The Modern Mammoth
by Connor
For years movies like Jurassic Park have fascinated us all. The idea of bringing back a dead or extinct species is fantastic. But the real question still remains: Can it be done? According to scientists it can be done, thanks to a new found mammoth carcass. In today’s world, scientists are trying to clone or reproduce live wooly mammoths. One organization in Japan has been working on this since 2005, and recently a documentary has been shown on this very subject. It’s as real as it’s going to get.
But to clone a Mammoth you must first go through a very rigorous process. First you must get the egg of an elephant (this would be the easiest way). Then you must fertilize the egg by either using a mammoth sperm, or by getting full mammoth DNA. It’s very complicated and if you would like to learn more visit this website.
Here are some facts about mammoths. Mammoths, African, and Asian elephants evolved from the same ancestor. The woolly mammoth was only about 11’ tall, whereas its predecessor, the Columbian mammoth was 13’ tall. Mastodons did not evolve from the same ancestors, but rather branched off immediately after the first elephant-like species died off. To learn more about the mammoths visit this site.
All in all I think it’s pretty cool what they’re doing with these mammoths. I hope that they can someday clone extinct animals, because it could help in studying animals on earth today. Here are some questions you might want to ask yourselves on the subject: Would you like to have a woolly mammoth in your zoo? Would it be safe? Would you like to have one as a pet? Would you think it would be dangerous? From a religious and/or scientific view, is it right to clone dead or extinct animals?
May 13th, 2008 at 9:55 pm
I think it would be awesome if it became possible to clone mammoths. To do something like this would be a great achievement for science. It would be increadible to bring back an animal into existence that has been extinct for hundreds of years. Though i do not believe that this will happen anytime in the the near future i do think that it would become realisticly possible in the future. Especially since mammoths have been found frozen in glaciers and they are fully intact with hair and all. This means that scientists have acces to the mammoth DNA, which is a big help in cloning it. And as for your questions first off i would love to see a mammoth in a zoo. That would be really cool for everyone to see something that has been extinct for so long. As long as they researched the conditions it lived in during its time and they took care of it very well. I think it would be safe too. It is similar to an elephant and they are not seen as very dangerous as long as you dont get to close. As cool as mammoths would be i definantly wouldnt like to have one as a pet and i doubt it would even be legal to have them as pets. From a religious view i do not see anything wrong with this. I beleive that God made all things and saw that they were good, and that includes mammoths. He was not the one that killed them off it was humans in the first place so i do not see any problems with bringing them back. To me it even seems like correcting a wrong that humans have done in the past by bringing back one of His creations. Also i beleive that if we can clone an animal like a mammoth then we can clone many other animals that are now extinct. Great post connor.
May 13th, 2008 at 10:03 pm
Wow, connor, very interesting post! Reviving a whole species thats been extinct for as long as the mammoth! it’s pretty crazy to think about. I think it would be very cool to have a woolly mammoth were scientists could study it and learn more about it and the world it used to thrive in. Personally i don’t think cloning animals is a very good idea, i mean if they arent here right now then what would happen if we brought them back? They could just die again bacause they aren’t used to the enviornment or they could cause the extinction of another species because it would either eat it or overrule it in the food chain. The mammoth would be very hard to take care of and they could damage the other animals that are here right now. i think we should let natural selection take its course and rule out those that shouldn’t be here and keep the ones that should. from a scientific point of view it would be amazing to bring an animal back from the ice age, to study it and make new descoveries. But from a religious aspect i think it would be unwise because if God didn’t put it on Earth right now then who are we to try to re-create a animal that he got rid of?
May 13th, 2008 at 10:21 pm
first offgreat post conner i have always wondered weather we could bring back thes species or not.
1. Iwould like to have a wolly
mammoth walking in the zoo tht woul be the coolest thing ever.
2. I am not sure how safe it would be it would take aloof
fencing to keep the animal cantained.
3. I also would notnlike tonoen one as a pet what am I going todo with a giant creature waking around my yard.
4. I do not think it is right for an extinct animal to be cloned no Matter how cool it would be to have one of these creatures I do not think it is right. This creature dried in the past for some reason why makes them think that it willbsurvive now. Also good does everything for a reason if God wanted the mamoths around he would not have killed them in the first. Saying that God could have lead us to the findings so that we could clone them. I do not think it is right to clone something that is dead. Great post!!
