[ExI] A Mammoth for $10 Million

[Damien Broderick]

At 05:28 PM 11/21/2008 +1030, Emlyn wrote:

>I reckon 10 million for a Mammoth would be a steal.

But probably a sad mess. First you need to find an egg with exactly 
appropriate extra-nuclear materials; oh, bad luck, no mammoth mothers 
left. Then a suitable uterus secreting the appropriate support 
materials; in an elephant? but wait, elephants *aren't* mammoths. 
Could be big trouble already. Then if any viable critter is born, you 
have to provide it with a mammoth behavioral-trait-eliciting and 
reinforcing and shaping environment, and I'm pretty sure a family of 
elephants will be about as salient as a family of chimps would be to 
a human or gorilla baby. Then you have to stop the "father" and 
siblings and other phants from tearing this stinking weird-looking 
alien thing to pieces. Then if the neurotic and either fearful or 
aggressively defensive animal survives long enough for it to grow 
some fur, how's it going to feel in a macro or micro climate 
appropriate for its adoptive chums?

Not *necessarily* a great idea.

Damien Broderick