Would you rather fight a horse sized duck or a horse’s weight in normal sized ducks?

Yeah, I mean what’s this Charles guy’s deal? Is he just like… nice to everyone? What an asshole…

Well yes, the way your thinking about it is wrong, because advancements in one area can lead to advancements in other areas, and often they do. I mean it’s not a guarantee, it doesn’t “necessarily” happen that way, but nothing is guaranteed.

But then I’ve already made that argument, so I’m not sure why I’m bothering to say it again.

Well you’re the expert, you must be right.

Well that’s great and all, but what if that doesn’t happen? Would you rather be dead or living comfortably in a warmer climate?

Something like learning to make perfect custom designed edits to genes, such abilities could easily save hundreds of millions when the next major plague or crop blight hits. We’ll definitely find ways to make hardier crops, that can survive harsher climates. Who knows, we could get so good at it that we could afford to just strengthen every species we can find with genes to help them survive the rapidly changing world, at least for long enough for us to turn things around. Maybe we could design lichens or mosses that could grow on Mars, adding oxygen to the atmosphere. Maybe we could learn to do even more impactful things that I can’t even think of right now (since I’m not even a biologist).

And maybe, just maybe, genetics isn’t even the only field that could turn out to be extraordinarily important to survival in the future. Maybe we should continue to pursue every field of science and engineering… Because fucking obviously we should.

So why mammoths? Why not? Bringing back the mammoth is just a bit of problem solving, it’s an exercise with a tangible goal.

Yeah, as I recall they’re actually really important to the ecology of Madagascar. A native species of tree simply doesn’t grow without them. And without those trees, well you can imagine that affects a lot of things.

I believe cod liver oil does have some benefits too. My understanding is that historically one of the primary uses was to stave off rickets, a childhood disease. This actually worked because the oil is high in vitamin D, the thing these kids actually needed.

If they want to be helpful they can work out how to engineer humans that can survive 40 degree heat and breathe co2.

That’s what they’re fucking doing by bringing back the mammoth…

They’ll run when they’re ready, but right now they’re learning to crawl. Or to put it differently, let them cook.

You’ll find that we have a lot of people on this planet, we can multitask. We can research genetic engineering, and green energy, and medical technology, and recycling processes, as well as things that don’t advance those immediate goals, like microprocessors, meta materials, superconductors, astrophysics, geology, mathematics, etc.

When your house will be burning for the next few hundred years and you still have to live in it because even on fire it’s the best house around, maybe just get on with your life and do something productive? Perhaps some of us can move out eventually, but it would take a lot of research in a lot of different fields, probably even genetics…

Can we just use our fcking resources for things that matter???

Yeah, bring back the passenger pigeon! We need more pigeons! Do something that’ll make a difference already!

Also, can we get some dodos up in here? Where all my dumb birds at?