With the recent ‘woolly mouse’ and ‘dire wolf’ by colossal biosciences, I was wondering if they actually managed to bring back various extinct animals (including dinosaurs) and said animals managed to either escape and/or where introduced back into the wild, how would they be handled on iNat?
Two separate situations here:
the animals are just genetically modified to show the phenotype of the animal, not the genotype (such as with the “dire wolf” from above) or 2. actual 100% genetically identical clones
also lets just say they manage to get around the issue that the DNA is to fragmentary in dinosaurs to use for cloning.
If by some technology the entire genome of an extinct organism could be restored in a living organism and that organism attained or was capable of attaining a self-sustaining population in a wild state, then it might qualify as a taxon that would be “countable” on iNat.
Good question. Since I don’t see how the original could be an exact match to the restored one — I suspect some genetic material from a living species would have to be present — it would probably have to be called a different species. And a bioengineered species as well.
I moved this topic to Nature Talk. I know it’s about how iNat could handle these animals, but this is hypothetical enough that I’m taking it out of General.
GMO corn is still corn. Rau quaggas are still plains zebras. I’m guessing any GMO animal would be handled similarly, unless it were closer to the extinct ancestor.
Interesting philosophical debate that’s above my pay grade WRT my knowledge of genetics (which is nonexistent). I have bacterial DNA in my mitochondria. Horizontal gene transfer, especially in viruses. Am I human? (don’t answer that)
Depending on the situation, it should IMO either be the “template” species (the grey wolf in the case of the “dire” wolf), or, if it is different enough, labeled as synthetic species. (For example, if the “dire” wolf were significantly different from the grey wolf: “Canis sp. synth.”
It may have to be done on a case-by-case basis. For the “dire wolves” the consensus seems pretty strong on considering them Canis lupus. If a larger proportion of genes were changed from a species so that the phenotype was obviously different then it might be different. It’s even inconsistent for domesticated animals (genetically modified the old-fashioned way). Dogs and cats both have their own species on iNat but chickens and pigs are just subspecies of the wild ancestor.
In the case of the dire wolves, I would consider them the same species (assuming that they weren’t demonstrated to be otherwise), but a different subspecies (distinct population with consistent genetic and phenotypic differences). One thing I would be interested in seeing is whether the new “dire wolves” are able to breed with grey wolves - if they are genetically incompatible, that might throw them out of “subspecies” category and into a new GMO species of some kind.
De-extinct animals generally would simply have to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
Follow-up: Would there be more or less trust to take at face value the work of some "they"s than others?
(Examples of "they"s: private company with potential to monetize, strictly research facility, well known, long-term entity, unknown start-up, etc.)
I am incredulous at the vast array of news stories these wolves have produced, so clearly there are those who readily accept from that “they” as well as those that do not, which is what makes me think about this.
If we could avoid making this into another “dire wolf” thread, please – let’s think about de-extinction of more recent taxa. De-extinction of the Carolina Parakeet, for instance, not by genetically modifying an extant parrot, but by using the genome from existing museum specimens. Preferably from every existing museum specimen so as to restore all existing genetic diversity.
The Carolina Parakeet is already an available taxon on iNaturalist – if you turn off “verifiable,” you find that there are 12 observations; just that its IUCN status shows as “extinct.” If it was de-extincted, that status would presumably change – and the 12 observations made while it was extinct would presumably also show the updated status.
This really isn’t a problem for iNaturalist to solve.
If this situation came about, the scientific community would resolve the taxonomic issues, and they would do so using peer-reviewed research, not hype-filled press releases. iNaturalist would follow the science.
Perhaps the taxonomy wouldn’t be clearly settled, and two or more conflicting standards would enter use. (I believe that’s the case for some taxa, now.) Then the iNat curators might have to decide which to follow.
But that’s a minor hypothetical on top of a bunch of very big hypotheticals. We don’t have to debate it now.
Counting bogus de-extinct animals reminds me of the old Monty Python sketch with the British “camel spotter”. After seven years of camel spotting in England, he had a life list of “nearly one… call it none”.
@ItsMeLucy "they"is any or all of them. And yes, trust levels would be different.
@larry216 I was specifically wondering about dinosaur taxonomy. iNat definitely does not follow current thinking in the Dinosauria group (though I do not agree with ‘current thinking’, see my iNat bio) and so was wondering on how taxonomy would be handled on iNat specifically. And what about obscure extinct groups, like for example Rauisuchids?