The Dinosaur Dilemma: Even If We Could, Should We?

My curiosity immediately sent me to Google, and my imagination took off. How incredible would it be to see a herd of Protoceratops grazing peacefully in a wide-open field? Something about that image just felt magical.

But as I dug deeper, my excitement started to fade. The hard truth is that our modern world simply isn’t built for them. Their immune systems wouldn’t survive our pathogens. Our ecosystems couldn’t absorb their presence without throwing everything out of balance.

There’s no place on Earth that could truly support the re-entry of a species that’s been gone for 65 million years—not without disastrous consequences, both for us and for them.

So, as much fun as the “what if” is, I have to go with the responsible answer: I wouldn’t bring any of them back. Some creatures belong to the past not because we couldn’t bring them back—but because we shouldn’t.

What do you think? Is the cool factor of seeing a real dinosaur worth the risk, or are some wonders better left in history?

About Douglas Blaine

Capnpen is a writer who was a newspaper and magazine journalist in a previous life. A college journalism major, he now works as an English teacher, but gets his writing fix by blogging about a variety of topics, including politics, religion, movies and television. When he's not working or blogging, Capnpen spends time with his family, plays a little golf (badly) and loves to learn about virtually anything.

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