Dinosaurs - GR Says are Fantastic - Official Thread

I've been reading Jurrasic Park recently, and have just spent 4 hours on wikipedia, researching various elements of dinosaurs, certain types and periods, and it's very awe inspiring. It's so hard to imagine that far back in the Earth's history, and even harder to imagine that they walked the earth for millions and millions of years, and how new we are to this Earth ourselves (humans). I guess there are simple answers for these questions but what always gets me is how can scientists tell from fossils, that this dinosaur had this type of skin, and the skin was this colour, and how can they tell about the extinction theories, due to rock movements - its amazing that we can date a fossil and automatically say, well thats 65 million years old, and this rock formation is just over 25 million years old. Think I'm just mind boggled, and feeling somewhat geeky now. Any views?

I used to love dinosaurs when I was a kid and could name loads of them when I was very young. My son still likes them a bit but he's more interested in birds (specifically water birds - i.e. flamingos, ducks, geese, swans). What's interesting about that is that birds of course descended from dinosaurs, so I can definitely see him getting more of an interest in dinosaurs once he's a bit older. For all that it's seen as a bit geeky, I now think back to my childhood and wonder whether, if I'd maintained my interest in the subject, I'd have wound up with a career in paleontology.

As an aside, the velociraptors in Jurassic Park are way wrong - they were smaller and had feathers in real life.

Unfortunately, the earth is actually only around five-thousand years old.

I had a bit of an obsession with dinosaurs when I was a kid. I thought the idea that the world was once populated with these gigantic creatures was amazing. I suppose I still do.

Here's the biggest, baddest carnivore of all, the Allosaurus.

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

Allosaurus was a large bipedal predator with a large skull, equipped with dozens of large, sharp teeth. It averaged 8.5 meters (30 ft) in length, though fragmentary remains suggest it could have reached over 12 meters (39 ft). Relative to the large and powerful hindlimbs, its three-fingered forelimbs were small, and the body was balanced by a long, heavy tail. It is classified as an allosaurid, a type of carnosaurian theropod dinosaur. The genus has a complicated taxonomy, and includes an uncertain number of valid species, the best known of which is A. fragilis. The bulk of Allosaurus remains have come from North America's Morrison Formation, with material also known from Portugal and possibly Tanzania. It was known for over half of the 20th century as Antrodemus, but study of the copious remains from the Cleveland Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry brought the name Allosaurus back to prominence, and established it as one of the best-known dinosaurs.

As the prominent large predator in the Morrison Formation, Allosaurus was at the top of the food chain, probably preying on contemporaneous large herbivorous dinosaurs. Potential prey included ornithopods, stegosaurids, and sauropods. Some paleontologists interpret Allosaurus as having had cooperative social behavior, and hunting in packs, while others believe individuals may have been aggressive toward each other, and that congregations of this genus are the result of lone individuals feeding on the same carcasses. It may have attacked large prey by ambush, using its upper jaws like a hatchet.

How is it geeky? Giant lizards = awesome!

My son is learning about Dinosaurs at the moment. Are there any Dinosaur museums in the London or Newcastle area?

http://xkcd.com/460/

suzzopher wrote:My son is learning about Dinosaurs at the moment. Are there any Dinosaur museums in the London or Newcastle area?

The Natural History Museum in London?

Dinosaurs are well cool.

In my second year of uni we had this kids wall chart of dinosaurs, it had cartoony pictures of them with some fact bubbles for each dinosaur along side the pictures. It was so awesome. My friend Mat had some dinosaur slippers too.

Hero of Canton wrote:As an aside, the velociraptors in Jurassic Park are way wrong - they were smaller and had feathers in real life.

True say. The Utahraptor on the other hand... now he was a badass.

Hero of Canton wrote:As an aside, the velociraptors in Jurassic Park are way wrong - they were smaller and had feathers in real life.

Yes indeed. I suppose 'Raptor' is a whole lot easier for kids to say than 'Deinonychus' which those in the film resembled more.

