by Michal Nodzynski
When I was a kid, I was fascinated with dinosaurs and other examples of prehistoric fauna that have been long extinct. I often wondered how it would be to live among those species and interact with them.
And in a turn of events that would excite 10 year old me (and terrifies 30-year-old me), an American biotech company called Colossal Biosciences, announced on April 7th that it managed to ‘de-extinct’ Dire wolves through 3 puppies named Romulus, Remus and Khaleesi.
Dire wolves were ancient species of animals, believed to be related to gray wolves, that went extinct around 10,000 –13,000 years ago. In their prime, they were believed to inhabit a wide range of environments, from Canada in North America all the way down to Bolivia in South America.
The company managed to achieve this ‘de-extinction’ by editing 14 genes within the gray wolf genome to affect the phenotype (how the organism looks) of the wolves to resemble that of a dire wolf.
modified to resemble dire wolves. Colossal Biosciences.
Now there has been already a serious discussion on whether the 3 puppies can be considered resurrected dire wolves or are just genetically modified gray wolves. It doesn’t help that there has been serious doubt whether modern gray wolves are actually the closest relatives of this extinct species. And on top of that, there are longstanding ethical issues connected with the practice of genetically modifying animals.
When it comes to ‘why?’ of ‘de-extinction, the leadership of the company points towards helping conservation efforts, increased biodiversity as well as potential way to combat climate change using de-extinct animals like mammoths to stop release of methane gas from thawing permafrost in the Arctic. This last theory is however not universally accepted by all researchers. For what it’s worth, George Church, geneticist and co-founder of Colossal Biosciences, compares such endeavours to “de-extinct” mammoths to “existing, rewilding projects” and seems not to be too concerned with potential implications of such “re-introduction”. This ‘downplaying’ of potential consequences could be beneficial for the public image of the company, and as such help with securing funding from private investors.
holding one of the ‘dire wolf’ pups. The author was supposedly involved
in the process of de-extinction, and is even featured as one of the co-authors
of the pre-print paper that the company released on the preprint server bioRxiv.org.
George R. R. Martin
However, regardless of the validity of the claims about benefits of ‘de-extinction’ and soundness of scientific claims behind it, for me there is another angle that is worth exploring – the ‘techno-solutionist’ aspects of it.
Techno-solutionism is a term popularized by Evgeny Morozov in his book “To Save Everything, Click Here: The Folly of Technological Solutionism” (Morozov, 2013). The term is used there to describe the tendency of tech companies to look for digital solutions to different kinds of issues that contemporary societies deal with. Another term sometimes used interchangeably is ‘techno-fix’.
Whether it’s techno-solution or techno-fix, what I find interesting is the idea itself, that most societal problems could (and should) be addressed through the use of technology and innovation. The concept of ‘de-extinction’ very much embraces this way of thinking. Proponents of ‘de-extinction’ (such as George Church) emphasize that because issues, such as climate change, are so overwhelming and pressing, it justifies those unconventional approaches.
But techno-solutions often ignore that there exist well-researched and established ways of solving those issues. It’s just that often those solutions are not as ‘easy’ or as ‘quick’ as techno-solutionists would like them to be. Conservation efforts can be complicated, and they yield both successes and failures. But because they typically advocate restraint and harm reduction, they can be seen as ‘unattractive’ to those that prefer more decisive actions.
It’s also worth noting that conservational work is not universally opposed to use of modern technology. Frequently, conservational efforts take advantage of tools like tagging, drones or GPS data. Of course, even those technologies are not used uncritically. For example, the drones can be quite loud, and their deployment is only considered in cases where alternative, in-person intervention would be considered more disruptive to the environment.
And even so, those established technologies are sparsely used in the field. Researchers often highlight additional costs as well as poor adaptation of the equipment to the outdoor environment as one of the barriers to adapting technological tools in their work. In the end, the main issue in conservation isn’t lack of new technologies but lack of funding and interest from prominent stakeholders.
But what’s striking about those technologies in comparison to techno-fixes is what role they play in the process. Drones, satellites, and tags are there to support and enhance existing conservational frameworks. The work and research benefits from usage of those technologies, but does not depend entirely on them. The work could be done (albeit with more difficulty) without them. And in the end, the decision whether to use them or not is left to researchers and workers conducting those efforts.
