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"Brontosaurus" Name Resurrected Thanks To New Dino Family Tree

Posted by timothy on from the usps-has-a-stopped-geologic-clock dept.

sciencehabit writes In, the U.S. Postal Service issued colorful dinosaur stamps, including one for Brontosaurus. Paleontologists and educators loudly protested that the correct scientific name for the iconic beast was Apatosaurus—a fact that even lay dino aficionados and many 8-year-olds took pride in knowing. But now, a dinosaur-sized study of the family tree of the Diplodocidae, the group that includes such monstrous beasts as Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, and Barosaurus, finds that USPS got it right: The fossils originally called Brontosaurus show enough skeletal differences from other specimens of Apatosaurus that they rightfully belong to a different genus. The study, published online this week in the journal PeerJ, brings the long-banished name back into scientific respectability as a genus coequal with Apatosaurus.

68 comments

  1. No News by Pec · · Score: 1

    Slow news today

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    This is a .sig
    1. Re:No News by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      Slow news my @55! Speak for yourself, bozo! So my good friend Fred Flintstone will finally be able to dump that stupid name "apatoburger" and refer to his favorite food once again by its proper rightful name.

    2. Re:No News by omfglearntoplay · · Score: 1

      I am so glad, myself. I got attached to the name Brontosaurus at age 4 and never let go. I've even been teaching my kids both variations on the name, JUST IN CASE. Vindication!

  2. Now get Pluto designated a planet by perpenso · · Score: 4, Funny

    And if we can get Pluto designated a planet once again we'll be back to normal. :-)

    1. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      "Pluto" Reinstated as a Planet Thanks To New Grammar Analysis

      In, the IAU created the "dwarf planet" category and put Pluto in it. Everyone thought this meant Pluto was no longer a planet. But now, an advanced analysis of English expressions which included "blue car" and "white cloud" came to the conclusion that a blue car is a car, and that a dwarf planet is a planet. The study, published this week, brings the long-banished planet back into scientific respectability.

    2. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your thesis is easily disproven. Schoolchildren are bing taught there are eight planets and when taught their names pluto is not among them. And when internet based scholars go to wikipedia they will find only four planets listed in the outer solar system, pluto excluded.

      And if we count dwarf planets there is far more than pluto to count.

    3. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by CanadianMacFan · · Score: 1

      Maybe not normal but at least the stuff I learned as a kid will be right again.

    4. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      +5 funny? +5 insightful!

      Came here JUST for this.

    5. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is breaking news so of course it's not yet in schoolbooks. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia anyone can edit, so you can go ahead and fix the relevant articles while citing the study. You're right it's not just Pluto, there are 13 planets now.

    6. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Funny

      Schoolchildren are bing taught there are eight planets

      Home schooled kids are still learning about all nine. Obama's conspiracy to purge Pluto from the textbooks is not going to work. When Ted Cruz wins in 2016, both Pluto and the brontosaurus will be back. The Republicans aren't call the "dinosaur party" for nothing.

    7. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I learned a long time ago, the stuff I was taught in elementary school was nearly all wrong.
      So when I hear that established fact has changed, it doesn't bug me so much. It is just part of the normal course.

      Truth is the opposite of lying, Truth isn't absolute fact.

      Scientific Truth, is the best guess on how things are based on evidence. As we get more evidence the nature of the scientific truth changes. The outdated scientific truth was truthful when it was new, as with the evidence it was the best case to follow. Then we find more and a better idea.... Sometimes we realize after we get even more the original idea was better.

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    8. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Too bad you didn't learn about a sense of humor in elementary school.

      Woosh ....

    9. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      King Flippynips said he was glad pluto was returned to its rightful status.

    10. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by cyberchondriac · · Score: 4, Funny

      or we could get Brontosaurus designated as a dwarf planet.

      --

      Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
    11. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Can we just get Pluto to the same level of sentience as Goofy?

    12. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you overestimate the textbook budget of most school districts.

      I mean, how are they going to pay the superintendent his rightful millions of dollars if they have to buy books for the kids all of the time? Tch.

    13. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Darinbob · · Score: 1

      It's sad. It's time for me to give another donation to the fund to help the humor impaired.

    14. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Schoolchildren are bing taught there are eight planets

      Well if you're using Bing to educate your kids then of course they're going to get things wrong.

    15. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, please, this!!! 1 down, 2 to go (I also want to see our National Anthem restored to its original version by having "under God" removed.

    16. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by tsqr · · Score: 1

      Yes, please, this!!! 1 down, 2 to go (I also want to see our National Anthem restored to its original version by having "under God" removed.

