Another FAQ

[Mike Taylor <mike@tecc.co.uk>]

Time to get rolling on the FAQ again after a bit of a break over the
summer (such as it was).  Despite the enormous amount of new material
over the last few months, I don't think any of it has made anything
that the FAQ says actually _wrong_ ...

(Don't worry, I won't be adding the "which genus was most recently
discovered" question right 'til the end :-)

Today's question is:

        Just how similar are related dinosaurs?  Obviously this is a
        very vague question, but here's an example: if we could see
        them in the flesh, might a Tyrannosaurs rex and a Gorgosaurus
        libratus look sort of as similar to each other as a lion and a
        tiger do?  Or perhaps T. rex and T. bataar are as alike as
        lions and tigers, and together they are as similar to the
        various Gorgosaurus species as lions and tigers are to, say,
        leopards and jaguars?

        Moving further back down the tree, no-one who is remotely
        familiar with extant mammals would ever confuse, say, a lion
        with a wolf, even though they are both members of the order
        Carnivora. Would it be similarly true that no-one would ever
        confuse the theropods Tyrannosaurus and Allosaurus?

Replies to <dinofaq@egroups.com> please; as always, I will summarise
the responses into the answer, which will appear at
http://www.miketaylor.org.uk/dino/faq/s-class/close/index.html
(and I'll post it to this list as well.)

Many thanks,

 _/|_    _______________________________________________________________
/o ) \/  Mike Taylor - <mike@miketaylor.org.uk> - www.miketaylor.org.uk
)_v__/\  "Writing is like driving a car at night.  You can only see as
         far as the headlights, but you make the whole trip that way"
         -- E. L. Doctorow.