Re: Tarbosaurus?

["Jeffrey Martz" <jeffmartz@earthlink.net>]

Dinogeorge wrote...
>I'm not looking for a pat answer (I certainly don't care one way or another
>how many species of tyrannosaurids there were in eastern Asia versus
>Mongolia),

    The pat answer I was talking about was "population sampling in formation
A is automatically the same as in formation B without evidence to the
contrary", not the number of tyrannosaur species argument that's based on
it.

> but to me the signal is so strong that it overwhelms the
>complications, which often work against one another and cancel (for
example,
>there may be a low tyrannosaurid ratio in a facies, but collectors take all
>they can find, increasing the ratio through collection bias). The taphonomy
>is like noise; you can sometimes filter out the effects to get at the
>underlying information.

    All right, how are you "filtering out the effects"?  Have you
demonstarted something like the collection bias you gave in the
you-know-what formation?  My impression of your argument is that were
weren't trying to filter anything, you just started with an assumption about
population sampling in deifferent formations and stuck with it.

Me said...
<< As comforting as it may be George, you can't reduce subjects as
complicated
as Biology and Geology into binary ones and zeros: "If its not definitely
this, it must be this, and we have an answer, TA-DA!" >>
George said...
>I think there are circumstances in which this is exactly the case. Asteroid
>impact and predator-prey ratios are good examples. Sometimes the simple
>answer is indeed the correct answer.

    Unless the simple answer is based on questionable data regarding a
complex system, or lack thereof.

LN Jeff


Genius without education is like silver in the mine.
-Benjamin Franklin

Be sure to keep busy, so the devil may always find you occupied.
-Flavius Vegetius Renatus

Jeffrey W. Martz
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