      I would settle for seeing the Pledge of Allegiance not referred to as the National Anthem.

    17. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by blivit42 · · Score: 2

      Schoolchildren are bing taught there are eight planets

      Actually, Bing-taught kids are learning that there are 13 ;P A search for "number of planets" returns the following quote from universetoday.com:

      "For those of us who believe dwarf planets should be counted as a subclass of planets, the latest status is that our solar system now has 13 planets: four terrestrial planets, four jovian planets, and five dwarf planets."

    18. Re:Now get Pluto designated a planet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Schoolchildren are bing taught there are eight planets

      Who cares. What do google taught children learn? after all, they're the majority!

  3. Makes me want to shout by Tablizer · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yabbadabba Doo!

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    Table-ized A.I.
  4. When was that again? by oodaloop · · Score: 4, Funny

    In, the U.S. Postal Service issued colorful dinosaur stamps

    That would be in 1989, according to 2 minutes of googlating. Good job, "editors"!

    --
    Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
    1. Re:When was that again? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Googlating.. is that like Conjutating?

    2. Re:When was that again? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, that is precisely what the article says, too.

      You weren't implying that the article itself was that old, were you?

    3. Re:When was that again? by Minwee · · Score: 3, Funny

      He was implying that you hadn't the summary.

    4. Re:When was that again? by ColdWetDog · · Score: 1

      Look, we're talking about dinosaurs here. Things that haven't been seen on this planet for hundreds of millions of years (well, except for the three digit UID guys). Twenty years is just pocket change.

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      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    5. Re:When was that again? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, oodaloop was clearly commenting on the fact that the first sentence of the summary is grammatically incorrect, having left out the date. But it is nice to see a fellow AC participating in the grand slashdot tradition of making a damned fool of himself by being incorrect while trying to point out how some other poster just made a damned fool of himself by doing the exact same thing.

    6. Re:When was that again? by codeButcher · · Score: 2

      In, the U.S. Postal Service issued colorful dinosaur stamps

      That would be in 1989, according to 2 minutes of googlating. Good job, "editors"!

      I thought that perhaps the date was so far in the past that the slashcode had some sort of overflow or wraparound error. Something like "Dates before -6000 are invalid". I guess 1989 predates the creation of slashdot?

      --
      Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
    7. Re:When was that again? by Rei · · Score: 4, Informative

      What are you talking about? Every self-respecting nerd should know that they're still here.

      People need to stop picturing all dinosaurs as looking like some kind of leathery reptiles. I mean, we not only know now that velociraptor was feathered, but even how many secondary wing feathers it had (14). Jurassic park would have maybe not been as scary had their "raptors" looked like this. ;)

      Meanwhile, some of their descendants today look like this and attack like this.

      --
      Trump's plan to get rid of Mueller appears to be 'be so guilty of so many things that Mueller works himself to death.'
    8. Re:When was that again? by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 2

      Jurassic park would have maybe not been as scary had their "raptors" looked like this. ;)

      Regardless, velociraptors still hate goto statements ...

      --
      It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
    9. Re:When was that again? by steelfood · · Score: 2

      Large birds of prey used to dine on humans regularly. In fact, the largest of their modern cousins are still dangerous to infants and small children today (and I'm not talking about that fake video).

      Just because it looks more like a bird than a lizard doesn't make it any less scarier. In fact, because a part of our psyche is attuned towards the danger of very large birds of prey, it may make it more.

      --
      "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
    10. Re:When was that again? by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      A.K.A. the "comma era", because commas resemble mullets.

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      Table-ized A.I.
    11. Re:When was that again? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just ask Christie Brinkley about birds, seems she was mistaken for prey recently and has the stitches to show for it

    12. Re:When was that again? by Rei · · Score: 1

      Or rather...

      --
      Trump's plan to get rid of Mueller appears to be 'be so guilty of so many things that Mueller works himself to death.'
  5. USPS? I credit The Flintstones. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Bronto burgers always looked pretty darn tasty to me.

  6. Neat by jythie · · Score: 2

    While neither earth shattering nor life effecting, it is still kinda neat to watch the process of science and reexamination.

    1. Re:Neat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I love it. There have been maybe 50 edits today so far on the Wikipedia page for Brontosaurus. It went from an impoverished redirect to a 28K article in one day.

      The page existed with useful text until 2008, when the deletionists got to it. There was a series of edit-warring for another five years; the deletionists had their sway.

      Now the page is back with a vengeance. Take that, deletionists!

