The world’s first successfully de-extincted animal?

[JoeyJoystick]

Dallas-based biotech company Colossal Biosciences has claimed it de-extincted the first animal.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/07/science/dire-wolf-de-extinction-cloning-colossal/index.html

Now they have used the genome from a Grey Wolf and edited 20 genes in 17 cells. The 12,000 years extinct is now resurrected they claim.

Now you can call it what you wanna call it, but a grey wolf is a grey wolf. And a dire wolf is a dire wolf. They claim that 99.9% is grey wolf.

I do not think it is fair to say tat they have de-extinct an animal. Because it is not. Now this does nothing negative to what they have achieved of course, because it is an enormous achievement I think.

The bottom line is, I think, They have created a Hybrid of some kind. And the Dire Wolf is still extinct.

Let me know what you think.


Joey

 

[Real blank]

It’s not quite Jurassic Park.

 

[ataraxia]

Dallas-based biotech company Colossal Biosciences has claimed it de-extincted the first animal.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/07/science/dire-wolf-de-extinction-cloning-colossal/index.html

Now they have used the genome from a Grey Wolf and edited 20 genes in 17 cells. The 12,000 years extinct is now resurrected they claim.

Now you can call it what you wanna call it, but a grey wolf is a grey wolf. And a dire wolf is a dire wolf. They claim that 99.9% is grey wolf.

I do not think it is fair to say tat they have de-extinct an animal. Because it is not. Now this does nothing negative to what they have achieved of course, because it is an enormous achievement I think.

The bottom line is, I think, They have created a Hybrid of some kind. And the Dire Wolf is still extinct.

Let me know what you think.


Joey

The fact is that the line between what makes a species distinct from another can be quite grey. It's a gradual process- and it takes a while for the genes to evolve to be so different that they can no longer produce viable offspring (the definition of speciation).

We humans have over 98% genetic homology to chimps. The species Homo sapiens (modern man) shared even more with Homo neanderthalis (the Neanderthals) and the Denisovans- enough where they could still have viable offspring with them. It turns out most humans in the world today have at least a little bit of Neanderthal and Denisovan genes- between 3-5%!

So it's hard drawing distinct lines when the lines are actually a little blurred and greyed out like that.

 

[What if...?]

Dallas-based biotech company Colossal Biosciences has claimed it de-extincted the first animal.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/07/science/dire-wolf-de-extinction-cloning-colossal/index.html

Now they have used the genome from a Grey Wolf and edited 20 genes in 17 cells. The 12,000 years extinct is now resurrected they claim.

Now you can call it what you wanna call it, but a grey wolf is a grey wolf. And a dire wolf is a dire wolf. They claim that 99.9% is grey wolf.

I do not think it is fair to say tat they have de-extinct an animal. Because it is not. Now this does nothing negative to what they have achieved of course, because it is an enormous achievement I think.

The bottom line is, I think, They have created a Hybrid of some kind. And the Dire Wolf is still extinct.

Let me know what you think.


Joey

That one percent can be a lot. We share 99% of our genes with chimpanzees.

 

[What if...?]

The fact is that the line between what makes a species distinct from another can be quite grey. It's a gradual process- and it takes a while for the genes to evolve to be so different that they can no longer produce viable offspring (the definition of speciation).

We humans have over 98% genetic homology to chimps. The species Homo sapiens (modern man) shared even more with Homo neanderthalis (the Neanderthals) and the Denisovans- enough where they could still have viable offspring with them. It turns out most humans in the world today have at least a little bit of Neanderthal and Denisovan genes- between 3-5%!

So it's hard drawing distinct lines when the lines are actually a little blurred and greyed out like that.

The Denisovans were the little Hominids, right?

Theirs is an interesting story about a culture in iirc New Guinea that has an oral history that includes interactions with small “men that weren’t men” that lived in the highlands.

Somebody decided to check it out and they found sites once occupied by a small hominid.

Which means that that oral history was either far older than expected or a hominid species maintained a population long after we thought we were the only ones left.

 

[What if...?]

