The Palaeontology thread

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belly button

28-04-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“Archelon (like so many other species) became extinct at the end of the Cretaceous when the Chicxulub asteroid struck the Yucatan Peninsula.

The others like most animals probably became extinct due to climate or habitat change.

Look them up belly button - there is a lot of interesting information about the various mega-turtles on the net (and somewhere before on this thread). ”

I was just wondering why the big whales didn't die out and they did. I'll look it up

aoife44

28-04-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“Don't expect any logic from JP III.

The scientific advisor for the film was Jack Horner who for many years played the Devil's advocate - he made the preposterous theory of Tyrannosaurus being an obligate scavenger a meme in the popular media.

It made him very famous and helped to fund all of the rest of his (really excellent) work - which was the main point I suppose.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ho...eontologist%29

The fact that in the fight the (undersized) rex had the (undersized) spino's neck between it's jaws and the massive theropod's bone-crushing multi-ton bite-force did not even pierce the skin is one reason why JP III is justifiably hated amongst people who know their dinosaur biomechanics.

One bite from a rex and the muscles, vertebra and spinal cord would have been utterly destroyed - game over for spino.

For what it is worth here is the official full trailer for Jurassic World.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJJrkyHas78”

What are your thoughts on Robert Bakker's theories re t.Rex?

Keyser_Soze1

28-04-2015

Originally Posted by belly button:
“I was just wondering why the big whales didn't die out and they did. I'll look it up ”

I will post more about them on this thread tomorrow for you.

Going offline now.

Keyser_Soze1

28-04-2015

Originally Posted by aoife44:
“What are your thoughts on Robert Bakker's theories?”

He has been proved right on many things although of course the science has moved on in the decades since he first proposed his theories and much of what he postulated about rex was correct (modern depictions also now show rex with feathers which is why Jurassic World looks so bloody old fashioned).

Take a look through this thread - there are plenty of warm blooded, feathery dinosaurs on here.

And glance out of your window tomorrow to see those small maniraptoran theropods that survived the mass extinction.

We call them birds.

aoife44

28-04-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“He has been proved right on many things although of course the science has moved on in the decades since he first proposed his theories and much of what he proposed of rex was correct (modern depictions also now show rex with feathers which is why Jurassic World looks so bloody old fashioned).

Take a look through this thread - there are plenty of warm blooded, feathery dinosaurs on here.

And glance out of your window tomorrow to see those small maniraptoran theropods that survived the mass extinction.

We call them birds. ”

Modified my question since you replied. This is a very interesting thread. May not have caught all of it due to just dropping in here and there.

Keyser_Soze1

29-04-2015

Originally Posted by aoife44:
“Modified my question since you replied. This is a very interesting thread. May not have caught all of it due to just dropping in here and there.”

I am glad you are enjoying it.

Mammoth 'mittens'.

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic....ammoth-mitten/

Keyser_Soze1

30-04-2015

Breaking news and just when you thought new dinosaur discoveries could not get any more surprising!

Take a bow Yi qi.

Forget Bruce Wayne this is when Bat-Dinosaur really first begin crime fighting in Gotham (or perhaps eating insects in what would become China).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF_FOay9d5c

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/scienc...ngs-180955122/

http://www.livescience.com/50663-bat...-dinosaur.html

http://www.livescience.com/50662-biz...ur-photos.html

http://theconversation.com/a-bizarre...feathers-40366

http://news.discovery.com/animals/di...ina-150429.htm

http://www.theguardian.com/science/l...feather-nature

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...l#.VUEOriFVhHw

The paper.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal...ture14423.html

Keyser_Soze1

30-04-2015

The giant ground sloths were so close to us in time.

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic....ground-sloths/

More on Yi.

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic....-and-feathers/

http://observationdeck.io9.com/em-yi...osa-1701131490

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yi_(dinosaur)

Prehistoric pygmy sperm whales.

http://www.livescience.com/50666-pyg...e-fossils.html

Keyser_Soze1

30-04-2015

As you would expect people have been very quick to create illustrations of the remarkable Yi qi.

http://img05.deviantart.net/35b4/i/2...88-d8rj4pv.png

http://orig08.deviantart.net/0c24/f/...ia-d8rjph9.png

http://img05.deviantart.net/5c98/i/2...na-d8rihue.jpg

http://img14.deviantart.net/4b68/i/2...ar-d8rkms9.jpg

http://orig14.deviantart.net/5b3e/f/...rt-d8rktt9.png

http://img04.deviantart.net/16dd/i/2...an-d8rjv0j.jpg

Keyser_Soze1

03-05-2015

Not exactly palaeontology but this thread is perhaps a suitable place for it given how we destroyed all of the the megafauna.

The last Thylacine.

Who died of brutal neglect on the 7th September 1936 and his body was thrown out with the weekly trash.

Another great triumph for Homo sapiens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gCov0PXkVo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vqCCI1ZF7o

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwmhmAfcRt8

Keyser_Soze1

04-05-2015

A few recent stories that may be of interest.

https://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2015...lows-on-earth/

http://www.sciencewa.net.au/topics/p...arine-reptiles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=166&v=vkIpAfYqndg

A very nice poster on the South American Titanosaurs - in Spanish but well worth a look.

http://quo.mx/uploads/files/info_dinos_patagonia.jpg

Keyser_Soze1

04-05-2015

A really big 70's porn star's beaver.

https://twilightbeasts.wordpress.com...3/nice-beaver/

Keyser_Soze1

04-05-2015

A few nice illustrations of Deinonychus antirrhopus - the 'raptor' closest in size to the ones you will see in Jurassic World (some genus of Dromaeosaur were far larger).