May 13th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
I think this research is fantastic. I think that learning more about extinct species can tell us more about why they went extinct and can help us protect future species from going extinct. I think it would be good if we had mammoths in our zoo’s because it would greatly benefit the zoo exhibits. I think it would be safe because people who run the zoo can keep ferocious animals under control I think they can keep a mammoth under control. I definately would not want to have one as a pet mainly because cleaning up after it would not be a pleasant experience. Pluse my backyard isn’t too big. I think it isn’t right or wrong to clone dead animals. We need to learn more about why and how those animals went extinct to help prevent it from happening again.
May 13th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Good post Connor! I think it would be neat to see a wooly mammoth at the zoo because they are always talked about, but on one has ever been able to see one live. I think it would be safe if they put it inside a cage and took the right percautions to keep the people viewing the exhibit from getting injured. The website below said that wool mammoths ate tundra vegetation, so it would be easy and cheaper to feed them, making them a good zoo animal. I would not like to have one as a pet, however, because they are so big and would be hard to clean up after! I don’t really know whether it’s morally okay to clone animals or not. I guess if God gave these people the passion to pursue something like this, and he gave them the talents to do it with… then they should put all their effort into it!
http://www.prehistory.com/wmammoth.htm
May 13th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
After visiting your third link I remembered that these creatures were alive during the Ice Age, that’s incredible! To survive in weather that extreme is truly an accomplishment. To answer your questions I believe that having a Woolly Mammoth in the Atlanta Zoo would be phenomenal, seeing a creature from that era is unimaginable to me. I think if it was properly accommodated there would be little to no problems in it’s life at the zoo. I would never have one as a pet, I imagine it being like Clifford the Big Red Dog in a way. Too big for the house, barely small enough for the yard. From a religious point of view I wonder how I could disagree, it doesn’t seem like anything wrong is being done. From a scientific, yes! It’s a great way to really learn about our and animal ancestors and really discover what life was like all those years ago. Great blog Connor!
May 14th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
It is truly incredible to hear about the wonderful things scientists have been working on. I also think it would be awesome to be able to clone extinct species to bring them back not only to study them, but to see and look at. The only thing is that by bringing back old species, some present species today could be affected by territory, prey, or resources. This could effect many species of animals by disrupting their environment. From knowing that elephants evolved from wolly mammoths, I came to a conclusion to think that wolly mammoths wouldn’t be that dangerous if they were to come back. The only danger they would cause would be their massive bodies could crush humans or animals. They wouldn’t seem to be vicious animals though. Hopefully one day we may be able to see a wolly mammoth alive and present in the world…
I personally don’t think its necessarily wrong to clone dead/extint animals. However, to a certain extent, if this was possible I think they should be kept “behind closed doors” in the labs just for scientific purposes to run tests and such. Obviously, scientists would have to be extremely careful though with the specimens. This post really got me thinking Connor, great job : )
May 14th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Woah thats really cool. I would love to have a mammoth as a pet but it might be a little hard considering that they are 11′ tall! I agree with Connor that it would be really great to be able to clone extinct animals to study and bring back to society but I also agree with the guy from Jurrassic Park who said that the animals were extinct for a reason and if brought back it might set the balance off the ecosystems or not survive properly. People and even myself are curious about the animals who are extinct. One of my favorite animals to bring back would be the dodo bird because it is so cute! Great post Connor!
May 14th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
Connor, some how you always find a way to make these blogs that much interesting. To answer your questions: No i would not like to have a wolly mammoth in the zoo, because it would not be safe. If the mammoth was safe and a loyal pet then yes, otherwise no. If it wasn’t trained then yes it would be dangerous. To answer your last question, yes i think that it is right to clone a dead animal. One they’re dead, so they cant feel it. Two by cloning it we could learn more about the individual and how they lived. But the animal would have to be treated in a humane way, even though it is dead. I remember watching a video on a wolly mammoth in science class of 7th grade, and this blog post reminded me of a few questions i had. So i researched and found http://www.trillian.com/animals/mammoth.htm to be the best website for information on the mammoth. One question i never figured out: Are Wolly Mammoths nomadic.
May 14th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Cool post Conner! This is very interesting. If you go to a zoo and see a real live Woolly Mammoth, It would be amazing! But it is probably unrealistic because mammoths lived during the ice age and probably died out because the ice thawed and got hotter out. But it would still be pretty cool to see a real life mammoth. It would be kind of scary to have a mammoth as a pet though….(really big!!) I agree with Graham on this though. The mammoth died for a reason, what makes people think that it could survive again. Besides if you can clone an animal that was extinct, shouldn’t we clone an animal that could be more benifitial to the enviorment. Well, I don’t think we should clone anything. If God meant it to die out then lets keep it extinct. Besides cloneing animals could lead to clones of humans, and I think that is a bit unethical.
