A company called Colossal Biosciences claims to have brought the dire wolf back from extinction after 10,000 years. But perhaps just as shocking is where its funding comes from. Glenn reveals that the CIA has invested in the company, and he gives potential reasons why the spy agency would want to fund genetic engineering technology. Does the CIA want to create genetically enhanced animal super weapons for its own use? What about genetically altered humans? And have we learned ANYTHING from Hollywood? Should we be making “Jurassic Park” a reality?

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: So, Stu, how excited are you that the animal made famous by Game of Thrones, that went extinct, 13,000 years ago, is among us now?

STU: You know, they said Trump was the greatest comeback story. And now, we have the HEP dire wolf.

GLENN: Yeah. So do we have any of the video of the dire wolf?

Here's the dire wolf. The little babies. Aren't they cute?

STU: Oh, my gosh. I want one.

GLENN: No. You really don't.

STU: Oh, my gosh. I want one.

GLENN: They're so cute, aren't they? Yeah. Listen to that.

STU: They're a little loud.

GLENN: You want to get up in the middle of the night and hear howling? No. Uh-uh. So they retrieved the DNA from fossils of dire wolves. 13,000 years ago, they were over. Then they discovered additional DNA, and they edited 20 genes of gray wolves. And then put the dire wolf in the gray wolf, and we now have the new and improved dire wolf.

Which, hmm. I'm not sure this is a good idea.

You know, when it comes to AI. When it comes to all of that.

Has anyone watched a movie? Has anyone watched a movie?

This was all science fiction, dystopia stuff.

It's now here!

So as I'm going perusing this.

Because remember, the next thing is woolly mammoth.

And we had the CEO on the program.

Remember?

And I said, why are you thinking about bringing the woolly mammoth back?

He said, it would be good for the environment.

What? It would be good for the environment.

Do they not fart? And do they eat cows?

How is that -- he didn't really have a good answer on that. But it will make a lot of people on the left feel good.

Oh, it's good for the environment.

So we'll bring the woolly mammoth back.

And look at, they're so furry and stuff. They'll make great if you are rugs in the end.

The next step is to bring back the woolly mammoth.

Okay. Again!

You know, if you believe in Darwin, you believe in survival of the fittest. There's a reason these animals went extinct.

One of the reasons, I think for like these large, dangerous animals, is so we could live!

You know, there was a lot of, oh, my gosh. Going on, you know what I mean? (sound effect).

I just want to make that clear. Maybe we've forgotten about that. But that's what those animals were doing to humans. But we'll put them on a special island. And then, they will be fine.

So now we have the -- now we have the dire wolf.

Which is -- is truly wonderful.

And as I get into this. I see who some of the investors are.

And one of the investors that is really excited about just pouring money into the colossal bio science, is the CIA.

I'm giving you a chance to process that for a second.

First of all, CIA.

They've got a budget to invest in companies!

Hmm!

Sounds like a bad idea.

STU: Shouldn't really be part of what the CIA does.

GLENN: Well.

STU: It's not a hedge fund, right?

GLENN: Hmm. They're not just investing. They have good reason to invest, okay?

STU: Oh.

GLENN: So if you're looking for -- if you're looking to do what the CIA does, this might be a very good application for them.

Here's why gene editing is catching the eye of the -- are you ready?

STU: Uh-huh.

GLENN: It's a dual use technology.

Gene editing tools like CRISPR are inherently dual use. Meaning, they can serve civilian purposes. Conservation, biotech breakthroughs, and military intelligence ones.

So okay. I'm trying to -- woolly mammoths. Woolly mammoths. Why would you want to bring a woolly mammoth?

Well, one of them is they believe that they could CRISPR their way into bioengineering resilient organisms.

You know, like spy drones, that are animals.

Oh.

Enhancing human capabilities. Maybe we can Mengele our way into Gene splicing a little of the dire wolf into all of us. So we're a little stronger.

GLENN: I should just on the surface, we shouldn't Mengele ourselves into anything. Always a bad choice. Always.

