Eat it, Crichton
Paleontologist Jack Horner has a better way to resurrect dinosaurs than all that tedious mucking about with mosquitoes and blood and amber. Far easier to start with a bird and work backwards. Avian DNA already contains instructions to make tailbones, teeth, scales, and claws. In “Dinosaurs: Return to Life?”, a Discovery Channel documentary, Horner says he would start with an emu, which looks halfway like a velociraptor anyway. A chicken would do in a pinch. (Unfortunately, the show does not seem to be scheduled for rerun anytime soon.)
Has Michael Swanwick written this story yet?
[Image by Ryan Ladbrook]
June 7th, 2008 at 5:57 am
Hi. I ran across this during a Web search, and can answer your question. No, I haven’t written this story. I plotted it a novel using this wheeze about a year and a half ago, but I haven’t had the time to get to it yet. We’ll see if I ever do.
June 8th, 2008 at 2:17 am
The “Summon Author” spell strikes again! Thanks for dropping by, Michael!
June 9th, 2008 at 9:01 am
Thanks for dropping by, Michael. The idea just seemed so … you.
My son is mad about dinosaurs, so it may be the germ of that children’s book I’ve been threatening to write.
June 9th, 2008 at 9:01 am
(Gee, I hope Michael Crichton doesn’t take the headline too personally…)
June 13th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
Actually, I’m fairly sure I read this story a couple of years ago in Asimov’s. I cannot remember the author, or any details of the story, but I recognize the basic idea (and I think I read the story on a bus, but that doesn’t exactly help me identify it…).