May 14th, 2008 at 7:52 pm
Awesome post Connor! That documentary you were talking about i actually saw it. They found the mammoth by following some villagers and when they lifted it the helicopter almost couldnt get off the ground with it. Here are two websites on it:
http://www.geocities.com/stegob/mammoth.html
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/09/27/mammothhair_arc.html
If I had a zoo i would love to have a wooly mammoth in my zoo, sure it would require a lot of space and clean up/care, but it would be awesome to have one. If you took the right percautions then i think it would just as safe as having an elephant in your zoo. I would love to have a wooly mamoth as a pet, but I doubt that the can be domesticated to live in your home. I think that it is fine to clone animals. I understand why someone would think that it is not right ti clone animals because God made them go extinct, but why would he let ou find out how to bring them back?
May 14th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
wow, i watching Jurassic Park in biology and asking Miss. Baker is this could really happen. And this post just answered my question. But as the easiest way to bring back the mammoth how would you get the sperm from the mammoth if it is extinct? Like resha said, since it lived in the ice age does that mean the sperm would be frozen then you would fertilize the elephant egg? I think it would be pretty cool to have a wooly mammoth at the zoo, they would just need a pretty big cage or gate to hold it in. but i also think i would be kinda dangerous because of its large tusks, they look like they can just go right through anything. I don’t really see anything wrong with a scientific point of view from this experiment, scientist are destined to create these new experiments and pursue what they know and love. Great job Connor!
May 14th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
very interesting post connor
I want to say that first off I have mixed feelings on the subject. Though I think that it would be very cool to see a woolly mammoth at my local zoo I question the fact whether it is morally and ethically correct. I believe it would be a great way to educate a new generation of past life on earth, but I ponder whether it is the right thing to do from a religious standpoint. These animals obviously disappeared for a reason, and maybe we will learn that reason by someday bringing them back. Its a very hard thing to think about but at the same time very amazing.
good post connor!
May 15th, 2008 at 4:11 pm
That’s really incredible that these animals perhaps could be cloned and re-created some day. However, even though it is really cool, I strongly think that it is wrong to bring back extinct species. To me, re-creating an animal seems like we would be trying to “play as God.” In my opinion, he created the animals, so that should be his job, not ours. Not to mention all the negative scientifical aspects. Wooly mammoths would not know how to survive in the modern world, therefore they would not have a specific niche to fill in and would either change other animals’ niches or drive another species to extinction. I also think that we should not try to spend our time trying to bring something back, but we should spend our time and energy trying to save the animals we have left. I believe that for right now, they are far more important. We have lost so many species already, it would hurt the environment a lot if too many more went extinct.
May 15th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
if wooly mammoths were to come back due to scientific research that would be amazing. it would be awesome to have wooly mammoths around but i dont know how well they would do in todays environment, as it is so different than that in which they used to live naturally. i think it would be possible to bring them back. Even though they went extinct previously, i we have the opporunity to bring them back then we should take advantage of it. It would be interesting to see how they lived in todays world and if they were much different. Good post
May 15th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
This is such a cool post connor! I definently think it would be amazing to bring back an extinct animal. It sounds like an awful lot of work though. Also, like many other people said, I’m not too sure if it would be morally correct. If an animal went extinct then there was obviously a reason it was extinct. If we brought them back, it could be imporant and helpful for learning but it could bring up consequences. For example, if the mammoths were not contained to the zoos then they could present problems for animals already living in that habitat with a new introduced species. This was very interesting connor! I’ll be curious to see how this story turns out and if this ever happens.
May 15th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
Cool post Connor! I think it would be cool to see a mammoth in a zoo, however i don’t think it’s a good idea. The mammoth would probabley not be used to the climate today since it is so much warmer than it was when they lived. There also wouldn’t be anything for the mammoth to eat sicne the things it ate probaley died off thousands of years ago. These two changes would cause it to die. It would also not be very safe to have it in the zoo. I also think it would not be a good idea to have a mammoth as a pet mainly since they are so huge and my back yard is kinda small. There would be no room for it. From a religious view, like Roger and Graham said, if God wanted the mammoths to be around today, they would still be here. Obviously there is no need for them so, I don’t think they should be brought back.
May 15th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
I think that it would be really cool to be able to see woolly mammoth again. That would be really awesome to be able to go to a zoo an see a woolly mammoth roaming around its pen. I think it would be hard to contain since it is so big an most likely eats hundreds of pounds of food everyday. I agree with Jake on the fact that it may not be ethically and religiously correct. I think Scientifically it would be awesome to have a live woolly mammoth to study. It must have died off for a reason. I would not want to have one as a pet, it would be hard to maintain and it is not well suited for our climate. They are used to a cold snowy climate like the ice age.
