible outcomes of reintroducing a species.

Like someone said in class, “think about the effect that pigeon fecal matter will have on buildings.” Not only would the fecal matter pose a sanitary issue to humans, but one should also take into consideration the amount of nests that may be built inside of building awnings. I love to eat outside and know for a fact that I wouldn’t want another pesky bird bothering me for some food. Who knows, if pigeons are “de-extincted” then they may become too dependent on humans for food just as other birds have around parks with gratuitous snack-eating children.

During our discussion on the bobwhite quail action plan, it was brought to our attention that wild quail foster parents are not successful at teaching their young. Pigeons are very social birds and a foster parent may not be enough to teach a baby things, such as migration patterns and how to fly among large flocks. Baby passenger pigeons may instead begin to exhibit behavior patterns that are more similar to their foster parents, rather than their own species.

Jurassic Park movies portray the dark side of de-extinction. In Jurassic world, humans thought they had control over the prehistoric species, but in the end were outsmarted by the dinosaurs. Dinosaurs were created for human entertainment and as much as I would love to play with a baby Brachiosaurus, I don’t think it’s ethical to bring them back for such purposes.

I took a trip to Dinosaur Land with some fellow SMSC students and couldn’t help but observe how excited everyone was to see a fake dinosaur. I noticed a little girl walking behind us with the opposite expression. She was bawling her eyes out at the site of these magnificent creatures. I don’t blame her because I feel like this should have been the initial response of people in Jurassic Park. Shouldn’t we be afraid of these animals? Most of them are meat eating giants! What’s worth more? Your life or having the chance to take a selfie with your favorite dinosaur species?

Ultimately, there are too many negative impacts to take into consideration when considering de-extinction of a species. Even though it has not been done before doesn’t mean that it should. I think that it shouldn’t be something that we rush full force into, especially since there are so many currently endangered species that we should be focusing on. I don’t think that anyone quite understands the impact that de-extinction could have on the world.