STU: There's a lot at college campuses right now, where they're saying the opposite, I've noticed in protest. But I'm going to go with no on the Mengele into anything.

GLENN: Try this one on for size.

Another reason why the CIA may be interested in the -- in the new, hey. Let's bring animals back from the dead!

Ecological and geopolitical leverage!

D extinction. Great word, huh?

New. D extinction could reshape eco systems intentionally or not!

Imagine reintroducing a species to destabilize a rival nation's agriculture or environment!

Say, flooding, a region with engineered pests or altering food chains.

You know, I -- I don't think this is a good idea!

I don't think this is a good idea.

If you weren't convinced the CIA is out of control, you might want to share this with your friends.

Bio security and threat assessment. Reason number three. If adversaries develop gene editing for hostile purposes.

In other words, a weaponized pathogen or super soldiers, the CIA needs to stay ahead.

Investing in colossal gives them a front row seat to cutting edge biotech, letting them study its limits or viabilities.

They're not just funding it. They're learning to fend against it, or wield it themselves, if necessary. Now, this is a story coming out of China. Where China is reengineering people, trying to make them smarter.

I mean, come on, guys. Chinese are always. They're better at instruments.

They're better at math. They're better at really almost everything.

STU: This is interesting research.

Interesting approach. Almost have to come up with a name for it.

Like a gain-of-function research.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh!

What a great idea!

Gain of function.

STU: That would work perfectly. What could go wrong?

GLENN: Oh, my gosh. Reason number four. Synthetic biology for covet ops. Picture you're a bioengineered animal. Say, a dire wolf with tweak senses used for surveillance or tracking in remote areas where drones might fail.

STU: We are screwed!

GLENN: Uh-huh.

STU: We are screwed.

GLENN: Uh-huh. Number five, future-proofing influence.

Biotech is supposed to -- is poised to explode, economically. Think lab grown meat.

I don't want to think about lab grown meat. Gene therapies or climate fixes. I don't think we should be doing stuff -- you know, can we really stop? We really should stop. We're creating God in AI. We're now thinking, we can bring things back from the dead!

I believe that was -- those two things were the story of Frankenstein. I just want to throw that in there. Okay? We can bring things back from the dead. You know what we can do?

We can bioengineer so things can live forever.

And it will be smarter. And, of course, it will always stay under our control.

Oh, my gosh.

By backing colossal, the CIA, via IQT, gets a steak in a field, that could rival big tech in influence.

If D extinction tech scales, it might affect food security, land use or even cultural narratives.

Okay. So there's your update on how the world will end today.

That's one of the most disturbing things I have -- I have read in a long time.

You know, I'm just trying to get my arms around AI. And how we can use AI for a very short period of time, before it's turned against us, and eats us all.

Well, we might -- the dire wolf might eat us first.

But I'm just getting my arms around that. I don't think we needed to introduce this one too.

And the fact that the CIA is involved!

Not good.

STU: Yeah. But we can release a bunch of animals in places where drones won't be effective. With their special senses.

GLENN: Where on earth?

Where on earth, would a drone not be effective?

STU: Well, tunnel. Right? Think of the Hamas tunnels. If you release some dire wolves down there, probably more effective than our drones.

GLENN: I think we could go over -- I think we could go over to really nasty parts of like, the Czech Republic. And get dogs that have just been, you know -- they're breeding them to tear people apart, and throw them in the tunnels.

I don't think we need to go back.

STU: Yeah. But they don't have the special senses. They don't have laser eyes. You need to have wolves with the laser eyes. What could go wrong with those?

They're probably great pets.

I feel like the Industrial Revolution gave us a lot of these types of things. Where you would say, for example. We developed cars.

And we could have the same conversation, you know, Model Ts rolling off the assembly line. Like, hey. People will just keep making these things. Faster and faster. And faster.

And they will get to the point where they're going two, three hundred miles an hour. And that happened. Right?

That's happened.

But it doesn't -- there was never a point where they're going so fast. That the entire world ends. Right?