May 15th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
I think that it is not a bad idea to clone animals but I also think that cloning may be a better idea for like if all animals in the wild have died out. But I think that it is not a great way to protect endangered animals. We have to figure out why they are endangered and figure out how to fix that. If we make clones of the endangered or extinct animals, then they would die out or become endangered again anyways. But another problem with cloning animals is that it greatly decreases gene variation, causing the animal population to not have as much of an ability to adapt through natural selection.
May 15th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
I always thought about this when i was little and first learned about cloning. I always thought to myself it would be so easy to clone a dinosaur because we could use DNA from all the fossils we have to clone them. As i grew up i learned that obviously wasn’t the case and i kind of lost the dream of seeing dinosaurs in zoos and such. This post is really awesome cause it really got me thinking and hoping again that we could some day in our lifetimes see a pre-historic animal in real life. To answer your zoo-question, yes i would love to see one in a zoo, and it would be an amazing way to get people these days to get interested in nature and motivate them to think about nature and how their presence on earth affects it. I know some people would argue that God made them extinct for a reason but i would like to argue that if we were able to clone wooly mammoths, then he obviously gave us the ability to clone wooly mammoths for a reason too. it’s just up to us as intelligent human beings to make the proper decisions in how we use the ability to clone pre-historic animals.
May 15th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
Interesting questions Connor. I think it would be amazing if scientists could figure out a way to clone extinct species, but the question is… would it be right? There is a big controversy over this. I definitely think cloning humans is morally and ethically wrong.
To me, it seems that since animals like dinosaurs and woolly mammoths went extinct, it was for a reason. Natural selection caused them to be eliminated from Earth because they were not able to successfully survive and reproduce. Therefore I don’t think it would be good or necessarily right to clone extinct animals. Keeping them in a zoo would be especially wrong because they are quite large and probably would not adapt well to being in a closed environment. I don’t think any animal would prefer living in captivity to the wild. And it could be dangerous as well. Since the mammoth is so large and strong, I don’t see how they would be able to keep it contained. And if it got out, there is doubt it would cause some major damage.
May 15th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
yeah I see Jake’s point, these animals disappeared for a reason, but maybe we are being given the chance to make them reappear for a reason too.
May 15th, 2008 at 9:17 pm
as I said at the top I do not think it is right to clone a dead thing, but what if god wanted us to find this and for us to be able to clone them. What do you think? It is another way to think about it too. God doesthings for a reason, is this something that he wants us to do? Is he trying to get us to bring these creatures back to life? What do you think?
May 15th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
Great post connor! To answer your questions, it would be cool to see a wooly mammoth in the zoo! However, i would not like to have one as a pet, because it would probably be too hard to take care of, and too big to handle. I can see from a scientific view how this discovery would be beneficial and we would learn a lot about extinct animals, but when it comes to a religious view I defeniatley agree with jenifer, who are we to try to bring animals back if they are not on earth right now, which means they are probably not meant to be here! I do not think it is right to try to bring back the extinct! I also agree with roger, in that this discovery of learning how to bring back the extinct could also encourage scientest to make a discovery in bringing back the dead humans, and that is complety wrong religiously speaking! We are all meant to die at some time, and move on to eternal life, and we are not meant to be brought back after death! I also disagree with peters statement about why would god let you find out how to bring them back, because i believe it can also work both ways why would god even let them disapear in the first place if they were meant to be here?
May 15th, 2008 at 9:39 pm
It’s really cool to hear about what some scientists are coming up with now! They have advanced in so many different things. This is a really cool post! I’ve heard of wooly mammoths in Jurassic Park and during the ice age in history, but I never thought that this would be able to happen! I think it would be awsome to have wooly mammoths in the zoo. It would have to be securely in a cage because it could be potentially dangerous. As cool as it would be to have one as a pet, I don’t think I would like that. I think it’s okay to clone animals to a certain extent. good job connor (:
heres a good website i found with facts about wooly mammoths!
http://www.prin.edu/mammoth/mammothfacts.htm
May 15th, 2008 at 9:57 pm
This is very interesting, but i must say i agree with Jake. Mammoths died off for a reason, and it would throw life off balance if we broght it back. What other species would have to compete with them if they were brought back? Though it would be truly remarkable to be able to see a living wooly mammoth and be able to study it, it wouldn’t be right from a religious standpoint.
