Re: warm-bloodedness

["Timothy Williams" <twilliams_alpha@hotmail.com>]

Andy Farke wrote:

> On a lighter note. . .When reading about "the array of theropods and
> sauropods" I can't help but remember Ralph Chapman's mother's comment on
> "all the meat eaters looking the same" (my apologies to Tim or any theropod
> fans on the last).

Gather 20 species of birds at random, pluck off their feathers, and *then* 
see how different they look.

Or, let's go one step further.  Let's just compare their skeletons.  With 
most extinct theropods, all we have are dry bones.  With modern birds, 
distinctions can be made using so much more criteria - plumage, behavior, 
internal anatomy, eggs and reproduction, etc.  Strip birds down to their 
bare bones, and there's not a huge difference between an emu and an ostrich, 
or a crow and a starling.  If all we knew of these species were their 
skeletons, we might put them in the same family.

For these reasons, the "families" of extinct theropod dinosaurs and 
"families" of modern birds are not directly comparable, I don't believe.  
Chalk and cheese.


Tim
________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com