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Field of clones: How horse replicas came to dominate polo (https://knowablemagazine.org)

146 points by gscott about 16 hours ago | 66 comments | View on ycombinator

walrus01 about 15 hours ago |

For a brief moment I thought this would be about something like robotic polo ponies, and considered the idea that four-legged high agility, high endurance robots had advanced significantly without me noticing.

didibus about 14 hours ago |

The thing is, what if there's an even better horse out there? Once you get on the cloning bandwagon, don't you also lock yourself out of looking/evolving an even better horse?

andai about 13 hours ago |

>“It was the same,” he recalls. “Same movements, same head.... I couldn’t believe it.”

My grandpa said the same thing, first time he saw me.

pfdietz about 3 hours ago |

This reminds me of a poem in Analog Yearbook 2 (1978) by Jeff Rovin, with the title "The Horse That Jack Built".

Science fiction becomes science fact every day.

foobar1962 about 14 hours ago |

Perhaps Polo will end up like competitive sailing with one-design classes based on the clone of horse. "Measurement" would be a blood test for drugs and dna.

apt-apt-apt-apt about 14 hours ago |

Humans can likely be cloned too.

Imagine 10,000 Albert Einsteins and John von Neumanns working together with modern AI on medical, scientific, and societal issues.

Though there could be an Evil Einstein due to upbringing or something.

jofzar about 14 hours ago |

Surprised that the legal drama part of this wasn't discussed, it's how I first heard about this

https://youtu.be/VARJnzhVryc

connorboyle about 15 hours ago |

Another Argentina/cloning-connected story is that President Javier Milei cloned his dog Conan at least four times: https://english.elpais.com/international/2024-04-26/the-myst...

The stories make me wonder if Argentina is a cloning hotspot, though I may be reading too much into two stories.

Garlef about 11 hours ago |

> At the slightest touch of the reins, he felt a familiarity that shook him...

Ah... Some good, old, pre-AI journalism slop.

Oh the countless times a universities press release has been turned into four pages describing the smell of coffee some scientist inhales on their way through campus...

deadbabe about 9 hours ago |

Given the way the world is now, I will not be surprised if full human cloning and replica people is a thing at some point in my lifetime, just like horses.

nxy about 4 hours ago |

[dead]

aaron695 about 15 hours ago |

[dead]

undefined about 8 hours ago |

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