On the other hand, techno-solutions often attempt to ‘disrupt’ established fields and completely change how issues are perceived and approached. And while this approach might work relatively well in markets focused on individual consumers[1] (such as consumer electronics or software) the consequences of failed ‘disruption’ in an environment-related field would be long-lasting and catastrophic.
The issue with techno-solutionist approach is that it not only ignores existing, non-technical, solutions, but it can even undermine them. Funding for conservation is already scarce and unevenly distributed. As such, some researchers worry that reallocating funds from undergoing conservation efforts towards de-extinction is simply not the most cost-efficient way to increase biodiversity.
Techno-solutions present a ‘quick’ technological fix that can appear to solve the problem without the need for deeper, structural changes, which more traditional approaches would call for. And when policymakers are both running out of time and money, techno-fixes can appear quite compelling.
It’s because of that need for urgency that techno-solutions are often proposed once ‘the issue’ reaches some sort of crisis. And this urgency can be then used as a way to legitimize those ‘fixes’ that otherwise would not be considered as a viable solution. For climate change, only now when the effects of it are obvious to everyone, are proponents of technologies such as Carbon Capture or Geoengineering becoming more bold and vocal about using them to address climate change.
Similar narratives can also be seen with ‘de-extinction’ movement. As conservation efforts become more difficult due to shifting political environments around the world, quick techno-fixes like ‘de-extinction’ can become more enticing to agencies and governments. In many ways, the tune changed from ‘there is no problem’ to ‘there is a problem, and we can only fix it now using technology’. This sense of urgency is a crucial element of techno-solutionisms, as it often allows it to bypass the usual assessment and public discussion that more established approaches require.
Technology might not be the solution, but it can definitely be part of it. But to do so, it has to work with people actively involved in conservational efforts and help them with addressing issues that they want to focus on. It also has to respect the voices and opinions of those that might be affected by deployment of said technologies. Conservational efforts to increase biodiversity shouldn’t have the same approach towards technology that in many cases caused the loss of said biodiversity.
It’s also worth highlighting that despite techno-solutionists claims that regulatory interventions don’t work – we have done that in the past. Remember the ozone layer hole? It’s still there, but studies have shown that since international efforts to reduce emissions of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) the ozone hole actually is slowly shrinking. This shows that coordinated, international regulatory efforts (which still include technological innovation) can work.
What personally scares me about techno-solutionist approach to conservational efforts is the potential for complete disregard for the well-being of currently living animals and their habitats. If we can ‘3D-print’ lions, why care about dying, sickly lions that currently roam the Earth? Let them die, and then we can just make more! It often seems easier to scrap everything and start from nothing rather than maintain what we might perceive as ‘flawed’ environment. We already see this type of thinking in politics when certain politicians call for heavy ‘budget cuts’ insisting on removing certain programs and funding with total disregard for how such cuts would affect people who rely on those funds. This might seem like a very pessimist view of de-extinction movement, but we’ve been similarly careless in the past with technologies of plastic, radioactive elements, nuclear waste. Techno-fixes of the past frequently ended up being equivalent of hiding the dirt under the rug and calling it ‘future-me’ problem. Except the future-us are the future generations that end up paying the price for our shortsightedness.
And honestly, Colossal Sciences shouldn’t try to impress 10-year-old me. If for no other reason, than simply because he was terrified of wolves.
Michal Nodzynski is a masters’ student at the Science and Technology Studies department of the University of Vienna. With background in molecular biology, his interests include how research in Life Sciences are conducted and communicated, with focus on perceptions of failures in research. Outside of academia, Michal is a huge nerd who enjoys fantasy novels and Tabletop Role-playing Games.
[1] Unfortunately, Colossal Biosciences approach to de-extinction seems to be close to Silicon Valley ethos of ‘move fast and break things’. Despite employing researchers, the company doesn’t publish their results in peer-reviewed journals and announces their results through press releases and photoshoots. There are very few instances where a company actually backs-up their claims with actual research (one rare example of that is the aforementioned 2025 preprint). Typical of techno-solutionism, the company promises quick and impressive results but is unable to explain how it plans to achieve them or even document what it has done so far. Not to mention addressing potential consequences of their interventions.