Saw the exhibition at the British Museum tday. Blew me away, seeing a whole sequence in evolution being discovered in just a few years – since 1996 – from China.
With the specimens displayed you can actually see how feathers evolved on dinosaurs. Revolutionary.
The collection will be touring Europe in summer, strongly recommended.
I love dinosaurs. I actually have a personal collection of bones which I found, with the permission of a University of course.
By: Tempest - 24th April 2003 at 22:42
Yeah Robert Bakker is good, I’ve read quite a bit about him. He’s the guy who made a name for himself without having a Phd in the first place as I recall, interesting story how he got to where he is, I admire his style. Jurassic Park was great. So were the V-raptors in it.
I must admit I don’t have a favourite dinosaur, ‘cept of course the V-raptor, which is the moniker I’d stick on the side of my jet if I were fighter pilot. Deinonychus is pretty good, it had opposable claws which meant it could manipulate things it grabbed or tore, a major advance in the arms race back then.
I used to live in a place where you could find these kinds of things, I used to find bones when I went hiking and so forth, even in the garden as well.
What I like the most about the Chinese dinos, is that they clearly demonstrate evolution of feather and flying, which is, from a scientific point of view, quite a revolutionary discovery.
I like pure science in general, astronomy is also a favourite of mine as well.
By: PhantomII - 23rd April 2003 at 21:26
Sounds interesting to me.
I too, love dinosaurs. I find them fascinating. I’ve been in love with them I guess you could say, ever since I can remember.
If you want an interesting perspective on what the life of a dinosaur might be like I highly recommend a book called “Raptor Red”, by Robert T. Bakker.
You have probably heard of him. He’s a very famous paleontologist. Anyway, the book is a work of fiction that takes you through a year in the life of a female Utahraptor dinosaur. The setting is the Utah flood plains back during the Cretaceous time period.
It’s truly a fascinating and very enjoyable read. In high school a couple of years ago I was assigned to write a novel towards the end of the year for my Advanced Placement English course. I wrote a similar book only using a different dinosaur (Dilophosaurus), and various other things that differed from Bakker’s book.
I didn’t publish mine, (that thought makes me laugh), so I guess I didn’t do anything wrong.
Anyway, seeing as your avatar is that of the Velociraptor, I assume you like the raptor-like dinosaurs (Velociraptor, Deinonychus, Dromaeosaurus, Troodon, Utahraptor, etc.), so I thought I’d mention that book.
Personally my favorite dinosaur is Dilophosaurus. Somewhat misrepresented in the movie Jurassic Park (my all-time favorite movie….and favorite book as well), but nevertheless I was glad to see the Dilophosaurus name get fairly well-known.
Sign In
April 23, 2003 at 8:17 pm