I know this will seem annoying, and will probably earn never-ending
flaming from the list, but I have to say it. How the hell did sauropods
develop long necks, (or, for that matter, how did ankylosaurs and stegosaurs
develop body armor, or pterosaurs their wings, etc.)? I don't mean when,
or why, or what the basal types are, I mean how. I read a lot of
smug remarks about creationists (drdino.com was deserving of them all,
I'll concede; I was almost expecting a link to an X-Files site, with all
the paranoid delusions abounding), but one of the questions that
I have yet to find a satisfactory answer to is: what is the mechanism by
which macroevolution is supposed to occur? I'm not being facetious here;
if someone does have a good answer for this, I'd love to hear it. Please
reply off-list, to avoid excessive flaming directed toward me clogging
up the list. :-)
Chris Srnka
My opinion is that sauropods possessed the external (note, not
internal) supports to keep their vertebrae's shape as they elongated.
Plesiosaurs did not elongate the vertebrae, so increased their number.
Sauropods, it seems to me, tried to make due with what they had,
adding a vertebrae every so often in their evolutionary development
when it was nessessary to extend the scope of their niche, or exploit
a new one.Or so I think.
==
Jaime A. HeaddenQilong, the website, at:
http://members.tripod.com/~Qilong/qilong.html
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