Thread: Dinosaurs and Cloning

I read an article about Dinosaurs today. Saying basically, we could clone them if we either:

a) find a full DNA sequence (which we have for some of them apparently, but not all species)

b) piece together the genes for a dinosaur from the fragments we have, which would be almost impossibly hard by today's methods.

or c) reverse engineer dinosaurs from creatures that are alive today (crocodiles, birds etc.)

The author of the article mentioned that we could not create a Jurassic Park because of the amount of space required.

We would also have to recreate all the plants that were around then most likely, or just hope for the best and see if they can eat our plants I spose lol

But do you think we could do it?
Just assume we can clone any dinosaur we want to because we found their full sequence of DNA somewhere.

Would you want us (humans) to create a 'Jurassic Park'?
Say we just cleared out the middle east or something, re-vegetated the whole lot and put dinosaurs in there. Or a big desert somewhere which is basically useless, we could slowly re-vegetate it into a gigantic park. Put huge fences around it etc.

Disregard money here of course. Just hypothetically.

Personally, if we couldn't create a massive area for them, I would at least want to clone some smaller dinosaurs. Maybe some flying ones too.

I don't know the names of them all so that probably sounds noobish but oh well.

I just think it'd be the most amazing thing in the world to see a dinosaur. Imagine seeing a giant Tyrannosaurus! I could watch it all day. See how it actually does everything, how it really looks. Not just speculation from people who don't really know and are just guessing.

Imagine watching it walk, the incredible weight of it shaking the ground, watching it chase other dinosaurs (or cows or something we put there for it) and attacking them, seeing how they have sex would be amazing too.

Then there's the little dinosaurs, little bird-like lizard things etc. Hearing the sounds they make, watching them do whatever they do.

I dunno, something about it intrigues me so much. Possibly the earliest forms of life on this planet, and you'd be right there watching them.

We could also see if any of them are smart. Coz we don't know the level of intelligence of any of the dinosaurs whatsoever at the moment. We don't know if they were mean or gentle, smart or completely dumb.... nothing!
The T-Rex could be the gentlest creature to ever exist! It could have gone around helping the other animals fine food for all we know!

Anyway, I'll it there for the moment.

Do you think it would be a good idea? How would you go about it?

it would be a waste of research, money, and recourses in my opinion. recreating the plants would actually have possible medical uses, but the other stuff, I really don't see the need for it. Entertainment, or otherwise.

(i'm not trying to insult you, tommo - you're one of my favorite members here...but..)

i fucking laughed, tommo. i liked these parts:

Originally Posted by tommo

Say we just cleared out the middle east or something, re-vegetated the whole lot and put dinosaurs in there...

seeing how they have sex would be amazing too...

Then there's the little dinosaurs, little bird-like lizard things etc. Hearing the sounds they make, watching them do whatever they do.

I dunno, something about it intrigues me so much. Possibly the earliest forms of life on this planet, and you'd be right there watching them.

...
The T-Rex could be the gentlest creature to ever exist! It could have gone around helping the other animals fine food for all we know!

Anyway, I'll it there for the moment.

Do you think it would be a good idea? How would you go about it?

holy fucking crap.

you trippin, son. ^_____^

Originally Posted by cygnus

holy fucking crap.

you trippin, son.

Jesus fucking Christ! XD

You are trippin'!

Though, I'm down with you on the 'cloning-a-one-or-two-specimens'. When I was like, 3-4, I was one of those kids who loved dinosaurs. And even now, whenever the mood strikes me, I'll ponder what it must have been like back then. Any time before I was born fascinates me. The farther back, the more interesting, to be honest. So yeah I'd love to 'grow my own' T-Rex, and then as soon as it starts to get big, just take it out back and end it with an elephant gun.

Edit: AHAHAHA "Last edited by cygnus : Today at 08:18 PM."

I am so glad I caught that post before the edit. Such small modifications... surprising how much they change the feel of the original post.

the idea of cloning a living thing because it would be a novelty is pretty disgusting to me. we've infected nature enough with our presence.

this would be just another case of scientists doing dumb shit just because they can (and will probably receive grants while they're at it). humans have a history of not thinking about the consequences of their creations.

Originally Posted by CanceledCzech

I am so glad I caught that post before the edit. Such small modifications... surprising how much they change the feel of the original post.

yeah i don't want him to take it the wrong way and give him a bum trip.

Originally Posted by Akono

it would be a waste of research, money, and recourses in my opinion. recreating the plants would actually have possible medical uses, but the other stuff, I really don't see the need for it. Entertainment, or otherwise.

I said forget about the money.
Yes it would be novelty. But also would teach us a lot that we don't know. Which is really the whole fundamental point of science, to learn more stuff.

