Scientist Says He Can Breed Dinosaurs Using Chicken Embryos

One of the most terrifying experiences of my pre-teen years was sitting in the movie theater with my friends just before the previews for Jurassic Park were set to begin. Despite the fact that I had been super excited to see the film during the weeks leading up to its release, I became – secretly – scared shitless, sitting there in the dark, waiting for it to start. “Oh, shit… Am I really going to do this? Did I sign up for something that I can’t handle? This is going to be so fucking scary!” I believe I was in fifth grade.

But the movie turned out to be not-scary, at least for my fifth grade self, and luckily I didn’t end up shitting my pants that day. Which brings me to a story The Telegraph ran today about a Canadian scientist who claims he can basically do what they did in Jurassic Park: use genetics to create fucking dinosaurs. From The Telegraph:

Hans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at McGill University in Montreal, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.

Mr Larsson believes that by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo’s development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.

Though still in its infancy, the research could eventually lead to hatching live prehistoric animals, but Mr Larsson said he has no immediate plans to create dinosaurs, for ethical and practical reasons – a dinosaur hatchery is “too large an enterprise.”

Where’s that crazy billionaire philanthropist John Hammond (the guy that built the dinosaur park in Jurassic Park…) when you need him? I’m sure all this will go over real well for humanity once they get funding for such a large enterprise. Real well. Climate change, ecological destruction, resource wars, genocide, mass extinction, and now… the threat of being eaten by dinosaurs.