Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Evidence Dinosaurs Are Like Giant Chicks

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the we-all-read-jurassic-park dept.

ZeroExistenZ writes "timesonline reports the new "irrefutable" fossil evidence of dino's resembling "giant chicks" more then reptiles as formerly accepted. Gareth Dyke: "The way these creatures are depicted can no longer be considered scientifically accurate," he said. "All the evidence is that they looked more like birds than reptiles. Tyrannosaurs might have resembled giant chicks.""

4 of 302 comments (clear)

  1. Alton Brown beat them to it... by phillymjs · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...on the "Fry Hard 2" episode of Good Eats.

    He used one of these, minus skull, tail and the bottom half of the legs, to demonstrate the proper way to dismantle a whole chicken for frying.

    ~Philly

  2. More information by JayBlalock · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Running a Google search on Liaoning dinosaur brings up a number of useful articles.

    This one at the BBC discusses the find in more depth and also mentions that the feathers were primarily on smaller dinosaurs, but even our beloved T-Rex may have hatched cute li'l chicks.

    And this American Museum of Natural History article discusses a diorama they're putting up based on the find, including pictures of their conceptions of the dinosaurs today.

    Really, submitter could have contributed a lot more information with a little basic research.

    --
    Bush: He's Liberal in all the wrong ways.
  3. Obvious? by Sensible+Clod · · Score: 5, Interesting

    reporting the obvious

    Oh, well, now, I wouldn't say that.

    This article is from February 2003. The guy is an evolutionary biologist, but search for the word 'factory' and notice where this factory is rumored to exist. You guessed it, Liaoning Province.

    Very interesting read.

    --

    The difference between spam and poop is that you don't have to dig through septic tanks looking for real food. -- Me
  4. Countermanding theory by blair1q · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This doesn't quite make sense.

    Once feathers evolved, it would be only a short time before their lifting qualities would enable the evolution of high-jumping then gliding then flying dinosaurs.

    There should be a huge number of fossils of a huge number of species of dinosaur-era birdlike creatures. But we only see a few.

    So these "feathers" couldn't have been very much like what we think of as feathers.

    Or else something about being avian kept those creatures from becoming fossils. Which implies that there may be other entire swaths of the genetic diversity that were prevented from becoming fossils. Which mean the dinosaurs we're finding are only the animals that couldn't avoid the tar-pits and eruptions and mudslides. That is, the period may have been many times more diverse and interesting than we're being allowed to see.