May 15th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
This is an extremely interesting post, Connor. However, I feel cloning a Wooly Mammoth can be incredibly dangerous. In biology we talk about the effects introduced species have on a popultion. A mammoth could compete with an animal already in a certain niche and it could drive it to extinction. Somthing like this could set off an extinction of modern animals. Cloning a mammoth could bring about many bad results though it could benifit scientists understanding of the animal. This post really helps you to think about hard questions like these. Great post.
May 15th, 2008 at 10:44 pm
Great research and wonderful post Connor! Ever since I saw the movie Jurassic Park I have wondered if it could be possible to create extinct animals. The answer is yes! This is a great advance in science that could open the door to a whole new world of discoveries. Mammoths in a zoo would be great. Not only would it attract a great amount of people but it would allow people to learn about the past. You must take into consideration something very important and that is habitat. Even if scientist can recreate the animal can the recreate a habitat that would allow for the mammoths to survive and successfully reproduce? Would you control breeding like in Jurassic park where there were only females. If you do not control breeding and you create both genders that can mate with each other than you would be in a way recreating an entire population. This is where you get into an ethics debate on whether it is right or not. Is it “playing God”? I would agree that there is no ethical reason why it is wrong. I accept that God created everything. I also accept that God created humans as the superior power on the earth and gave us our ability to think and reason. We must use that. The mammoths and many other prehistoric animals went extinct for a reason. We must use our knowledge to find out answers to why they went extinct. If we have been given the ability to restart an entire species than we should use it. Jake as you said they disappeared for a reason and one day we will find out. Well what if that day is today, What if cloning is the answer to many of our questions on the natural world?
May 16th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
This topic is really neat. To answer your questions I have to say that it would be really cool to see a woolly mammoth in the zoo but I really do think that it would be too dangerous and I don’t know how they would be able to find suitable conditions for it to live and survive. Also I really would not like a woolly mammoth as a pet because it would be too big and too much work but I wouldn’t mind my friend having one.
Really I do believe that it would not be right to bring a species that has been extinct back to live again. Nature has intended it to die and natural selection has probably had a big role in this. So I believe we should not bring a species back into our ecosystem also because it would make the whole earth unbalanced. Great Post
May 16th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
Great post Connor!!!! Liker several others I could not believe this is happening!! From my stand point I disagree with all of it in a religous and scientific way. Jurassic Park is one of my favorite movies and everyone knows that the “idea” of one man created destruction for others. It is like he is playing God and there is a reason why we are not filled witall of God’s powers. Eventually something will go wrong. It would be cool to see bones of one in a musem but I would never allow a child to go near a mammoth in a zoo or at a house. I mean even though they are herbavors they still can be dangerous. I believe like dinosours they are extinct and always will be. But, i do think it is cool to research and find out about them the old fashion way. The coolest facts or on this website http://www.sdnhm.org/exhibits/mystery/fg_mastodon.html so check it out.
May 17th, 2008 at 12:43 am
I agree with you Jennifer M, I dont think that it would be a good idea to clone animals, especially if they have already gone extinct. Looking at it from a religious point of view, I dont think that God would want to have someone alter something that had already gone it’s way. If you look at the Christian bible in all of the rightful healings, or things being brought back from the dead, is either Jesus’ doing or the doing of someone who was told to do so by Jesus or God. If a person created a miracle out of falacy then the person was repremanded or chastised. I would love to see a Wooly mammoth in a zoo, sure, but it may be a safety hazard due to the fact that they Wooly Mammoth was a wild animal who was not tame or trained, so if you were to bring a Wooly Mammoth back from the dead and clone it, it would still have the same natural instincts, which is most likely to get out of a situation, and if you were the one that was trapped in an enclosed area, with no way out, wouldn’t you want to at least try to fight your way out?
May 27th, 2008 at 7:40 pm
Connor,
Thanks for writing about this, and thanks for noticing my site, too! Yes, it’s definitely an intriguing idea, both from the perspective of whether it’s biologically possible and also from an ethical perspective.
The behavioral and ethical issues are not as bad as some of your commenters are worried about from what I understand; however, the mammoth hasn’t been extinct for that long. As far as we can tell, humans played a role in their extinction just 3,700 years ago. So it wouldn’t be like bringing back a tyrannosaurus, it would be like bringing back the Dodo.
It would be a wonderful thing to bring it back, study it, and learn about it. At this point, we don’t even know whether it’s the same species as an elephant (i.e., whether they can mate) or not! Remember, cloning isn’t the same thing as resurrection, it’s making a whole new one from scratch, and when it comes out, it’s a baby!
Keep on thinking about these interesting topics!
Ethan