Re: Triassic protofeathers and fake-heads

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

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ken Kinman" <kinman@hotmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2002 4:40 PM

>       I just don't see how quoting Gould's ideas is very relevant in this
> discussion.  We are talking about dinosaurs,

We're talking about the evolution of dinosaurs, aren't we? Gould's ideas are
very relevant for any discussion of evolution. :-)

> In this context, increased brain
> size (allowing for increasing intelligence capability) is relevant.  The
> same is true for mammals, which came to dominate much of the "top end"
> during the Cenozoic.

Awwww... you do know how big an _entire_ Grey Parrot is, not to mention its
brain, and yet one is learning to read right now?

> So predator on predator interactions were probably at a
> much higher level early on.

Why?

> P.S.  As for Anomalocaris, it might have been the most fearsome predator
of
> the Cambrian, but it was probably the vertebrates [...] that soon
> outcompeted Anomalocaris

Competitive exclusion. How could something like *Myllokunmingia* -- a
predator of some sort, if the "pharyngeal teeth" are real -- evolve into
something as big as *Anomalocaris* sizes _alongside *Anomalocaris* and its
relatives_?
        Evidence, please. Even in the Ordovician, *Promissum* (the gigantic
conodont) was only 40 cm long, while the earlier *Anomalocaris* was 60 cm
and longer, and more massive.

> and caused the gradual decline of trilobites (even
> the spiny ones) during the Paleozoic.

And the trilobites failed to adapt _throughout the entire Paleozoic_!?!?!
How could they have overcome natural selection? They must have had really
amazing DNA polymerases... :->

> And I would think fish intelligence
> had a lot to do with it (they are pretty brainy compared to the vast
> majority of invertebrates).

Why do you think so?