With AI. With gene splicing. With biological warfare. Nuclear warfare. We keep having these conversations. Eventually some bad actor is going to take this to some logical extreme, and we're all screwed.

GLENN: What are the chances there are bad actors in the world? Can you name a thousand?

STU: 1.2 billion. 2.4 billion?

GLENN: I mean, besides everyone that is, you know -- when somebody writes a prescription and gives you advice as a doctor, I don't think they need a pardon, so they can never go to jail. You know what I mean?

You know, when Fauci is just writing a prescription, he's like, look, you should wear a mask. You should wear a mask. And take this.

You know, that's doctor's advice. I don't think that you need a pardon. What he was doing, was so corrupt, that he needed a presidential pardon.

I don't know, those are the kinds of doctors that maybe we should put in jail. Maybe it's just me.

I mean, it -- how do we get to this place? How do we get out?

It's going to be interesting, to see how this all works out.

STU: It will.

GLENN: How do we get out of this place, where we just seem hell-bent on our own destruction?

STU: With all of these things, I just don't see how -- I mean, our response with nuclear weapons.

And biological weapons was to just try to limit them as much as possible.

To go out, every time we heard. Hey, Bob, over in Iran. Might be doing -- might have the nuclear weapon. Why don't we go there and stop them. That's kind of been our approach.

Worked so far.

Eventually, it probably won't.

With AI. Our response is, let's just keep pushing it as fast as possible. With a bunch of really smart companies competing, along with governments doing the same thing.

GLENN: I mean, that's unfair a little bit.

STU: It is?

GLENN: So you have to remember that we didn't control things until after we used the bomb. Everyone was rushing towards it.

And we didn't know.

Honestly, there were, I don't know. 10 percent of scientists that said, if we do this, it could cause a chain reaction, that could set the entire world on fire!

STU: I remember that, from the documentary Oppenheimer.

GLENN: Okay. All right. So not really. Anyway, so --

STU: Close.

GLENN: So we had no idea what we were doing. We just knew, we had to get there first!

So afterwards, this is where it becomes fair.

After his, we could ban it.

We could control it.

It took extraordinary amounts of money to do.

It took certain equipment, that we could just ban.

You can't do that!

Okay?

And it was only -- only nation levels that could actually create one.

You know, the average person couldn't create.

Feen you had all the knowledge in the world. You couldn't create a nuclear weapon in your basement. Right?

You would need access to certain things that could be banned.

When it comes to AI. That's not true.

That's not true.

AI, you're going to have to ban, so much. And if somebody is using a nuclear weapon, on their own people, you know it!

You know what I mean? You would know it.

If somebody is using AI against their own people. You would never know it.

I mean, that's the kind of things that we're dealing with now.

Where it's so insidious.

That it could fall into the hand of one person. And it can design a weapon, that they can make themselves.

That will kill half the people on the planet. And you didn't even see it coming!

You didn't even know.

You didn't even know.

You could have the government ban it. But they're using it on you!

And you would never know.

That's the real problem, I think with AI. And the fact that you can no longer put it back in the bottle.

It's going to happen. We're all racing to get there.

But there is no way to get this back into the bottle. There's no way to control this. Like there was with nukes.

And honestly, that's why Silicon Valley went to Trump.

You know this. Right?

They were having a meeting.

Remember when Kamala Harris was like, AI.

This is great. It's a fun two letters. It's actually two words. Artificial intelligence!

Remember that? So insulting.

That was the meeting she had with all of the bigwigs in Silicon Valley.

And they said at that meeting, don't spend think more money on server farms or anything else.

We're taking care of it. This will all be controlled by the United States government. Because it's too big to let anyone else have it. Except for the United States government. They all walked out and went, we can't have the government have this. We will let the government be the only one that has this.

That's not good. That's why they flipped to Trump. Because they realized, this cannot be just in the hands of the government. But I would be the one in the room going, I don't think any of you guys should have this in your hands. Nobody should have access.

What you're building is an anti-God.