Unnatural History of the Holocene

In June 1884, three Icelanders rowed through the night to a remote, rocky island that was home to the world’s last pair of great auks. Like the dodo, these penguin-like seabirds were largely defenseless against humans, and were doomed by their parental instincts. Their last stand was undignified. Once this pair was located, they were promptly strangled and the single egg they were incubating was crushed. Their story appears to be a running theme of European exploration and the Holocene extinction.

The Holocene is the sixth great extinction. The five previous ones were caused by natural changes, such as increased oxygen in the atmosphere, lower temperatures, or volcanic activity, but this one rests squarely on the relatively young shoulders of humanity. The current extinction rate is an estimated 140,000 species a year, which is 10 to 100 times the average for an extinction event and 10,000 times greater than the baseline rate. This is the greatest loss of biodiversity since the Cretaceous-Paleogene event that infamously wiped out the dinosaurs.

When we look back at our collective past, we see a pattern of wiping out entire species one after another out of greed and shortsightedness. When we look forward to our collective future, it seems to be only getting worse. Extinction carries with it a sense of finality and a permanent loss to the diversity of our planet. Thus, when scientists announced it was theoretically possible to bring back extinct species, many jumped at the chance for us to redeem ourselves. But the story isn’t as simple as just cobbling together another mammoth.

In 2009, researchers produced an animal from an extinct species. A newborn Pyrenean ibex born from a surrogate mother lived for seven minutes before dying due to deformed lungs. With her death, the Pyrenean ibex was extinct again. Other attempts have proved that bringing back a species is difficult, but far from impossible. Samples of skin from museum specimens and “frozen zoos” of cells collected from the last member of a species could provide the necessary genetic material. Costs are likely to be high, but they would likely rapidly go down once progress begins because of improvements in biotechnology (similar to the Human Genome project). Despite de-extinction being possible, it may not be the best option.

At best, de-extinction is likely to waste resources that could be better spent on existing species. At worst, de-extinction could cause more problems than it solves. To be successful, researchers must bring back large enough numbers of extinct species so they could survive in the wild, and maintain enough habitat for them to not become extinct again (which may be harder than species revival). Other issues include reintroduced extinct species becoming invasive, poaching due to their rarity, and disturbing the existing ecological balance.

Currently, the question of if we should do it is a bigger issue than how. Since many extant species are also at risk of extinction, conservationists argue that the resources would be better spent on ensuring their continued survival, and that biotechnology could be used to help existing species whose numbers have been devastated to regain genetic diversity (such as with cheetahs and northern white rhinos). We have undoubtedly lost countless species before we have even discovered them; the gastric brooding frog went extinct the same year it was discovered.

We are losing species at a faster rate than we could possibly bring them back. De-extinction would not change the underlying issues of pollution, habitat loss, and human introduction of invasive species and disease that cause extinction in the first place. By putting resources into conservation and directly addressing these problems, we can save far more than one or two extinct species.

While successfully bringing back an extinct species may be an inspiring display of how far science has come and reveal new information about extinct species, there are still many undiscovered species that will go extinct before we ever discover them if our efforts are in de-extinction rather than conservation. Today, conservationists tote guns and risk their lives to protect the dwindling African elephant population. We do not have the luxury to pour resources into bringing back a mammoth. We are an unnatural disaster and may soon fall prey to ourselves unless we change course.