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United States Science Technology

The CIA Just Invested in Woolly Mammoth Resurrection Technology (theintercept.com) 54

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
As a rapidly advancing climate emergency turns the planet ever hotter, the Dallas-based biotechnology company Colossal Biosciences has a vision: "To see the Woolly Mammoth thunder upon the tundra once again." Founders George Church and Ben Lamm have already racked up an impressive list of high-profile funders and investors, including Peter Thiel, Tony Robbins, Paris Hilton, Winklevoss Capital -- and, according to the public portfolio its venture capital arm released this month, the CIA. From a report: Colossal says it hopes to use advanced genetic sequencing to resurrect two extinct mammals -- not just the giant, ice age mammoth, but also a mid-sized marsupial known as the thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger, that died out less than a century ago. On its website, the company vows: "Combining the science of genetics with the business of discovery, we endeavor to jumpstart nature's ancestral heartbeat." In-Q-Tel, its new investor, is registered as a nonprofit venture capital firm funded by the CIA. On its surface, the group funds technology startups with the potential to safeguard national security. In addition to its long-standing pursuit of intelligence and weapons technologies, the CIA outfit has lately displayed an increased interest in biotechnology and particularly DNA sequencing.
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The CIA Just Invested in Woolly Mammoth Resurrection Technology More

The CIA Just Invested in Woolly Mammoth Resurrection Technology

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  • I hope they partner with lab-grown meat companies (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Most of the "lab grown meat" companies are focusing on boring food like chicken and hamburgers.

    I think the more interesting potential in the lab-grown-meat industry is with more exotic meats (tiger, 16-oz black widows steaks).

    And this would be about as exotic as it gets.

  • Resurrection? (Score:2, Funny)

    by necro81 ( 917438 )
    John Wayne's not dead, he's frozen
    And as soon as we find a cure for cancer
    We're gonna thaw out the Duke, and he's gonna be pretty pissed off
    You know why?
    Have you ever taken a cold shower?
    Well, multiply that by fifteen million times
    That's how pissed off the Duke's gonna be

    [source [google.com]]
  • Not a good idea. I have seen this movie

  • In case you were wondering... (Score:3)

    by geekmux ( 1040042 ) on Thursday September 29, 2022 @03:10PM (#62924837)

    ...if your tax dollars were being wasted, go ahead. Read that headline again.

    the group funds technology startups with the potential to safeguard national security.

    Ah yes, because tank divisions and multi-billion dollar fighter jets, apparently suck at that, right? What's next, horsepower in our cars created with actual horses?

    Only thing that fits that idiotic title well, is Paris Hilton the mammoth investor.

  • As a rapidly advancing climate emergency turns the planet ever hotter, ... Colossal says it hopes to use advanced genetic sequencing to resurrect ... the giant, ice age mammoth ... to jumpstart nature's ancestral heartbeat.

    They do know that bringing back ice-age mammoths won't reduce Earth's temperature - right? I mean, pretty sure mammoths didn't cause the Ice Age.

    ... funded by the CIA. On its surface, the group funds technology startups with the potential to safeguard national security. In addition to its long-standing pursuit of intelligence and weapons technologies, ...

    Unless they're "stealth mammoths", I'm not sure how they're going to help the CIA.

    • I mean, pretty sure mammoths didn't cause the Ice Age.

      Or so we have been led to believe..

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      They do know that bringing back ice-age mammoths won't reduce Earth's temperature - right?

      Actually [smithsonianmag.com] ...

      • They do know that bringing back ice-age mammoths won't reduce Earth's temperature - right?

        Actually [smithsonianmag.com] ...

        Thanks and interesting, I guess, but I have to imagine the number of mammoths they've have to breed would be a *lot* and not sure how'd that work out in the long run overall.

  • Frickin' mammoths with frickin' laser beams on their frickin' heads

  • For the record (Score:3)

    by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Thursday September 29, 2022 @03:46PM (#62924975)

    The Dodo, passenger pigeon, and, as mentioned in the article, Tasmanian tiger, all became extinct due to humans. The least we could do is try to bring them back.

    As for wooly mammoths, while humans hunted them, it's more likely they died out because of their inability to adapt to climate change [canadiangeographic.ca].

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by tekram ( 8023518 )
      Good point on the extinct birds. It may also be easier to resurrect an avian genome than a mammalian one. 'Current features of bird genomes. Compared to any other group of tetrapods, birds are the ones that have less repeated elements in their genomes, comprising only 4-10% of its extent, a rather small number when compared to the 34-52% that they take up in mammals. Another example of genome reduction in birds is that of short interspersed nuclear elements (SINEs).'
  • Whenever you hear CIA/NSA. Always go with the thought process of hammering the stick at the other end hard and nonstop. This has been the US play book since the Brits started looting and ran off to stash their wealth. So whats to gain? CIA would use the tech to resurrect similar but extinct species that would cause environmental problems to 'enemies'. Say resurrecting an ancient bat species in china/asia just to fuck with them. Or a vigoursly invasive species of fish that would decimate an enemies ecosyst
    • Ah yes, the old "We'll use mammoths to make it look like an accident" trick. I think I first saw it in The Far Side.

