Zixinus I apologize in advance if I am missing any sarcasm or anything else.
I was not being ironic at all (I'm not a fan of being ambiguous), though I admit that I didn't quite think trough some of the stuff I've written.
There are USDA requirements on human interaction with wild animals for the health and safety of animals. Assuming those minimum requirements are met you have the problem that it's not good form to encourage exotic animals as pets, and that its not good form to teach that wild animals should be pets.
I was not aware of these USDA requirements.
In my imaginary all-animals-pettable zoo, the purpose wouldn't be to make them pets, but to allow children (and even adults) to interact with the animal without fear of the animal harming the humans. Granted, that won't stop the problem happening the other way around (humans harming the animal).
Perhaps only under supervision, these genetically-tamed animals could interact with humans? That way, harm could be prevented.
It would make zoos incredibly more interesting at any rate. People like to do more than just watch animals and read stuff on plaques. Feeding an animal by hand is a neat experience, never mind doing things like petting it or even playing with it.
1 - For professional reasons I cannot disclose all of the details of this situation, but I know of someone who raised a Binturong (from the civet family, also known as a bearcat) by hand while the animal was an infant and the grown Binturong was still aggressive enough that she is rarely handled today. You can't just remove the instincts of some animals, especially carnivores.
A dog too is a carnivore and there are many cases of dogs becoming aggressive, dominating and even dangerous. Usually, the problem is with the owners and rarely with the animals.
How do you prevent these TameGene(tm) animals be in a similar situation?
Of course, I'm assuming that this genetic treatment/trait mentioned in the OP is good and works almost magically. The level of tameness would be that of a normally tame animal: ie, unless they are treated well, they will not attack humans unless extreme circumstances.
What would be the point of taming these wild animals not suited for domestication when we have domestic dogs and cats that we have lived along with naturally for thousands of years?
What is the point of having cats and dogs? Because they form relationships with their owner.
There are other animals than cats and dogs that people keep. Guina pigs, rabbits (I own one, although I do not reccomend it in a flat), squirrals, etc.
I am not saying that every possible wild animal should be tamed with TameGene(tm) but generally animals that could live well in a human home.
Owls and Snakes already do that naturally, preserve their habitat and they will do just that and no training is required.
Yes, but I am assuming that with TameGene(tm) you could also control these animals far more, allowing concentrating the area and the animals themselves.
What I believe would be helpful with such animals on farms:
- the animals would not endanger the humans. If this is a more dangerous animal, such as a bird of prey that could peck out someone's eye or a (mildly or medicorely) poisonous snake, this would be definitely beneficial.
- the animals could be trained to allow to live more densely in the area than in the wild.
- the animals could be taught or be simply restricted (depending on the animal) to the farm's area, thus making their vermin-hunting activity more concentrated and beneficial.
- the animals could be safely taken to the vet. This allows taking animals outside of their native habitat (and if you have numerous number of them, preventing these animals from overbreeding the area and taxing the local ecosystem). This would also prevent plauqes or other pathogens (or parasites) to be spread on the farm or into the local ecosystem.
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