Dinosaurs had Feathers

[Silver Rusher]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1081677.stm

ian_of_smeg should like this thread...

This is quite an amazing discovery. Although there is an almost 100% chance of this thread turning into another ID/Evolution argument, I thought this news should get out to the members of the ORG.


We found it on the hillside just behind the village. In what looked like a huge quarry, researchers were excavating some of the most exciting fossils yet discovered: dinosaurs with feathers.

The fossils have been dated to 124 million years ago, in the lower Cretaceous period. At that time, there was a shallow lake here and anything that fell into it soon got buried under mud and volcanic ash. As a result, many skeletons have been preserved intact. The fine shales even display traces of the creatures' feathers.

[dessa14]

while this one item or two items might only be recent, they have known this for a few years now, chinese paleontologists have been pulling them out since the nineties.
thanks,
dizzy

[Silver Rusher]

I read this in the news this morning so it must be fairly recent. (news is supposed to be new)

EDIT: Anyway the article is just about how dinosaurs evolved into birds pretty much...

[Meneldil]

This is quite old. I saw a documentary about that a while ago. Some people from Natural Geographic went made, and some others thought it was a fake.

Edit : I've always been thaught that Dinosaurs evolved into birds. This theory is also quite old.

[Steppe Merc]

I've heard of this. However, the feathers were for warmth, rather than any sort of flight. It is extremely interesting, though.

[Gawain of Orkeny]

This is whats truly known as ancient history. This has been known for quite sometime. Dont you ever watch the discovery channel?

[BDC]

I think this is different... It's been known for a while some dinosaurs had feathers at least, but I think this means pretty much all dinosaurs.

The National Geographic article was quite funny really. Basically some Chinese peasants stuck two fossils together to make one which looked better and sold for more. The NG fell for it and did a whole article saying how amazing it was. And it turned out to be a fake. Except both fossils were actually new to science too, and both far more interesting individually than combined.

[Gawain of Orkeny]

but I think this means pretty much all dinosaurs.

No it just means more of them than we thought. Its always been believed that theropd dinosaurs evolved into birds.

[Big_John]

Its always been believed that theropd dinosaurs evolved into birds."always" since the 80s at least..

[ichi]

Reptiles existed before the dinosaurs; things like alligators and turtles were alive when dinosaurs were alive. The concept that dinosaurs evolved into reptiles was simply a popularization and perhaps an assumption based on early ideas. As more evidence has become available we've discovered the link between dinosaurs and birds.

Genetically the difference between skin, scales, fur, and feathers is really small, just a few genes.

ichi :bow:

[Gawain of Orkeny]

always" since the 80s at least..

Yeah the 1880s


If we look back into the history of the issue, it is apparent that many comparative anatomists during the 16th through 19th centuries noticed that birds were very similar to traditional reptiles. In 1860, shortly after the publication of Charles Darwin's influential work On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection, a quarry worker in Germany spotted an unusual fossil in the limestone of the Solnhofen Formation (late Jurassic period). This fossil turned out to be the famous 'London specimen' of Archaeopteryx lithographica. It was a beautiful example of a "transitional form" between two vertebrate groups (traditional reptiles and birds); just what Darwin expected would eventually be found. Archaeopteryx, generally accepted as being the oldest known bird, is an important link between birds and other coelurosaurs that has helped to illuminate the evolutionary history (phylogeny) of the group. It is not widely held to be the ancestor of all living birds; this is a common misconception. In fact, recent expeditions in China, Mongolia, Madagascar, Argentina, and elsewhere may uncover dinosaurs that usurp the "urvogel" status of Archaeopteryx.

Are birds Dinosaurs? (http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/diapsids/avians.html)

[econ21]

I have not read it closely, but I think one new discovery is that an early tyrannosaur was found with feathers. We knew that raptors had feathers - that even made it into the more recent Jurassic Park movies. But now we're going to have to live with images of fluffyT-rexes that look like grotesque overgrown chicks.

[Taffy_is_a_Taff]

I like to think I'm eating new version dinosaur when I'm tucking into my KFC.

[Big_John]

Yeah the 1880s

Are birds Dinosaurs? (http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/diapsids/avians.html)

However, birds were still not well accepted as dinosaur descendants—such hypotheses as A. Walker's "crocodylomorph" ancestor and G. Heilman's "thecodont" ancestor held sway for most of the 19th and 20th century, or else birds were simply dismissed as originating from some unknown reptile that didn't matter anyway. That would change. Dr. J.H. Ostrom's 1969 description of Deinonychus antirrhopus and its similarities to Archaeopteryx was the major step: his work since the 1970's has provided the impetus for a paradigm shift in paleontologists' visions of the origin of birds and the evolution of flight. Dr. Gauthier's cladistic work in the mid-1980's provided the best analytical systematic support for the theory that birds are the descendants of dinosaurs.
thanks for backing up my comment, btw. :thumbsup:

[Gawain of Orkeny]

thanks for backing up my comment, btw.

Your welcome. I was reffering to the fact that they always thought this but that it wasnt really acceptted as fact until the 80s.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Tuesday, 26 December, 2000, 19:04 GMT

The feathered dinosaurs of LiaoningThe article is not really 'news'.

