At 4913 Penn Ave, Pittsburgh, there is an unusual institution. The Center for PostNatural History is a small museum with an eclectic and bizarre mix of specimens: you will find a rib-less mouse embryo, sterile male screwworm, a sample of E. coli x1776 (a specimen designed to be harmless and unable to survive outside the laboratory), and a stuffed transgenic BioSteel goat named Freckles, genetically modified to produce spider silk proteins in her milk.

The museum’s subject, post-naturalism, is the study of the origins, habitats, and evolution of organisms that have been intentionally and heritably altered with genetic engineering, and the influence of human culture and biotechnology on evolution. Its tagline: “That was then. This is now”, complements its logo, an evolutionary tree with an arrow joining two distinct branches. Visitors are encouraged to consider that each specimen has a natural, evolutionary history, as well as a post-natural, cultural one.

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As long as humans have existed, we have been influencing our planet’s flora and fauna. So, if humanity continues to flourish far into the future, how will nature change? And how might this genetic manipulation affect our own biology and evolutionary trajectory? The short answer: it will be strange, potentially beautiful and like nothing we’re used to.