Shall we bring back the passenger pigeon? …Sure: I hear that they’re tasty.

Via AosHQ, meet a controversy you may not be aware of: the politics of using genetic engineering to recreate extinct species. Although admittedly the NYT thought that it was just writing about passenger pigeons.

More pressing to conservationists is a practical anxiety: Money. De-extinction is a flashy new competitor for patronage. As the conservationist David Ehrenfeld said at a Revive & Restore conference: “If it works, de-extinction will only target a very few species and is extremely expensive. Will it divert conservation dollars from tried-and-true conservation measures that already work, which are already short of funds?”

[snip] Continue reading Shall we bring back the passenger pigeon? …Sure: I hear that they’re tasty.