r/environment 2d ago

Mammoth de-extinction is bad conservation

https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/04/editorial-mammoth-de-extinction-is-bad-conservation/
150 Upvotes

14 comments sorted by

View all comments

16

u/Pyrrasu 2d ago

I'm glad this article touches on the ethical considerations people so often skip over. Elephants are intelligent, emotional animals that rely heavily on cultural knowledge for survival. How are we going to teach mammoths to survive in the wild when all that knowledge has been lost for thousands of years?

11

u/ChemicalMight7535 1d ago

Additionally, we should probably try to ensure that Earth is more livable for creatures we're trying to revive BEFORE reviving them. Hell, I often question my OWN birth into this declining world–why would I subject another creature to that knowingly?

2

u/JoeSicko 1d ago

We need to bring back the naked mammoth for a globally warming world.

1

u/ChemicalMight7535 1d ago

Probably need to bring back the immolating mammoth at this point (the breed of mammoth that possesses a shaggy coat of actual flames —that one might be able to hack it on Earth in 2100).

1

u/I_tend_to_correct_u 1d ago

Plus they rely on their mothers so much. How much love would an Indian elephant give to an offspring that is so obviously not what she’s expecting? It could even be dangerous, after all humans are purportedly intelligent and we have history of burning excessively hairy infants