Ice Age Park

[ysabetwordsmith]

Some scientists are hoping to clone mammoths and other Ice Age creatures.  I'm all for it. 

But for fucksake DO NOT mix that with a tourist attraction.  DID NONE OF THESE PEOPLE WATCH ANY OF THE MOVIES?!  Let me simplify it with a picture instead.  Mammoths are big enough to squash people.  Saberteeth are big enough to eat people.  Never make something that can kill people and then put people in proximity with it.  That is mad science.  It's the plot of countless spec fic movies and novels.  You want people to see your cool things?  Take pictures.

Also, anyone who willingly puts themselves within reach of things that see humans as food is choosing to engage personally with the forces of evolution.  If you lose, you die, and it's nobody's fault but your own.  You want to see saberteeth? Look at pictures.



The stupid, it burns like hydrogen.  >_<

Comments

[siliconshaman]

and yet, we keep elephants and tigers in zoos..

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

Where every once in a while, they manage to kill someone. Not a good situation.

Now consider that some mammoths are bigger than modern elephants. Here are cave lions compared to modern great cats. And this is a parade of other extinct predators.

Species have been getting smaller for some time. Predictions indicate that climate change will kill off most of today's "megafauna," which is actually the smaller range of things that didn't already die near the end of the Ice Age. We'll be left with things the size of foxes and goats this time. >_<

If you reintroduce those giant species, they are really going think nothing of the small stuff, and humans are small stuff to them. That's not a good proximate contact anymore, when humans no longer think of themselves as small stuff.

[ayebydan]

I'm against it. They would probably be utterly miserable as the climate is too warm for them. Not to mention they would be trapped in exibits all the time with no hope of ever roaming free because they are too dangerous. Sabtertooths coudl probably function in the wild without being more dangerous to us than other big cats but they would disrupt our ecosystems far too much.

Well ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

The less idiotic proposal I've seen was to create an island sanctuary in the far north. That is probably doable.

Your ethical stance is up to you, though.

[redsixwing]

I'm more concerned about their food sources having died out or shifted their marketing. :s Being put into a weird too-warm place with no palatable food because of human action is being set up to fail, and that's cruel.

Well ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

The herbivores would be fine. The grass is still there and the trees haven't even noticed they're gone.

The predators just need lots of meat.

If a self-sustaining population is desired, it should be possible as long as the right amount of each is created. The less-stupid version that I've read about involved populating a far-north island. It would have to be a big island to sustain both predators and prey, but herbivores alone could survive in a smaller area. Several cases of remnant megafauna survived on islands.

[we_are_spc]

He big thing? Can you give me a mental image of yoou?

...

I've often wonder if I could ask Falcon to let me touch Him through someone elses bird of prey, but I've never had the chance. Mainly because the handler themselves say no, for valid reason.

But it makes my soul sad. I've yet to find a rehab place with injured birds that are willing to be touched by humans without wripping the fingers to shreds first.

CCW: Otherworld shit


It's why most of my interactions have been in other dimentions where the birds are intelligent enough to know i can't see them...and why I still hae friends among said birds.

...

They are eagles, and they are large enough to be ridden on. I...am still one of the few who is allowed that privelige, and I never take it for granted. Ah love mah feathered dear ones.

-Trausio~

Never played D&D either...

[margali]

Dire wolves and giant land sloths would also fit the "theme".

These are available creatures in D&D with accurate relative strength. They will kill you every time...

Re: Never played D&D either...

[ysabetwordsmith]

Dire wolves are extremely dangerous.

Giant sloths, however, are basically big piles of meat. You just stand back and throw spears until they fall over dead. They are one of the first species that humans ate all of. They're only dangerous at point-blank range.

[(Anonymous)]

I like the idea of reanimatong extinct species, but proximity to humans will cause problems. Id like to hear some more good suggestions for that.
One suggestion for reanimation involves recreating a wild strain from domestic stock, ie wolves-> dogs -> dogs + selective breeding -> dire wolves. This may be safer than a Jurassic Park situation. (Or more dangerous, see pack-hunting coyotes).
Also, elephants and mammoths may be intellegent enough to reason with. If dogs can use speechboards to communicate we should be able to communicate with a higly social creature that forms lifelong social bonds, displays cross species empathy, and is already capable of rudimentary cross species communication with humans.