Nature - autonomous learning

4 strange naturesBiotechnology’s ‘new’ and ‘old’ natures 4It is one of the paradoxes of modern biotechnology that it can resurrect lostspecies even as its physically reconstitutes others so that they become‘supernatural’. Consider the following.A team of Italian scientists recentlyrevealed Promethea, the first horse ever to be cloned.This Halfliger foalcould presage a new generation of champion racehorses and show horses.Derived from a cell taken from the mare that was its mother, Prometheashows that it is possible to replicate champion horses without the need forstallions, sexual intercourse or even artificial insemination. The ownersof thoroughbreds strictly control which other horses their animals copulatewith. ‘Unnatural’ horses like Promethea show that it’s now possible toreproduce genetically similar animals generation after generation.Meanwhile, biotechnologists elsewhere are trying to ‘bring back the dead’.Cloning – the procedure that made Promethea – can, it is hoped, also beused to resurrect extinct or threatened species, like woolly mammoths,dodos and bucardos. The last of these is a species of goat found in thePyrenean mountains, the last of which died of natural causes in January2000.Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) – a Massachusetts-based company– plans to bring bucardos back using cloning techniques.The long-termaim is to create Noah’s Arks of frozen genetic material so that any andall threatened animal species can be recreated if the need arises. Not surprisingly,many people are uneasy about these attempts to both supercedeand resurrect nature.What, they ask, are the moral implications of biotechnologists‘playing God’? Is it right to ‘tamper’ with nature in the ways thatPromethea’s creators and ACT want to do?Do fish have rights? 5In spring 2001 the Texan angling community became the butt of a morallyloaded joke.The organisation PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment ofAnimals) threatened to dose a fresh-water fishing retreat, Lake Palestine,with tranquilliser. Why did it do so? In order to put the lake’s fish tosleep so that they would not be caught during the Red Man CowboySporting Division Angling Tournament! The tournament had been scheduledfor April Fool’s Day and a cadre of park rangers were deployed toprevent PETA seeding the lake with sleeping pills. Sure enough, both therangers and the anglers were made to look foolish.The tournament went