Re: Say this slowly: theropoda is paraphylitic, theropoda is paraphlyitic.....

[ELurio@aol.com]

In a message dated 6/25/00 3:03:02 AM, jeffmartz@earthlink.net writes:

<< The fossil record says that coelurosaurs and other theropods are really

really similar in a lot of ways that are hard to tie with flight or living

in trees.  Even if flight did evolve in the trees,  how does your idea that

theropods are polyphyletic follow from that?  How come you can have flying

birds evolving from originally ground-dwelling archosaurs that became

arboreal, but not from origianlly ground dwelling theropods that became

arboreal?


LN Jeff >>

Well, there's Longisquama, that little feathered beastie that we've all been 
talking about. It seems that you don't think it exists. Or that feathers 
evolved more than once, or that they're ferns.....

If Longisquama had real feathers, that that's the assumption here, then 
convergance is the only answer. Unlike bats and pterosaurs, the feathered 
wings would be a major problem for quadropedal walking. Bipedalism is one 
method of solving that problem.

If the theropoda is polyphelitic, than you have a situation like some 
Malagasaysay lemurs, that jump or walk on two legs. Then you have the mass 
extinction at the end of the Jurassic, which is not an assumption. We know 
that it took place.

You have two superficially similar groups competing after a minor holocaust, 
with dogma refusing to recognize the real truth.

eric l.