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Dinosaur Posture Still Wrong, Says Study

Posted by kdawson on from the sit-up-straight dept.

An anonymous reader sends along a piece in Cosmos about new dissension to the current prevailing wisdom on dinosaur posture. The researchers admit that blood pressure presents an unresolved obstacle to their model of dinosaur heads held high. "The current depiction of the way giant sauropod dinosaurs held their necks is probably wrong, says a new study. 'For the last decade the reigning paradigm in palaeontology has been that the big sauropod dinosaurs held their necks out straight and their heads down low,' said co-author Matt Wedel, who researches biomechanics at the Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona, California. But 'our research [now] suggests that this view of sauropods is simply incorrect, based on everything we know about living animals,' he said." The researchers worried that some other team might beat them to publication, so obvious did they consider their methodology of looking at living animals to gain insight into the biomechanics of extinct ones.

9 of 226 comments (clear)

  1. AW... by The+Living+Fractal · · Score: 5, Funny

    Guess this means there was no Stuckupasaurus? You know, the snooty dinosaur who thought it was better than all the others and walked around holding its head high and looking down its nose at the others? ...ok, wow, THAT was lame.

    I apologize.

    --
    I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
  2. Oh, come on by Daniel+Dvorkin · · Score: 4, Funny

    It was only 6000 years ago -- didn't anyone get any pictures?

    --
    The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
  3. Listen to your mother. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Sit up straight! Eat your palm trees! Don't ROAR at your sister! Ignore those tiny furry mousey creatures...they are of no consequenc and won't amount to anything!

    1. Re:Listen to your mother. by je+ne+sais+quoi · · Score: 4, Funny

      ...I don't care if the neighbors are evolving into birds, we're not doing it. If they were evolving to jump off a cliff, would you do it too? And for the last time, that giant bright spot in the sky the last few days is not an asteroid that will kill us all. I swear, kids these days and their wacky imaginations.

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  4. Occams razor tells me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    The long necked dinosaurs simply tied their long necks into a knot whenever they needed to raise their heads for feeding and observations.

    They had a symbiotic relationship with the horned dinosaurs who were needed for untieing the knots.

  5. Coiled up on top by hoggoth · · Score: 5, Funny

    Come on people, CLEARLY the large long-necked dinosaurs kept their necks curled back and their heads resting on top of their backs.

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  6. Re:I'm horny by mrdoogee · · Score: 5, Funny

    There's an app for that!

  7. Re:TFA Is slashdotted by Minwee · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm pretty sure gravity is the problem

    Well that's simple, just change the gravitational constant of the universe.

  8. Re:TFA Is slashdotted by shess · · Score: 4, Funny

    I can't did up the reference right now, but it turns out the eneregy requirements for maintaining the long neck outweigh the cost of simply walking to the food.

    Meaning dinosaurs did not have long necks. QED.