Re: Bird-like dinosaur

From
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Hold on folks. Maybe(definetely) I did not phrase my question correctly.
Sorry to stir up such a froth. Geez, come on folks you all got seriously
lit over this one calm down...

I am getting lots of replies from folks in paleontology and all of you are
preaching to the choir. No one has to try to convince me about the
extremely close relationship between dinosaurs and birds. I have been aware
of the connection since well before this became a big media topic. I
remember reading about John Ostrom's observations many years ago and it
made sense all along. And cladistics is OK by me no problems there either.

Excuse me though, in that from what I understand, the jury is still out on
where & when the divergence came about and wether or not the common
ancestor was already a dinosaur or something else slightly earlier in the
line. From what I understand therapods go back a long way too. I'm not
trying to be argumentative here just curious.

It seems that most everyone here is just too close to the subject. I will
re-post this on the Home & Garden newslist and see what they think(just
kidding). But, seriously, they at least would not be so terribly
adamant(even hostile) in their replies.


What I was raelly after was how do we keep these relatively "complex" ideas
from being overly simplified when they are presented to the public.


Just one other observation in reply to Norm's comments on the murals. Most
of us(the folks on this list) can tell what is art and what is scientific
illustration. The problem lies in that the public cannot descern between
natural history "art" and "illustration". John Doe sees that mural and
thinks gee that must be what the scientists know it looked like. Typically
only minimal effort is made to explain what is fancy and what is fact
although the trend is away from that and more toward explaining that what
is being presented is just an hypothesis. Unfortunately my experience as an
exhibit designer is that despite these lofty goals when the budget ax falls
the fantasy stays('cause it sells tickets) and the facts get cut because
there is this crazy idea that the public is stupid and doesn't care anyway.


So anyway what I would hope is that this train of thought would shift away
from trying to convince me that birds are dinosaurs and more toward how do
we get these ideas across to the public without the over simplification
that seems so prevalent today.

Sincerely

Erich Rose
NY