Mark Twain, ever the skeptic of human hubris, is ready to take his pen to this tale of scientific ambition. But first, here’s a plain-spoken summary before we dive headlong into his wry observations.
At the SXSW conference, Ben Lamm, CEO of the biotech startup Colossal, spoke about his company’s efforts to revive extinct species using genetic editing. Colossal aims to bring back creatures like the woolly mammoth, though Lamm assured the audience they have no intention of creating a real-life Jurassic Park. He framed this endeavor as a “moral obligation,” arguing that humans have a duty to restore what they helped destroy. The company’s work is rooted in CRISPR gene-editing technology, which allows scientists to modify DNA with precision. While some see this as an exciting step toward conservation and ecological restoration, others worry about the ethical and practical consequences of reviving species long gone from the Earth.
Mark My Words
The Resurrection Business
It appears the modern man, having grown weary of the simple mischief of his forebears—wars, swindles, and the occasional political scandal—has now taken it upon himself to outdo even the Almighty in the matter of creation. Mr. Ben Lamm, a gentleman of scientific enthusiasm and no small amount of daring, has declared that it is our “moral obligation” to bring back the departed beasts of yesteryear, as if the universe were a hotel and the woolly mammoth had merely stepped out for a cigar.
Now, I have made the acquaintance of many a moral obligation in my time, and most of them were as flimsy as a politician’s promise. But this one is of a peculiar sort. It suggests that because man, in his usual blundering fashion, helped drive these creatures to extinction, he must now, with all the arrogance of a child gluing back together a shattered vase, attempt to restore them. One might suppose that before raising the dead, we should first demonstrate a capacity to properly manage the living. But such is not the way of progress—no, sir! Progress charges forward like a steam locomotive with no brakes, and heaven help the fool who stands in its way.
A Woolly Notion
The chief object of Mr. Lamm’s endeavors appears to be the woolly mammoth, a creature of grand proportions and, if my understanding of history is correct, a distinct preference for a world untroubled by human interference. These behemoths once roamed the icy expanses of the north, shaggy and solemn, until nature—or, more likely, a few too many enthusiastic spear-throwers—saw fit to remove them from the stage. Now, armed with the ingenuity of CRISPR and the boundless confidence of modern science, Mr. Lamm proposes to knit together the tattered remnants of mammoth DNA and set them loose once more.
One cannot help but wonder what the elephant, a most dignified and respectable beast, must think of this development. Having spent centuries perfecting the art of existing in a world that barely tolerates its presence, it will now be asked to share its lineage with an ancestor resurrected from genetic oblivion. Will the mammoth be consulted in this arrangement? I suspect not. Science is a grand and glorious thing, but it rarely troubles itself with the opinions of those it experiments upon.
Jurassic Jest
To quell any fears that we may soon find ourselves cowering beneath the shadow of a revived Tyrannosaurus rex, Mr. Lamm assures us that his ambitions do not extend to the realm of Jurassic Park. This is a comfort, though a small one, for I have found that when men insist they will not do a thing, it is often because they very much intend to do it later.
What, then, is to be gained from this grand resurrection? Some whisper of ecological restoration, of returning balance to a world disrupted by human folly. A noble thought, to be sure, but one wonders if there are not simpler ways to achieve it—perhaps by preserving those creatures not yet consigned to history rather than playing at sorcery with the bones of the past.
And so, we stand at the precipice of a new age, where the dead may walk again, not by divine will, but by the hand of man. Whether this is a triumph or a tragedy, time alone will tell. But if history has taught us anything, it is that when man plays the creator, he often finds himself quite unprepared for the consequences.