Dinosaurs, Lego, and Star Wars. I was obsessed with them as a young child. I can still name pretty much any Dinosaur you show me.

I used to love 'em as a kid. I had this great little fact book on a huge amount of dinosaurs with the standard "This is how big you are, THIS IS HOW BIG THIS DINOSAUR IS!" way of measuring.

Anyone else collect that T-Rex skeleton in those weekly magazines in the mid-90's?

I don't believe in them.

Gil-Martin wrote:Yes indeed. I suppose 'Raptor' is a whole lot easier for kids to say than 'Deinonychus' which those in the film resembled more.

Ooh, I was going to mention the deinonychus thing, but decided that was a bit too geeky. Kudos, fella.

Dinosaurs, Lego, and Star Wars. I was obsessed with them as a young child.

Me too.

suzzopher wrote:My son is learning about Dinosaurs at the moment. Are there any Dinosaur museums in the London or Newcastle area?

Maybe the Natural History Museum. :fp:

Gil-Martin wrote:
Hero of Canton wrote:As an aside, the velociraptors in Jurassic Park are way wrong - they were smaller and had feathers in real life.

Yes indeed. I suppose 'Raptor' is a whole lot easier for kids to say than 'Deinonychus' which those in the film resembled more.

Dinosaurs, Lego, and Star Wars. I was obsessed with them as a young child. I can still name pretty much any Dinosaur you show me.

Add to that toy cars and a GameBoy and there is my childhood.

I had one of those posters in my room that had the height of an average male, and then a number of significantly larger dinosaurs next to it.

...And I still play Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis today.

I recall being kicked out of my RE class in y10 for asking the teacher "Sir, What about Dinosaurs and the whole creation sham?", the class did'nt no whether to laugh or cry. To this day I've no idea why I was kicked out. I was serious.

emilythestrange wrote:
Gil-Martin wrote:
Hero of Canton wrote:As an aside, the velociraptors in Jurassic Park are way wrong - they were smaller and had feathers in real life.

Yes indeed. I suppose 'Raptor' is a whole lot easier for kids to say than 'Deinonychus' which those in the film resembled more.

Dinosaurs, Lego, and Star Wars. I was obsessed with them as a young child. I can still name pretty much any Dinosaur you show me.

Add to that toy cars and a GameBoy and there is my childhood.

I had one of those posters in my room that had the height of an average male, and then a number of significantly larger dinosaurs next to it.

...And I still play Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis today.

Oh yeah, I forgot about cars. I used to get my mum or dad to buy me a copy of that little handbook with pictures in it (I think it started out as 'Automobiles 1983/1984' (for example) then became simply 'Cars 1986/1987') every year. It had all the stats for the cars under the pics, but the only one I ever paid attention to was 'Top Speed'. Lol

What with the Lego and the Car fascination, I should've become an Engineer. Such a waste.

Gil-Martin wrote:
emilythestrange wrote:
Gil-Martin wrote:
Hero of Canton wrote:As an aside, the velociraptors in Jurassic Park are way wrong - they were smaller and had feathers in real life.

Yes indeed. I suppose 'Raptor' is a whole lot easier for kids to say than 'Deinonychus' which those in the film resembled more.

Dinosaurs, Lego, and Star Wars. I was obsessed with them as a young child. I can still name pretty much any Dinosaur you show me.

Add to that toy cars and a GameBoy and there is my childhood.

I had one of those posters in my room that had the height of an average male, and then a number of significantly larger dinosaurs next to it.

...And I still play Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis today.

Oh yeah, I forgot about cars. I used to get my mum or dad to buy me a copy of that little handbook with pictures in it (I think it started out as 'Automobiles 1983/1984' (for example) then became simply 'Cars 1986/1987') every year. It had all the stats for the cars under the pics, but the only one I ever paid attention to was 'Top Speed'. Lol

What with the Lego and the Car fascination, I should've become an Engineer. Such a waste.

I should've been a boy.

Dinosaurs - GR Says are Fantastic - Official Thread

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