So close, and yet, so far

Good news, everyone! Thanks to a breakthrough in cloning technology, we can revive the woolly mammoth! Now, all we need is some surviving soft tissue from a woolly mammoth ... (Via Ferris Jabr)

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

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gwailo_joe

Show Me The Mammoth!!!
vinegartom

So they’ll finally stop having to use a puppet for Mister Snufalufagus on Sesame Street?
AllyPally

But how authentic a mammoth will it be?

Its mitochondrial DNA will come from the elephant. If the clone survives, and the environmental difference during its early development inside an elephant rather than a mammoth may mean it won’t, can we really say it’s 100% mammoth?

All the same I’d still like to see one.
- Anonymous
  
  If you took a herd of 4095 mammoths and one female elephant and cross-bred them for dozens of generations, you might well end up with an offspring whose mitochondrial DNA was inherited directly from that elephant. I imagine most of us would consider it mammoth enough. That you’d need biotech for the cross-breeding to work might change your opinion, though.
thebelgianpanda

Sci-fi, technology enthusiast comment? Check.
Carnivore comment? Check.
Truly terrible puns and jokes? Check, check, and check.

Looks like everything is just fine and normal in this thread, just needed to make sure. Happy Monday! :D
Anonymous

Since nobody else has mentioned it: Maggie, I appreciated the Professor Farnsworth reference you used! I can hear his voice in my head…
- Maggie Koerth-Baker
  
  I thought it was particularly apropos given the little detail of not having the tissue material to clone. The technique has been around since 2008. All we need is that pesky mammoth tissue. But once we have that, nothing can stop us!
hungryjoe

I am totally on board with this.
freshacconci

Yes, I know that there are serious ethical considerations here but screw that. This would be so cool. I hope they do it.
Boba Fett Diop

I wonder what it will taste like.
wrybread

I, for one, welcome our new Wooly… oh nevermind.
Metostopholes

After they successfully clone one, the obvious next step is to genetically engineer dwarf woolly mammoths to keep as pets.
- blendergasket
  
  I’d rather have a gigantic(er) woolly mammoth whose digestive tract I could take tourists on adventures in in a giant nondigestable plastic ball.
Brainspore

Why the hell not, we’re almost certainly the reason they went extinct in the first place. And if they get out of line we can kill ‘em off again!
- The Chemist
  
  Actually the reason they probably went extinct was climate change.
  - OoerictoO
    
    the cause of extinction seems to be highly debated amongst paleontologists. many say that over-hunting contributed highly to their extinction. anecdotal evidence lying in the pygmy herd which existed much later on the remote Wrangel Island.
  - Brainspore
    
    What OoerictoO said. Besides- there are still plenty of places where the climate has remained suitably frigid or we wouldn’t still have all those frozen mammoth carcasses.
bardfinn

… and when we discover that they’re sentient … what then?
- codesuidae
  
  and when we discover that they’re sentient … what then?
  
  Why, 100,000 years of indentured servitude of course.
  - jestar_jokin
    
    Why, 100,000 years of indentured servitude of course.
    
    I don’t know about that, I don’t think they make big enough butler costumes.
- Anonymous
  
  @bradfinn They were obviously sentient.
  
  If they are self aware and have verbal skills we could have an issue. They might start demanding equal rights!
jordan

The meat aisle will never be the same.
franko

@Boba Fett Diop and jordan: my bet is on “chicken”
- Boba Fett Diop
  
  That’s funny, I would have said “elephant.”
AirPillo

Augh, without even thinking about it I read the post in his voice, too.

Well played, Maggie.
Alden

Screw mammoths! Let’s find some Neanderthal DNA!
elk

Why is this a good idea again?
PBryden

I canâ€™t wait to get my hands on a mammoth sausage,â€¦ err wait that didnâ€™t sound right.
AT203

BORING… Now, T-Rex soft tissue, that’s an island-adventure waiting to happen. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/03/0324_050324_trexsofttissue.html
Anonymous

Mammoth is delicious!

On an unrelated note, we here at the research station have no statements to make concerning the whereabouts of the soft tissue samples collected in 1999.
thatbob

Man, if you think circus elephants have sad lives, just wait til you see the lab mammoths. Still, it would be fun to see a team of these excavating a quarry, a la The Flintstones.
Jean-Luc Turbo

Just when we were winning the fight against fur, this animal provider will flood the fashion world with its prehistorically luxurious wooly fibers.