The fact is that the line between what makes a species distinct from another can be quite grey. It's a gradual process- and it takes a while for the genes to evolve to be so different that they can no longer produce viable offspring (the definition of speciation).

We humans have over 98% genetic homology to chimps. The species Homo sapiens (modern man) shared even more with Homo neanderthalis (the Neanderthals) and the Denisovans- enough where they could still have viable offspring with them. It turns out most humans in the world today have at least a little bit of Neanderthal and Denisovan genes- between 3-5%!

So it's hard drawing distinct lines when the lines are actually a little blurred and greyed out like that.

What it really means is those “frozen zoos” kept by many zoos like the one in San Diego could be “resurrected” now. We alone ended many species fairly recently. And those holes in those ecosystems have often not fully recovered from those extinctions.

 

[What if...?]

It’s not quite Jurassic Park.

It is the mechanism used by JP though.

 

[uptower]

The Denisovans were the little Hominids, right?

Theirs is an interesting story about a culture in iirc New Guinea that has an oral history that includes interactions with small “men that weren’t men” that lived in the highlands.

Somebody decided to check it out and they found sites once occupied by a small hominid.

Which means that that oral history was either far older than expected or a hominid species maintained a population long after we thought we were the only ones left.

I think they were stone age Europeans, similar to cro magnon. The small ones were southeast Asians. The "hobbit" was homo floriensis or something. No time to Google sorry.

 

[CaughtInThe]

 

[eman623]

It’s not quite Jurassic Park.

More like Game of Thrones.

 

[JoeyJoystick]

The fact is that the line between what makes a species distinct from another can be quite grey. It's a gradual process- and it takes a while for the genes to evolve to be so different that they can no longer produce viable offspring (the definition of speciation).

We humans have over 98% genetic homology to chimps. The species Homo sapiens (modern man) shared even more with Homo neanderthalis (the Neanderthals) and the Denisovans- enough where they could still have viable offspring with them. It turns out most humans in the world today have at least a little bit of Neanderthal and Denisovan genes- between 3-5%!

So it's hard drawing distinct lines when the lines are actually a little blurred and greyed out like that.

Hi Ataraxia,

Sorry but it sounds to me like you are contradicting yourself.

- First you say that the definition of speciation is when different species can not produce viable off-spring. (I think you mean to say; 1 of the definitions)
- Than you say that we have 3-5% Neanderthal DNA. Yet, here we have 2 different species who clearly and successfully have interbred. Obviously there are many animals that do that today, or could do that today if they were not separated geographically.

I agree that the line between species is blurring though. But it is quite a leap to say you have done something while in reality you have done something else. They did not bring back an extinct species I think. They created a species that resembles the extinct species very well.

I had an acquaintance in Holland who's hobby was the bread-back chickens that looked like the chickens they had in Europe 400-500 years ago. And they looked quite different I can tell you. What these guys did is obviously way more advanced. It is done in a lab. But they still just created an animal that looked looked like it.


Joey

 

[JoeyJoystick]

The Denisovans were the little Hominids, right?

Theirs is an interesting story about a culture in iirc New Guinea that has an oral history that includes interactions with small “men that weren’t men” that lived in the highlands.

Somebody decided to check it out and they found sites once occupied by a small hominid.

Which means that that oral history was either far older than expected or a hominid species maintained a population long after we thought we were the only ones left.

Hi What If,

That is really interesting. But just because they found small humanoids, does not mean they were not human. We have Pygmies in Africa, and just 1,000 years ago we were about that size too in Europe. Look at all the King and Queen beds from the royals in museums. They were incredibly small these beds. And most often it was not just husband and Wife but the whole family who stayed in the bed....

But I do believe that they found these small people in PNG. I have been there several times. Oh man. Wait 'til it's safe and go look before the tourists ruin it. It is an absolutely incredible place!


Joey

 

[What if...?]

I think they were stone age Europeans, similar to cro magnon. The small ones were southeast Asians. The "hobbit" was homo floriensis or something. No time to Google sorry.

That’s right. It was the “hobbits”.

Still pretty interesting though.

