Should private buyers be allowed to own scientific specimens?

What is any buyer going to do with such a specimen? Some weido might just hang it in a back room at home, but it is going to be expensive to maintain. Most buyers are going to show it off. People will see it, maybe as many as at a museum; maybe not. The owner might set it up in a public space and charge people to see it. It's kinda like owning land; land is just an expense to maintain unless you do something with it, like grow grass and raise cattle or sheep or goats, etc. Or grow timber and eventually make lumber, or grow seed bearing cover for birds and mixed wildlife. Whatever one owns is only rented for what remains of one's lifetime. The heir of the specimen then has to keep it up or sell it, most likely to a museum or another private owner who wants to show it off.

No, the dinosaur should be viewed by all, irrespective of their financial situation.

No, I don’t think wealth should be a tool for individuals to horde for themselves what naturally belongs to all.

It would be reasonable to have a system of categorizing fossils like living animals, to the extent they are considered common and in great supply, or limited supply, or quite rare, or incredibly rare, and this would drive whether they should be allowed to have private ownership and with that, to be legally traded/sold. There's always the economics of an item, and the value to the public as a rare or unique artifact. You can also include a tax of some kind - a rare collectors tax that says 25% of Gus's sale should go to the agency and museums that are there to manage and display the rarer side of the list.

Gus is extraordinary, but its also interesting to note that of the 100 or so different "finds" of T-Rex skeletons, none are complete, but of the 10-15 full skeletons on display, all have bones or bone fragments that are cast or 3 D printed replicas of other real artifacts found elsewhere, so I'd say once you have at least a couple or more of all the originals and have them scanned and available for re-print on a 3D printer, then the more skeletons reproduced, the better. the originals will still be far more valuable, but the ability to print the full size skeletons should at some point make the originals more fungible. Just to print all the bones for a full scale T-Rex would be quite an undertaking and probably costs tens of thousands to print and assemble. Our digital technology is going to allow us to do all kinds of things with these artifacts, and once we have all their genomes also digitized, then what? Not long before Jurassic Park becomes a reality……….

I don't think it's a problem. But the fossil should be available for public viewing, free of charge.

Large and scientifically valuable fossils should remain in the public domain, not part of private commercial sales.

No, private buyers should not be allowed to own these unbelievable specimens

Sometimes private ownership is a way to save something. That should be a key consideration.

I feel that dinosaur fossils should not be privately owned as they belong to the earth and to all the people.

As with art, private buyers have always sought prize specimens for their collections. That is their and the seller right of course, provided the items were obtained legally. Sadly however, that means those items are rarely if ever subsequently available to the public for viewing or to scholars for research.

For those reasons and more one can't help but feel that some type of agreement or assurance should be come with such sales to allow at least occasional access to such treasures for research or wider display to the public. One would also hope in the case of this superb T. Rex skeleton, that approved reproductions for museums were made before the sale.

Fossils of animals that became extinct over some given time period, e.g., neolithic, paleolithic, etc., should belong to organizations that provide for scientific study to gain historic perspective and education, not individuals.

Absolutely NO. They belong in places where the public and/or scientists can have access to them. For the uberrich, they are just a trophy or something to brag about owning.

No

Sotheby's should set their standards higher in the interest of science in such matters as this by at least encouraging auction winners to donate important specimens as this one to institutional and public scientific interests. Shame on them.

No, private buyers should not be allowed to own scientific specimens, unless they commit to donating or lending them to museums, universities or other institutions where they can be kept in a proper environment and be available for the public to view and for scientific research. These unique specimens belong to all of humanity, not only to certain individuals.

No, no and no. Eat the rich.

No, absolutely. Ok, you buy the skeleton, but what next? What about science? The selling of the skeleton is a great mistake.

No. Private individuals should not own scientific specimens. These specimens belong to humanity as a whole and should not become instruments of the ego of wealthy individuals, just as protected species cannot be bought and sold.

Private buyers should be allowed to own fossils only on the condition that the fossil will be available (and kept in an optimal environment) both for public viewing (such as in a museum) and for unlimited scientific research, as regulated by an international paleontologist committee to be set up for that purpose.

No, these should not be owned by private people. They belong to museums and institutes that scientists and the general public should have access to view and to do research on them.

No. They are hoarded away in vaults and never seen again. These should be something everyone can enjoy.

Disgusting! $50,000,000 should go to better causes

NO! Using your extreme wealth to own a public treasure is just another example of what is wrong with the world, especially, but not exclusively, in the USA. If it can not be regulated away, then a tax, equal to the amount of purchase should be applied to offset the public loss and aid smaller institutions in developing their own collections.

No. They are frequently never seen again and are lost to further scientific investigation

No. End of conversation