Talk:Dinosaur

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Physiology

Please link "air sacs" to Bird_anatomy#Respiratory_system. 96.61.88.217 (talk) 07:23, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Section on inclusion/exclusion of birds

Peter M. Brown, is this section really necessary? I feel this is covered adequately in Definition. Also, it seems that you are confusing use of "dinosaur" as a vernacular or colloquial term with support for a formal paraphyletic group. When a paper title includes the word "fish", it does not necessarily follow that the authors of that paper implicitly support the use of a paraphyletic taxon Pisces. MMartyniuk (talk) 17:23, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

The full title of the paper I cite is, "The first hatchling dinosaur reported from the eastern United States: Propanoplosaurus marylandicus (Dinosauria: Ankylosauria) from the Early Cretaceous of Maryland, U.S.A." Neither "dinosaur" nor "Dinosauria", in context, is a vernacular or colloquial use. Peter Brown (talk) 17:53, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

If you honestly believe Weishampel, at least (one of the co-authors) advocates for a paraphyletic Dinosauria, I suggest you read any of his books. "Hatchling dinosaur" here is clearly being used colloquially. At the very least, there is no possible way you can seriously argue this kind of usage is a tacit, professional advocation of a paraphyletic taxon excluding birds. MMartyniuk (talk) 20:30, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

My addition of a new section to the article has been rejected as "synthesis". The only argument for birds' being dinosaurs that I know about, however, is that birds are descended from dinosaurs, and I can produce sources presenting that as the reason. If there is another reason, it needs to be included in the article. Descent works as a reason only if paraphyletic taxa are rejected, however, and such rejection is a controversial matter, much too controversial for Wikipedia to takes sides on. Peter Brown (talk) 17:39, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

And so we need a disclaimer on every single biology article? I don't think so. This should be discussed on Phylogenetic taxonomy etc., not Dinosaur. Or Mammal. Frankly, the opinion that paraphyletic groups are ok is a minority in dinosaur science and should be treated with the same amount of space as the BAND hypothesis (i.e., one or two lines, not an entire sub-header). Yes, paraphyletic groups are advocated by workers in other fields, but dinosaur paleontology is nearly 100% in favor of clades nowadays. Suggesting or implying otherwise is dishonest. Rejection of paraphyly may be controversial in general, but this is not a general article on the philosophy of biological classification. MMartyniuk (talk) 20:26, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

OK, I'll compose the one or two lines. Maybe a few more. Peter Brown (talk) 21:56, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Just to add, I don't see what the point is of writing in these kinds of disclaimers and contrarianism. Like BANDits, opponents of cladistics and PN have not proposed any decent alternatives. If I were to decide to follow a paraphyletic concept of Dinosauria, how exactly would that work? What is the alternate definition or diagnosis of Dinosauria vs birds (Aves, or Avialae, btw?)? Is Microraptor a dinosaur or not and why? What about Aurornis? Archaeopteryx? Is Aves the crown, the branch, the Archaeopteryx node, or something else? These questions all have practical problems for Wikipedia (what date goes in the Bird taxobox for their origin, for example?) Until such things are worked out by supporters of paraphyly and validly published on by numerous researchers and a consensus is reached, all of this anti-monophyly stuff is extremely counter-productive. MMartyniuk (talk) 20:37, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Here I disagree. Pointing out difficulties with the dominant paradigm is an essential part of the endeavor. Were it not for papers like James & Pourtless (2009), there would reason to fear that the birds-from-dinosaurs theory was not being adequately challenged. Alternative theories are not necessary at all stages; only when the network of auxiliary assumptions needed to support the dominant theory becomes unwieldy is a new paradigm required. Peter Brown (talk) 21:56, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Reference

• James, Francis C.; Pourtless, John A., IV (2009). "Cladistics and the Origin of Birds: A Review and Two New Analyses". Ornithological Monographs. 66: 1–78. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

What difficulties? This boils down to a pure matter of opinion--whether or not to recognize paraphyletic groups. I'm pointing out that people who choose to recognize paraphyletic groups stop there. They recognize them, and then do zero work to actually create a workable alternative framework. At this stage it appears to be pure contrarianism, not an alternative classification system. The last person to actually propose an alternative framework was Benton in 2004, nearly a decade ago, which was inadequate at the time and has only gotten worse with age, as it leaves out numerous major taxa and has not been updated to reflect changes in our understanding of dinosaur relationships. Livesy and Zusi attempted to do the same for early birds in 2007, but their arrangement of taxa and the incompleteness of their included early bird taxon sample was so out of synch with actual science that it's never been viewed as anything but complete joke by dinosaur paleontologists familiar with this area. (Full disclosure, I discussed this issue in more depth in my book and even offered an improved framework for the Linneaan classification of dino/birds, but I'm loathe to add my own material and would not personally advocate that this should be used in place of phylogenetic nomenclature, which is the near-universal lingua franca of this subject area.) MMartyniuk (talk) 11:28, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

You mentioned BANDits; my comment was to defend their brief inclusion. James & Pourtless claim that the statistics supporting the accepted phylogeny are flawed. If so, that's a difficulty. If not, it merits rebuttal. Peter Brown (talk) 14:22, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately, there is no formally published rebuttal to that (objectively terribly done) study, but there are plenty of rebuttals online, e.g. [1]. Comments in this blog post [2] suggest critical reviewers may have been ignored. Agree that somebody should put this in print. Ignoring dissenting opinions to push a pre-concieved agenda based on horribly out of date concept of the subject area. Once again, BANDits show themselves to be the equivalent of creationists. MMartyniuk (talk) 21:04, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

For comments on the problems with this particular study (such as assuming, rather than testing, that Longisquama is an archosaur) see also the comment of Andrea Cau (one of the authors of description of Aurornis). As he notes, an earlier phylogenetic study specifically designed to test alternative suggested placements of birds with Amniota and including more taxa than the study of James and Pourtless, i.e. Philip Senter's dissertation (which James and Pourtless do not cite and might have not been aware of) does support placement of birds within Theropoda. --Macrochelys (talk) 18:34, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Age of dinosaurs

This page mentions that dinosaurs are 150 million (or somewhere around there) years old, which I disagree with. How can you tell how old the dinosaur is? --Dianasweetiegina (talk) 04:10, 24 June 2013 (UTC)Dianasweetiegina

150 million years old? Not close; have you even read the page? We can "tell" by reading reliable sources, which are provided abundantly. Peter Brown (talk) 14:13, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Scientists have been able to determine beyond reasonable doubt that dinosaurs are between 230 and 66 million years old using various methods for dating the age of geological formations, most of which are generally very reliable. --24.36.130.109 (talk) 01:51, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

Distinguishing Anatomical Features section...

Can someone please translate that into English? This is an encyclopedia, not an academic journal. Non-experts should be able to read this and get some understanding. Instead, non-experts will read this and not understand much if any of it. This is very non-accessible. Please fix. The reason I ask is because I can't translate it...Hires an editor (talk) 02:09, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

This might be a big job, actually. Translating it to something understandable would basically be "lots of little tiny bumps and knobs on specific parts of various bones not seen in the same spots in other archosaurs". MMartyniuk (talk) 13:57, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

LOL. Abyssal (talk) 14:16, 28 June 2013 (UTC)