Woolly Mammoth Cloning Raises Ethical Questions About Resurrecting Extinct Species

What was said

"There is a real risk of bringing back extinct species because the world today is a lot different than the world that they knew. That's definitely true of a T-Rex. But even a woolly mammoth, these were animals that were adapted to the ice age. The world was a lot colder than their habitats have mostly disappeared. They would be living in many ways on an alien planet. So the ethics of that get very tricky. On the flip side, the whole reason the woolly mammoth doesn't live anymore is really because of us. Because of humans changing the environment so quickly, so thoroughly over hunting, but not just over hunting woolly mammoths, but changing the land, clearing land, clearing vegetation."

Brusatte discusses the real possibility of cloning woolly mammoths from preserved DNA, noting the ethical complexity: mammoths would face an alien world vastly different from the ice age they evolved for, yet humans caused their extinction through overhunting and habitat destruction. He presents no firm answer but suggests this debate must be had soon as the science becomes feasible.