This questionÂis hard to answer, not because answers don't come forth readily and easily, but because too many answers come forth. Here are 10 categories highlighting the significance of dinosaurs in a modern understanding of the natural world. I think that these are all relevant in a modern education.
1, Dinosaurs provideÂfundamental insights into the origin of the most diverse group of living tetrapods (birds) on the planet, informationÂnot available from neontological studies.
2. Dinosaurs provide fundamental insights into the originsÂand significanceÂof the features of birds, informationÂnot available from neontological studies.
3. Our relatively new understanding of the relationship of dinosaurs to the rest of the biota utterly rearranges what had been the going paradigm for many, many years.ÂÂ
4. Dinosaurs give us an opportunityÂto understand what a former ecosystem, in effect parallel to the modern one, might look like.
5.ÂDinosaurs allow us to consider alternative solutions to life's problems. This includes a truly vast array, from size, to herbivorous strategies, to metabolism(s), to the role of intelligence, to so much else, in biotic fitness.
6. Dinosaurs have changed our understanding of the nature and significance of mass extinctions in evolution;
7. Dinosaurs have changed our understanding of extraterrestrial influences on terrestrial events.
8. Dinosaurs have provided a venue for understanding deep (or Earth) time, and the difference between short- and long-term events and solutions;
9. Dinosaurs have provided a venue for understanding changing paleoenvironments and climates (essential concepts, particularly when paired withÂmass extinctions);ÂÂ
10. Dinosaurs require revisitation of the human conceit about its central role on Earth.
- David