RE: Cloning of extinct Huia bird approved

["Stewart, Dwight" <Dwight.Stewart@VLSI.com>]

Moral implications?  By WHOSE standards? :-)  I'd love to see the Huia bird
revived.  Of course, I'd love to
see the Tyrannosaurus rex revived, so...

Nice evening for daydreaming.

Dwight

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Betty Cunningham [SMTP:bettyc@flyinggoat.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 1999 6:38 PM
> To:   vrtpaleo@usc.edu; dinosaur@usc.edu
> Subject:      CNN: Cloning of extinct Huia bird approved
> 
> http://customnews.cnn.com/cnews/pna.show_story?p_art_id=4102567&p_section_
> name=&p_art_type=652817&p_subcat=other+animals&p_category=animals
> 
> Cloning of extinct Huia bird approved 
> July 20, 1999     Web posted at: 3:15 p.m. EDT (1915 GMT)
> 
> (ENN) -- It may sound like science fiction, but scientists and ethicists
> meeting in New Zealand earlier this month have determined that efforts
> to revive the extinct Huia bird through cloning should begin
> immediately. 
> 
> Professor of molecular biology Diana Hill, who has also investigated the
> cloning of another extinct bird, the Moa, called the project "flagship
> research" and "exciting leading-edge science of international
> significance." 
> 
> Hill cautioned that technical hurdles mean a cloned Huia is probably
> some years away. 
> 
> The project began when students at the Hastings Boys High School in New
> Zealand wondered if their school emblem, the extinct Huia, could be
> revived.  The students researched the idea, invited speakers and
> organized a conference.  Students, representatives from the Maori,
> scientists and moral experts met July 9-10 to discuss the technical
> feasibility and moral permissibility of reviving the Huia. 
> 
> Now the schoolboy fantasy, inspired by Dr. Michael Crichton's
> best-selling novel, Jurassic Park, is leading to cutting edge scientific
> research. 
> 
> The Huia is a bird of great cultural importance to the Maori, New
> Zealand's indigenous population. They prized the bird for its large,
> white-tipped, black tail feathers. Due to a European fashion craze, the
> bird was declared extinct in the 1920s. 
> 
> The Reverend Dr. Norman Ford, Catholic priest and director of the
> Caroline Chisholm Centre for Health Ethics in Melbourne, Australia, said
> that the benefits to Maori and to New Zealand of cloning the Huia meant
> the research was morally acceptable. 
> 
> Other arguments that supported the morality of cloning the Huia included
> a restorative justice argument  that the Huia suffered loss through the
> actions of man and that man should now make good that loss. Cloning
> supporters also say that it shows that technology can fix the mistakes
> man has made in the past. 
> 
> Those who opposed the cloning project had a range of objections  that
> man should not play god, that the money could be spent better elsewhere,
> and that the Huia, due to its overspecialized nature was not meant to
> survive. They say a cloned Huia would not be real and might not be able
> to survive in the wild. 
> 
> Cloning supporters carried the day. 
> 
> "The next step in the cloning process involves searching for cells in
> the bones and tendons of preserved specimens," says Dr. Rhys Michael
> Cullen, a New Zealand physician and secretary of the academic committee
> of cyberuni.org, a conference sponsor. "If none are found, then we will
> try to extract DNA from those specimens and use 'Jurassic Park
> technology'." 
> 
> If none of these cells can be found, the nucleus of a cell removed from
> a taxidermic specimen of a Huia could be fused with the ovum of another
> bird to start the regeneration. In Scotland, scientists used a cell
> implant to clone Dolly, the sheep. Alternatively, scientists could
> attempt to create a clone from a genetic template of the Huia. This was
> the process to revive dinosaurs from extinction as described in the
> novel, Jurassic Park. 
> 
> The cloning project will be financed in part by cyberuni.org, inc., a
> California corporation and Internet start-up, based in San Francisco.
> 
> -- 
> Flying Goat Graphics
> http://www.flyinggoat.com
> (Society of Vertebrate Paleontology member)
> -------------------------------------------<,D,><