It’s always fun when the “known” things become less so.

Anthropology is having its “velociraptor” moment.

Dinosaurs were cold blooded tail dragging animated lumps when I was a little kid. And the paleontologists talked mad smack to the warm blooded bird like complex folks or a long time before they had to give in to th evidence.

Anthropology is now facing moving the dates for “civilization” back by tens of millennia.

And Homo sapiens sapiens is now being moved back from 40 thousand years to nearly a hundred now, evidently, because I’ve seen the higher number a couple of times now.

Portable ground penetrating radar has discovered some amazing things in remote places.

Gobekli Tepi shocked everybody, as well as the hominid that practiced elaborate burial behavior 250,000 years ago, which made the sapience club bigger. And older.

 

[Sven Karma]

The fact is that the line between what makes a species distinct from another can be quite grey. It's a gradual process- and it takes a while for the genes to evolve to be so different that they can no longer produce viable offspring (the definition of speciation).

We humans have over 98% genetic homology to chimps. The species Homo sapiens (modern man) shared even more with Homo neanderthalis (the Neanderthals) and the Denisovans- enough where they could still have viable offspring with them. It turns out most humans in the world today have at least a little bit of Neanderthal and Denisovan genes- between 3-5%!

So it's hard drawing distinct lines when the lines are actually a little blurred and greyed out like that.

It's a bit of a ho-hum reworking of Jurassic Park with this here story (mammoths) but Douglas Preston's novel Extinction has a.very interesting afterword about Neanderthals and their genes.

 

[ataraxia]

Hi Ataraxia,

Sorry but it sounds to me like you are contradicting yourself.

- First you say that the definition of speciation is when different species can not produce viable off-spring. (I think you mean to say; 1 of the definitions)
- Than you say that we have 3-5% Neanderthal DNA. Yet, here we have 2 different species who clearly and successfully have interbred. Obviously there are many animals that do that today, or could do that today if they were not separated geographically.

I agree that the line between species is blurring though. But it is quite a leap to say you have done something while in reality you have done something else. They did not bring back an extinct species I think. They created a species that resembles the extinct species very well.

I had an acquaintance in Holland who's hobby was the bread-back chickens that looked like the chickens they had in Europe 400-500 years ago. And they looked quite different I can tell you. What these guys did is obviously way more advanced. It is done in a lab. But they still just created an animal that looked looked like it.


Joey

You're absolutely right in seeing the paradox here: the classical definition of species—often called the Biological Species Concept—says that species are groups of organisms that can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. According to this definition, if two groups can interbreed, they’re typically considered the same species, or at least subspecies. That's sort of the classic Biology 101 definition of "species".

But reality is unfortunately a little more complicated and grey than the artificial sharp categories and definitions we humans often like to impose on it. These hominins evolved from a common ancestor and gradually diverged over hundreds of thousands of years, but they remained genetically similar enough to interbreed. That’s why modern humans outside of Africa carry small percentages of Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA—clear evidence of interbreeding. This suggests they weren’t completely reproductively isolated and may have been more like subspecies than entirely separate species. The definition of “species” is more fluid than it might seem, and scientists use different definitions of "species" depending on context. While the definition I used is a classic one, focusing on reproductive compatibility, other definitions emphasize physical traits, ecological roles, or evolutionary lineages. Under some of these frameworks, it’s reasonable to classify Neanderthals and Denisovans as separate species, while others would treat them as subspecies of Homo sapiens.

Ultimately, speciation is a gradual process, not a clean break, and these ancient human relatives occupied a gray area where genetic exchange was still possible despite evolutionary divergence. That's why arguing now over whether this new genetically engineered wolf "species" is really a new species or not is really probably just a matter of semantics.

 

[What if...?]

Hi What If,

That is really interesting. But just because they found small humanoids, does not mean they were not human. We have Pygmies in Africa, and just 1,000 years ago we were about that size too in Europe. Look at all the King and Queen beds from the royals in museums. They were incredibly small these beds. And most often it was not just husband and Wife but the whole family who stayed in the bed....