Remember them when you look at the naked, vastly outdated versions in the movie.

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/20...88-d87u3sy.jpg

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/20...by-d6bg80m.jpg

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs8/i/200...by_jconway.jpg

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/i/20...ar-d7k6mxz.jpg

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com...a946564c5b.jpg

ThatGuy11200

04-05-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“Not exactly palaeontology but this thread is perhaps a suitable place for it given how we destroyed all of the the megafauna.

The last Thylacine.

Who died of brutal neglect on the 7th September 1936 and his body was thrown out with the weekly trash.

Another great triumph for Homo sapiens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gCov0PXkVo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vqCCI1ZF7o

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwmhmAfcRt8”

There are still extant megafauna, and not all of the (relatively) recent megafauna that became extinct were driven to extinction by humans.

Keyser_Soze1

04-05-2015

Originally Posted by ThatGuy11200:
“There are still extant megafauna, and not all of the (relatively) recent megafauna that became extinct were driven to extinction by humans.”

Sadly not for very much longer.

Most of them were - whenever Homo sapiens appeared almost all of the really large animals became extinct.

This cannot be a coincidence.

Regis Magnae

04-05-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“http://www.sciencewa.net.au/topics/p...arine-reptiles”

It's sometimes easy to forget that there were other non-reptile predators around in the age of dinosaurs.

ThatGuy11200

05-05-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“Sadly not for very much longer.

Most of them were - whenever Homo sapiens appeared almost all of the really large animals became extinct.

This cannot be a coincidence.”

In Europe and North America, certainly. Not so much in Australia, where a large proportion of the megafauna that once existed there were already extinct before the earliest evidence of humans.

The driving force there appears to be an increasingly dry environment. Indeed, of the native megafauna, the only ones that still exist are carnivores and grazers (living in the dry grasslands). All of the browsers, which lived exclusively in the rainforests, are extinct.

Keyser_Soze1

05-05-2015

Originally Posted by ThatGuy11200:
“In Europe and North America, certainly. Not so much in Australia, where a large proportion of the megafauna that once existed there were already extinct before the earliest evidence of humans.

The driving force there appears to be an increasingly dry environment. Indeed, of the native megafauna, the only ones that still exist are carnivores and grazers (living in the dry grasslands). All of the browsers, which lived exclusively in the rainforests, are extinct.”

Edited this post because I may have missed some of the most recent papers on the topic.

But my gut feeling is still that the arrival of humans was the last straw for most of Australia's most spectacular terrestrial animals.

A remarkable new early bird from Northeastern China - Archaeornithura meemannae.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-32596726

http://news.sciencemag.org/paleontol...n-modern-birds

http://news.discovery.com/animals/bi...ago-150505.htm

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2...vered-in-china

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the...found-in-china

Keyser_Soze1

05-05-2015

The paper (for anyone really interested).

http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/15...comms7987.html

ThatGuy11200

06-05-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“Edited this post because I may have missed some of the most recent papers on the topic.

But my gut feeling is still that the arrival of humans was the last straw for most of Australia's most spectacular terrestrial animals.”

Humans almost certainly had a role but there's no evidence for it.

The problem is that there's an oft cited paper (Roberts et al., 2001) that places a very precise date on the extinctions of about 46,400 years. But the paper itself acknowledges that about 40% of the megafauna they examined were already extinct before 100,000 years ago. The paper is also heavily criticised because it excludes remains that were disarticulated (i.e. not in life position), just in case they had been redeposited, which means it excludes animals that were butchered, and thus misses much younger evidence.

Also, there is only one site, in the whole of Australia, older than 30,000 years with any evidence of humans even coexisting with the megafauna. There is no evidence of hunting, at all.

I could go on for a while. I did a review of this last year.

Keyser_Soze1

06-05-2015

Originally Posted by ThatGuy11200:
“Humans almost certainly had a role but there's no evidence for it.

The problem is that there's an oft cited paper (Roberts et al., 2001) that places a very precise date on the extinctions of about 46,400 years. But the paper itself acknowledges that about 40% of the megafauna they examined were already extinct before 100,000 years ago. The paper is also heavily criticised because it excludes remains that were disarticulated (i.e. not in life position), just in case they had been redeposited, which means it excludes animals that were butchered, and thus misses much younger evidence.

Also, there is only one site, in the whole of Australia, older than 30,000 years with any evidence of humans even coexisting with the megafauna. There is no evidence of hunting, at all.

I could go on for a while. I did a review of this last year. ”

Very interesting - thanks.

A beautiful illustration of the remarkable 'Scissor-toothed shark' Edestus.

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...pscfmtjgfl.jpg

And a paper discussing the possible predation mechanism of it's incredible jaws.

http://www.academia.edu/12187750/An_...e_of_predation

Keyser_Soze1

06-05-2015

The sheer genius of Creationists.

http://www.cptawesome.co.za/wp-conte.../482106792.jpg

Keyser_Soze1

08-05-2015

A rather nice BBC article on ten prehistoric giants.

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150...om-earths-past

Keyser_Soze1

10-05-2015

A five hundred million year old fossil brain - and it's not Bruce Forsyth's either.

http://www.livescience.com/50770-fos...evolution.html

http://news.discovery.com/animals/an...ads-150507.htm

A short video of Odaraia swimming.

http://burgess-shale.rom.on.ca/en/fo...cies.php?id=89

bozzimacoo

10-05-2015

Originally Posted by Keyser_Soze1:
“The sheer genius of Creationists.

http://www.cptawesome.co.za/wp-conte.../482106792.jpg”

wow!

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