photo credit: Ryan Somma
Old joke, updated: Do you have any Neanderthal in you? Do you want one?
Ok, so you may have heard that all humans of non-African descent have a small percent of Neanderthal genes buried away in our double helix. So that’s exciting.
In other Neanderthal news, there’s a discussion about whether it would be ok to scrape together the small amount of Neanderthal DNA we can find in fossils and such, and create a living being.
We can’t do this yet. We can’t even come close. So it’s good that we’re having the conversation now.
And the answer is:
No. We should never ever ever ever clone a complete Neanderthal person.
Mind, you, I’m ok with cloning humans, pieces of humans, sheep, pieces of sheep, etc.
But a Neanderthal is a thinking, rational being, with emotions, the ability to speak, and a fine brain who would be all alone and an object of ridicule and scientific study without giving permission.
So some people said, hey, let’s create a colony of them, so they won’t be lonely. Yeah, colonies of extreme minorities always do really well, right?
Nope. Don’t do it. I’m on record.
See:
So was the clone of the post intentional, or am I making bad assumptions again? If the former, know that I laughed. If the latter, forget that I laughed. I hate it when I laugh at someone’s joke, only to find out it was accidental.
Accidental, but I’m leaving it there, because it’s hilarious.