Originally Posted by cygnus

(i'm not trying to insult you, tommo - you're one of my favorite members here...but..)

i fucking laughed, tommo. i liked these parts:




holy fucking crap.

you trippin, son. ^_____^

Haha, yeh well. I get a little obsessed sometimes lol
But I was just putting forward some ideas lol

Originally Posted by CanceledCzech

Jesus fucking Christ! XD

You are trippin'!

Though, I'm down with you on the 'cloning-a-one-or-two-specimens'. When I was like, 3-4, I was one of those kids who loved dinosaurs. And even now, whenever the mood strikes me, I'll ponder what it must have been like back then. Any time before I was born fascinates me. The farther back, the more interesting, to be honest. So yeah I'd love to 'grow my own' T-Rex, and then as soon as it starts to get big, just take it out back and end it with an elephant gun.

Lol now THAT is mean. Still, understandable I spose. Or you could genetically modify it to stay small.

Originally Posted by CanceledCzech

Edit: AHAHAHA "Last edited by cygnus : Today at 08:18 PM."

I am so glad I caught that post before the edit. Such small modifications... surprising how much they change the feel of the original post.

Damn, I wanna see the original post now lol

Originally Posted by cygnus

the idea of cloning a living thing because it would be a novelty is pretty disgusting to me. we've infected nature enough with our presence.

Hmm, maybe true. But it would be AMAZING! Just imagine what the dinosaur would think. So far we haven't cloned any thing that has died. And if we're not talking about cloning as in growing it in a chamber, but just recreating the dinosaur a few....
okay, say the dinosaur died of a heart attack. We clone it how it was right as it was dying, then shock it back to life. Wtf would it be thinking? Like everything's suddenly changed and it suddenly back alive.

If we're talking about normal cloning like we do it now, it would still be interesting to see how it would act and to learn about dinosaurs more. Since there's proof birds came from dinosaurs, would they be the same as birds in the way that the first thing they see they think is it's mother?

You could have a Velociraptor side kick to protect you lol.

The thing is with most invention that will come soon like nano tech etc. is it would be cool if you were the only person that had that technology. When everyone has it it's useless. Like if you had nanotech now you could be the most powerful person ever, but if everyone has it you're fucked.
Same with the cloning for personal protection thing I spose.

Anyway, getting off point but yeah maybe we have infected nature too much, but would it be that bad to bring dinosaurs back to life? If we kept them in only one area, whether it's an island or a whole country. I'm some country is going to get wiped out by nukes soon, may as well use it.

But yeah it isn't just pure novelty, we could learn a lot.

Originally Posted by cygnus

this would be just another case of scientists doing dumb shit just because they can (and will probably receive grants while they're at it). humans have a history of not thinking about the consequences of their creations.

Yeah but.... Baby T-Rex!!!!

And even if, say, dinosaurs take over, that means humans can no longer fuck anything up. We'd basically be resetting the world back millions of years!

Hmmmm.... maybe this has happened before....

^

I would love to have a Raptorex as a guardosaur lol. Imagine people trespassing on your property, send a pack of 5 to 6 feet tall mini raptors at them.

Originally Posted by tommo

I said forget about the money.
okay, say the dinosaur died of a heart attack. We clone it how it was right as it was dying, then shock it back to life. Wtf would it be thinking? Like everything's suddenly changed and it suddenly back alive.

I just wanted to make one of my random negative points that this isn't really how cloning works. If you clone something, it has to grow and be born again from an egg; it doesn't magically appear.

EDIT: WAIT HOLY CRAP YOU'RE IN MELBOURNE NOBODY IS IN MELBOURNE

recreating an ancient ecosystem is a lot more complicated than genetically engineering certain species. You would have to take in to account the oxygen levels in the atmosphere, which were a lot higher, the microorganisms that exist today that could potentially lay waste to the unadapted animals, just to name a few obvious variables. In order to create a sustained environment, we'd probably have to make a massive biodome that recreated every factor that existed when dinosaurs were alive. In short, it would be a truly epic project to undertake just to see if we could.

It's a good thing that Tommo got "tripping" about Jurassic Park's theory.
It is this tripping, an inspired creative process, that leads people to novel inventions leading to new possibilities.

I get that obsessed too about certain subjects too. Nothing wrong with it at all. It's called getting inspiration.


The only problem is not having a Dinosaur womb to develop eggs or foetuses in. How do you develop DNA into an egg or foetus without a Dinosaur womb?

Find a geneticly related guest animal to carry and develop it into an egg or live baby dinosaur?

Gee it's hard to tell how possible it is since I lack all knowledge of genetical engeneering and cloning.