Re: pteros have lift-off

[David Marjanovic <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> Jim, Jim, Jim,
>
> Don't be silly.

It is not unusual for a scientist to say "don't be silly" -- not to write, 
sure, but to say, and certainly to think.

However, it is quite unusual for a scientist to say "don't be silly" _without 
the slightest attempt at explaining where the silliness lies_. It's a bit like 
saying "yo, man, yo, wassup, yo!" to a distinguished senior Japanese colleague 
whom you've never met before: it doesn't actually harm anyone, but it doesn't 
help either, and it amounts to a major culture shock. You simply _can't_ assume 
that everyone automatically has the same 3-D movie of a pterosaur takeoff 
playing in their heads; it's your responsibility to make sure that everyone 
imagines it the same way.

Because I started the comparison of the take-off jump to a downstroke, I should 
probably provide some explanations:
- A downstroke ends with the wing extended more or less vertically downward. 
The take-off jump ends with the same position, except that the wing finger is 
still partly folded so that the first three fingers still are the part of the 
wing that's closest to the ground.
- The way the wing arrives at this more or less vertical position is similar, 
too; the difference is that no mediolateral component (or hardly any) is 
involved in the take-off jump, but all the rest is about identical. Don't you 
think?
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