Disappointed
Disappointed
34 comments
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Hank Green has a good video on the subject. This is like grafting genes into chimpanzees to make them stand upright and be hairless, and calling them human. There's some cool technology going on here, but it isn't anywhere near a full clone.
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Thanks for the link, that's an interesting material. However, I had to re-read that sentence three times trying to make sense of clothing items in genetics.
UPDATE: It has been fixed. Thank you : ).
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Well, have you tried bending over in skinny jeans?
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BREAKING NEWS! AUSTRALOPITHECUS HAS JUST BEEN DE-EXTINCTED!
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Stephen Baxter catching strays...
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Is anyone surprised by this? I feel like similar things have happened in the past with back breeding
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Back breeding? Is that what kim k had to her in the video?
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They needed a grabby headline for their sponsors to get excited about. "Multiplex CRISPR gene editing on Grey Wolf" doesn't scream SciFi enough.
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So what's the genetic difference? If the copy was good enough, surely they would be dire wolves? Also, what is the motivation to bring back dire wolves?
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I'm not the president of genetics, but dire wolves are apparently super different to present-day wolves. They're not even in the Canis genus. Regular grey wolves are Canis lupus and dire wolves are Aenocyon dirus. Canis and Aenocyon split off from a common ancestor 5.7 million years ago.
To create these new dire wolves, scientists modified 14 genes to express traits they considered to simulate the appearance of dire wolves--I specifically say simulate because in at least one case (the white coat), they took a gene from regular ass-dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) rather than replicating the original dire wolf coat.
I'm guessing, but there's probably more than 14 genes that changed since these two species diverged almost 6 million years ago. These wolves are almost certainly much, much closer to Canis lupus than Aenocyon dirus.
Sources:
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Lol ass-dogs
On a serious note, does anyone else get some serious Dunning-Kruger vibes from this? Like serious scientists and experts in the field are very specificly saying that these are not dire wolves. The only people saying they are dire wolves are the owners of the private company that made them. A company with an invested economic interest in people believing them. I'm not an expert geneticist, but I hope you'll excuse me if I believe the scienctists over the people saying, "you can tell it's a direwolf by the way that it is!" so that they can make money.
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What an embarrassingly stupid waste of money. Gene editing tropical plants so that they can grow in other climates or common plants to be more pest/drought resistant would improve the lives of billions of people yet time and money is being wasted on this crap.
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Bringing back species that disappeared because of humans and restoring ecosystems are possible ones. Jurassic Park is another.
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They're still largely grey wolves DNA, with a few aesthetic genes of direwolf grafted in.
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Why be disappointed? This wolf died off for a reason. If you brought it back it would likely die off again. Beyond that if you don’t bring back a pack of them then they will be very lonely as they are pack animals.
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Big puppy
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Probably because of constant media lies.
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Anyway… this is useless science for humanity. Let’s focus on saving the species that are still alive.
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b-b-but pidgeon
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If you're American I don't think you really want passenger pigeons
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We’ll have more accurate clones of more recently extinct species. DNA just doesn’t last that long.
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Haha the reaction guy does need a Winterfell style fur cloak around his shoulders though.
But like, of LARP quality though.
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I said as much "How much of that DNA is just wolf? No way that thing is authentic."
And then both the people smiling look disappointed. Let me tell ya, I really know how to set a mood.
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Ffs now how am I supposed to sleep tonight?
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Well, it's nonetheless a step forward, and we should cherish it! 😁
34 comments