  7. Plutosaurus? by Tablizer · · Score: 2

    And if we can get Pluto designated a planet once again we'll be back to normal.

    "Normal" depends who you ask.

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    Table-ized A.I.
  8. MR DNA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dino DNA

  9. Paging Dr. McCoy. by Minwee · · Score: 5, Funny

    In, the U.S.

    Uh oh. Sounds... like... wemayhavea... case... of.

    ...

    Shatner's Disease.

    Get... thismanto.. sick. Bay. Now!

    1. Re:Paging Dr. McCoy. by StikyPad · · Score: 1

      Damnit, Jim. Bones died years ago.

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      https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
  10. What... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    do you call a blind dinosaur?

    1. Re:What... by Rei · · Score: 1

      A thesaurus!

      --
      Trump's plan to get rid of Mueller appears to be 'be so guilty of so many things that Mueller works himself to death.'
    2. Re:What... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Doyouthinkhesaurus-rex's owner?

  11. Brontosaurus Burgers are back on the menu! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That's All Folks.

  12. I wonder... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How this changes xkcd #636 https://xkcd.com/636/

    1. Re:I wonder... by Rei · · Score: 1

      Probably in this manner.

      Yep, XKCD has a comic-form response for everything - even itself. ;)

      --
      Trump's plan to get rid of Mueller appears to be 'be so guilty of so many things that Mueller works himself to death.'
  13. Finally by Tighe_L · · Score: 1

    I am so tired of people correcting old TV shows.

    1. Re:Finally by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Now you get to correct them

  14. They should use the ACTUAL name for all dinos: by stoned_ritual · · Score: 1

    Jesus Horses.

  15. Jack Horner's TEDx talk by PhrostyMcByte · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Jack Horner put on an TEDx talk a while back discussing research that asks an interesting question: where are the babies?

    Jack's research indicates many of these similar species may in fact be the same, but merely at different levels of development -- an adolescent thought to be a difference species from one fully developed.

    The crux of it is that in the early days of our rediscovering dinosaurs, these guys would find a visual few differences in the dinos and name it as a new species, turning a blind eye to many similarities that might suggest otherwise.

    1. Re:Jack Horner's TEDx talk by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      TEDx, is that like an evolved fork of the known cult TED?

    2. Re:Jack Horner's TEDx talk by omfglearntoplay · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I don't trust Horner. He also said T.Rex was a scavenger, and that has been proven false:

      http://phenomena.nationalgeogr...

      He also wants a dino-chicken. Basically, I don't like Jack Horner a terrible amount. It seems to me he very much wants dinosaurs to be different than what other paleontologists find them to be. I guess he is good for stirring up publicity at least.

  16. Bronto burgers not just vernacular, I knew it! by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    The fossils originally called Brontosaurus show enough skeletal differences from other specimens of Apatosaurus thatthey rightfully belong to a different genus

    So, yeah! And Pluto's a planet, too, you bastards!

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    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    1. Re:Bronto burgers not just vernacular, I knew it! by n6kuy · · Score: 1

      That's because the resurrected "Pluto" for a new planet they just discovered...

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      If you disagree with me on social issues, then it's pretty clear that you are a narrow-minded bigot.
  17. Now the egg-heads need to acknowledge Triceroptos! by arfonrg · · Score: 1

    Oh, wait,... http://www.smithsonianmag.com/...

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    Your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
  18. April Fools! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    God, I hate it when stuff like this hits a week late.

  19. USPS took advantage of recent research by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    on the dinosaur's shape, which was explained by the research scientist in an episode of Monty Python ("Theory of the Brontosaurus").

  20. The original Birdemic by tepples · · Score: 1

    Jurassic park would have maybe not been as scary had their "raptors" looked like this

    Are you trying to imply Hitchcock's The Birds wasn't scary?

  21. F key necklace by tepples · · Score: 1

    Not to mention people have already defictionalized the the title text from that strip, making and selling F key necklaces.

  22. Re:USPS? I credit The Flintstones. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I knew the Flintstones were right all along!

  23. my sister was once bitten by a moose by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    hey hey HEY! Whoa there!
    Please properly attribute Anne Elk's theory of brontosaurs or there will be repercussions.

  24. Re:USPS? I credit The Flintstones. by Quirkz · · Score: 1

    Ah, they just taste like chicken.

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    The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
  25. Next: Saint Christopher... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...and Limbo

  26. Re:Now the egg-heads need to acknowledge Triceropt by omfglearntoplay · · Score: 1

    Horner was behind that stunt as well, eh? Apparently that was disproven as well according to wikipedia.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T...