In a message dated 10/24/2007 10:44:41 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
dsmith@xxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
it will almost certainly improve the breed’s gene pool since the high
cost of cloning means only the best of the breed will be cloned. Thus,
horses with desirable qualities, such as high endurance, will increasingly be
bred thanks to cloning which will improve the gene pool for the entire
breed.
If human nature were not what it is I would probably agree - but the
introduction of AI, ET and the like have not improved the breed - in fact, it
does not insure quality from a logical perspective, but does insure that people
with money will be able to do it, and so their opinions about what constitutes a
good horse will be the guidelines. Sadly, money is not a genetic sister of
intelligence nor education. Case in point is the huge number of "halter champ"
babies dumped yearly onto the auction market, for numerous reasons but basically
because breeding 3 of something good does not necessarily translate into 30 MUST
be better. JMHO