But I do believe that they found these small people in PNG. I have been there several times. Oh man. Wait 'til it's safe and go look before the tourists ruin it. It is an absolutely incredible place!


Joey

What they found was “hobbits”. Homo floresiesis.

 

[JoeyJoystick]

What they found was “hobbits”. Homo floresiesis.

Hi What If,

Ok, fair enough. Thanks, I learned something again.

Joey

 

[bomberfox]

Dallas-based biotech company Colossal Biosciences has claimed it de-extincted the first animal.

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/07/science/dire-wolf-de-extinction-cloning-colossal/index.html

Now they have used the genome from a Grey Wolf and edited 20 genes in 17 cells. The 12,000 years extinct is now resurrected they claim.

Now you can call it what you wanna call it, but a grey wolf is a grey wolf. And a dire wolf is a dire wolf. They claim that 99.9% is grey wolf.

I do not think it is fair to say tat they have de-extinct an animal. Because it is not. Now this does nothing negative to what they have achieved of course, because it is an enormous achievement I think.

The bottom line is, I think, They have created a Hybrid of some kind. And the Dire Wolf is still extinct.

Let me know what you think.


Joey

Yeah they didnt create a dire wolf. A dire wolf is in a different species than the canis familiaris and canis lupus.
Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Mammalia

Order: Carnivora

Family: Canidae (dogs, coyotes, foxes, jackals, wolves; many extinct genera)

Genus: Canis (Linnaeus, 1758)

Species: Canis dirus (Leidy, 1858) - dire wolf (extinct)

Subspecies: Canis dirus guildayi (extinct)

Subspecies: Canis dirus dirus (extinct)

 

[dockside]

That’s right. It was the “hobbits”.

Still pretty interesting though.

It’s always fun when the “known” things become less so.

Anthropology is having its “velociraptor” moment.

Dinosaurs were cold blooded tail dragging animated lumps when I was a little kid. And the paleontologists talked mad smack to the warm blooded bird like complex folks or a long time before they had to give in to th evidence.

Anthropology is now facing moving the dates for “civilization” back by tens of millennia.

And Homo sapiens sapiens is now being moved back from 40 thousand years to nearly a hundred now, evidently, because I’ve seen the higher number a couple of times now.

Portable ground penetrating radar has discovered some amazing things in remote places.

Gobekli Tepi shocked everybody, as well as the hominid that practiced elaborate burial behavior 250,000 years ago, which made the sapience club bigger. And older.

Wait, wait, wait. According to some Bible-believers, the humans were only created 6,000 years ago. How do you explain that? /sarcasm

 

[What if...?]

Yeah they didnt create a dire wolf. A dire wolf is in a different species than the canis familiaris and canis lupus.
Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Mammalia

Order: Carnivora

Family: Canidae (dogs, coyotes, foxes, jackals, wolves; many extinct genera)

Genus: Canis (Linnaeus, 1758)

Species: Canis dirus (Leidy, 1858) - dire wolf (extinct)

Subspecies: Canis dirus guildayi (extinct)

Subspecies: Canis dirus dirus (extinct)

Genetic engineering does some weird stuff.

Our brains aren’t novel. They are new things stacked on older things. We still have the reptile brain in our structure. It just has mad aftermarket parts. Human embryos pass through earlier forms as they develop.

The canids have a common ancestor. So did they go back to the divergence point and splice from there?

 

[GIJane]

Where's the poll?

Question: Should we be doing this?
O Yes
O No
O Other
O Frito pie

 

[JoeyJoystick]

Where's the poll?

Question: Should we be doing this?
O Yes
O No
O Other
O Frito pie

Hi Jane,

I screwed up. Wrote the poll, and than I clicked and clicked and clicked and obviously had no idea what I was doing...


Joey

 

[GIJane]

Hi Jane,

I screwed up. Wrote the poll, and than I clicked and clicked and clicked and obviously had no idea what I was doing...


Joey

No worries. It probably would have been a interesting discussion.

I can see the science helping people who can't have children at some point in the future. I think they need to be careful. Science unregulated can be dangerous (Covid).