    • It seems likely to me the CIA is interested in the ability to sequence DNA from highly degraded samples for the purpose of determining if person X is or was in a given location.

      The ability to manufacture "fake" DNA evidence for clandestine operations would be similarly useful.

      We *wish* it was about mammoths.

  • CIA calling card (Score:4, Funny)

    by byromaniac ( 8103402 ) on Thursday September 29, 2022 @04:28PM (#62925107)
    In the same way that polonium poisoning is the FSB calling card, goring by a 6 ton extinct mammal will be the new CIA calling card.

  • Yikes! (Score:4)

    by IonOtter ( 629215 ) on Thursday September 29, 2022 @04:31PM (#62925111) Homepage

    Seeing Peter Thiel's name attached to something makes my bottom pucker.

    He's the kind of libertarian that makes other libertarians nervous, because they all know he'd run them all through a meat grinder if there's a profit in it. He is the last person you want in charge, of anything!

  • CIA also does counter intelligence (Score:5, Interesting)

    by SethJohnson ( 112166 ) on Thursday September 29, 2022 @04:34PM (#62925115) Homepage Journal
    The CIA budget isn't entirely dedicated to causing problems around the world. One of the things they keep track of is factual knowledge. Like the CIA World Factbook [cia.gov]. It's important to US security that the CIA be aware of what a geopolitical adversary is capable of. If the US wanted to weaponize woolly mammoths ala Helms Deep battle, the NSA could apply its unknowingly mammoth resources to making that a thing. More likely, there's a couple interests here.

    1. Ascertain what could be accomplished through genetic manipulation and cloning by a dysfunctional nation state like North Korea. By applying a similar sized budget to what would be available to N. Korea and assigning industry experts, the CIA can figure out what their capabilities are in this area. Then when something odd starts to happen like Wyoming cattle production drops off because all the offspring are males, the CIA can recognize there might be fuckery afoot.

    2. Due to climate change and other human-caused factors, the number of species going extinct may begin to include those that are relevant to national security. Like the aforementioned cattle, or perhaps honey bees. Once we get into an uncontrollable cascade of extinctions due to ecosystem dependencies, the CIA might want to be able to re-stabilize things to some extent. This is proactive due-diligence on their part.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by cb88 ( 1410145 )
      Honey Bees is because we are abusing the shit out of pesticides.

      We already have numerous breeds of heat tolerant cattle.

  • Why mess around with dangerous animals when you could have what is arguably history's most dangerous apex predator?

  • Dinosaurs, of course.
  • The CIA has a venture capital arm?
  • There is a reason these wolly mammoth's are not around. They are not MEANT to be around. Eventually, they are going to use dna technology on something, "remake it" and the critter will have some sort of biological disease or something that the rest of the animal kingdom & humans have no protection from, thus wiping out everything else. Every time I see them say they found a frozen critter in amber, and try to extract something from it, I shutter to think if they release pandora's box.
    • Uhhh... given that they were around in historic times, the likelihood is that we killed too many of them. When were we given jurisdiction over what animals are "meant" to be around?

  • They'll keel over from heatstroke. Maybe they can alter the DNA a little and come up with a bald mammoth.

  • There is no suitable place in the world for these creatures, besides I'm already using that name for my penis.
  • Aliens. We must have enough of something resembling DNA to consider making a live one for study. /s
    • The reason for thinking that Joe Random Alien would have a genetic mechanism which used anything resembling DNA is ... ?

      Yes, Joe Random Alien will have a genetic system for transmitting information (chemistry) from one generation to the next. It's quite likely to be something that uses discrete digital information (as opposed to an analogue data format) stored in a polymer too. But the reasons for thinking it would use specifically a ribose sugar and phosphate backbone (there are dozens of similar sugars)

  • Without simultaneous resurrection of the mammoth's microbiome (especially the gut biome), there is little chance of maintaining a healthy population of these animals.
    • How are gut biomes formed? I don't know anything about this. Is it like whale fleas, where each whale has their own unique species of flea? The gut biome a product of individual environmental/biological/mechanical factors?

      • How are gut biomes formed?

        A more instructive question might be how they are transmitted from generation to generation.

        When the foetus breaks out of the amniotic membrane, it is generally entirely sterile (there are exceptions, frequently resulting in a stillbirth). So, somehow the infant's gut needs to get populated with a suitable biome. There is probably some direct transmission of the mother's anal flora onto the skin of the infant during birth, but that's going to be a small subset of the whole biome -

  • I kept expecting this to reference the Culinary Institute of America... because MammothBurgers!

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