Thread: Doubting Dinosaur Bird Connection

http://www.astrobio.net/news/index.p...ticle&sid=3163


Interesting read, especially when it mentions birds perhaps being older than dinosaurs.. and evolving alongside them.

Awwww, but I really like the birdosaur theory

I'm wondering about the evidence of birds predating the therapods, and dinosaurs generally. The therapods were around for a long, long time--quite possibly long enough for birds to diverge from that line. And I'm not sure why the OSU researchers consider it unlikely for the fixed-thigh to have evolved from fast runners and evenutally gliders in the therapod family rather than some earlier form.

It also fails to address the fact that therapods have been found with feathers. Feathers are a pretty complicated thing to have evolved twice.

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

It also fails to address the fact that therapods have been found with feathers. Feathers are a pretty complicated thing to have evolved twice.

meh, I could see birds diverging before feathered dinos, and the scale-->feather bit repeating itself, conferring benefits of insulation, glide time, or both.

Hell, even if the adult animal doesn't benefit from feathers, it might bring more eggs to term in a feather-lined nest.

Originally Posted by Taosaur

meh, I could see birds diverging before feathered dinos, and the scale-->feather bit repeating itself, conferring benefits of insulation, glide time, or both.

It still seems like the simpler solution is that the fixed femur evolved in late stage gliders and that feathers evolved once. They're pretty complicated and the likely hood of the sequence of mutations occuring twice is, imo, much less than that of there being gaps in the fossil record to make it appear as if birds were around before feathered therapods.

I think that it's gonna take a little more than this to knock the 'birdosour' (love that word) theory down.

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

It still seems like the simpler solution is that the fixed femur evolved in late stage gliders and that feathers evolved once. They're pretty complicated and the likely hood of the sequence of mutations occuring twice is, imo, much less than that of there being gaps in the fossil record to make it appear as if birds were around before feathered therapods.

I think that it's gonna take a little more than this to knock the 'birdosour' (love that word) theory down.

Mutations don't really occur twice. Don't you forget evolution is not about species generating others, but about a species differentiating into two new one - a species doesn't end as a new one begins. Who knows for how long birds and feathered therapods (or any other species for that matter) lived together.

Originally Posted by DeathCell

http://www.astrobio.net/news/index.p...ticle&sid=3163


Interesting read, especially when it mentions birds perhaps being older than dinosaurs.. and evolving alongside them.

My bible picture book could have told you that.......Dinousaurs walked along side man and birds saw the whole thing happen in the skies. Just like in ma piktur book