Re: Cope?s Rule in the Pterosauria - Hone & Benton 2007

[Nick Pharris <npharris@umich.edu>]

Quoting Tim Williams <twilliams_alpha@hotmail.com>:

> Mike Taylor wrote:
>
> >                 I rather think the purpose of Hone and Benton's serier of 
> > papers is to
> > _investigate_ whether Cope's rule works in clades, using, y'know,
> > _evidence_ and stuff.
>
> I found this paragraph interesting (from the end of the Discussion)....
>
> "...Further, there was always a substantial size gap between the 
> largest birds and the smallest birds at any time. The suggestion that 
> birds somehow drove the pterosaurs towards large size, and perhaps to 
> final extinction, is currently not supported."

That should read "a substantial size gap between the largest birds and 
the smallest *pterosaurs*," right?

--
Nick Pharris
Department of Linguistics
University of Michigan

"Creativity is the sudden cessation of stupidity."
    --Edwin H. Land