But exciting nonetheless.

[Papewaio]

Can you imagine a T-Rex coloured like a hummingbird or a peacock?

Probably more likely to have some sort of camo pattern like a tiger or the flightless parrots in NZ or the Moas.

[GoreBag]

I like to think I'm eating new version dinosaur when I'm tucking into my KFC.

Nope. Ever wonder why the name is no longer legally Kentucky Fried Chicken?

[bmolsson]

Or they might just use mob justice and some poor dino was evicted from the village in tar and feathers.... Barbarians....

[dessa14]

This is whats truly known as ancient history. This has been known for quite sometime. Dont you ever watch the discovery channel?
no because the discovery channel is the biggest load of quasiscientific C&*p in the world at the moment, i've known about this for years, read one of the original papers by a group of chinese paleontolgists that found the first examples.
thanks,
dizzy

[Gawain of Orkeny]

no because the discovery channel is the biggest load of quasiscientific C&*p in the world at the moment,

That wasnt addressed to you. What do you think I cant read? It was to the post that started the thred. The one above yours.

[Reverend Joe]

Nope. Ever wonder why the name is no longer legally Kentucky Fried Chicken?

I am sure almost everyone else here already knows this, but I will clarify this in writing (mainly because I want to revel in the grotesque comedy):

KFC can no longer legally call themselves Kentucky Fried Chicken becuase they no longer sell chicken. That is because the animals they have been breeding for decades have become so mutated from massive overbreeding and hormonal use that they are no longer legally or scientifically considered chickens. They appear similar, but they are not genetically within the chicken species.

I can't believe people can still eat there; it seems like eating those animals should be illegal.

[bmolsson]

I am sure almost everyone else here already knows this, but I will clarify this in writing (mainly because I want to revel in the grotesque comedy):

KFC can no longer legally call themselves Kentucky Fried Chicken becuase they no longer sell chicken. That is because the animals they have been breeding for decades have become so mutated from massive overbreeding and hormonal use that they are no longer legally or scientifically considered chickens. They appear similar, but they are not genetically within the chicken species.

I can't believe people can still eat there; it seems like eating those animals should be illegal.

I knew it... They are selling dino parts. That explains the ancient taste and archeological look........ :help:

[Papewaio]

They call it KFC because Fried is not a good marketing point.

And most company symbols and names get simplified over time.

Check out the way the Shell Oil company Logo shell has changed over time for instance.

[Aenlic]

And here I thought it was because many people envision banjo-playing on decrepit porches and inbreeding when they think of Kentucky. ~;)

[Proletariat]

I can't believe people can still eat there; it seems like eating those animals should be illegal.

I really hope you're joking around, but if you aren't and for the others who believe this canard, here is a useful link.

http://www.snopes.com/lost/kfc.htm

[Papewaio]

Learn something new every day.

[Tachikaze]

In 1990, the Commonwealth of Kentucky, mired in debt, took the unusual step of trademarking their name. Henceforth, anyone using the word "Kentucky" for business reasons — inside or outside of the state — would have to obtain permission and pay licensing fees to the Commonwealth of Kentucky.Where will we be at Thanksgiving time if the nation of Turkey trademarks their name?

By the way, the quote above is from the "Lost Legends" section of Snopes. Proceed at your own risk.
http://www.snopes.com/lost/

[Reverend Joe]

I really hope you're joking around, but if you aren't and for the others who believe this canard, here is a useful link.

Well, I didn't find it that hard to believe- when you overbreed chickens, whilst using massive numbers of hormones, I would have expected some genetic drift. Then again, I heard this story from the same source that said that Arby's meat arrives at the franchises in liquid form... :rolleyes: so...

[dessa14]

heres an odd question, how the hell did we go from dinosaurs with feathers to whether or not KFC changed their name to get rid of the fried from the name...?
thanks,
dizzy

[Gawain of Orkeny]

Well heres a sort of link berween the two. Remember this oil company?

http://www.sinclairoil.com/images/hs-010.jpg

Is it still around. I remember having a blow up sinclair Dino as a kid.

[Lemur]

Its always been believed that theropd dinosaurs evolved into birds.Nonsense. Everybody knows that the dinosaurs and birds were both collected onto Noah's Ark at the same time. Moreover, flying dinosaurs were used to collect animals before the flood. (http://www.landoverbaptist.org/news0605/flyingdinos.html)

New evidence from an archeological find in China supports the long held Christian belief that Noah's sons rode giant flying dinosaurs to transport duck billed platypuses from Australia, and penguins and polar bears from the Antarctic, to name a few. "Those must have been some mighty big flying dinosaurs," says Pastor Deacon Fred. "Imagine the look on Noah's face when his sons flew in for a landing with a pair of Hippos strapped to the back of one of them things! Glory to God!"

http://www.landoverbaptist.org/news0605/flydino1.gif

[Ianofsmeg16]

Palaeontologists have theorised that specific dinosaurs may have had feathers for a while, this is due to there un-common likeness to birds, they my not have evolved into birds but their bone structure and muscles looked similar, especially in the Raptor species'. We are yet to find concrete evidence to prove that dinosaurs had feathers, but concrete prof would be finding a feather so the chances of that are slim.