RE: [Fwd: Dinosaur Society]

["Stewart, Dwight" <Dwight.Stewart@VLSI.com>]

Thanks Mike.   Yes, I'm probably mixing applesauruses & orangesauruses by
using the term order. :-)

I recently acquired a Spinosaurus Bataat 1/40th scale model.  It's a
fascinating piece, but it raised several questions in my mind.  First; is
this specimen well enough known to really produce an accurate model (the
body of the Battaat model looks rather Allosaurid to my eyes).  Also, I read
that the vertebrae of a Spinosaurus specimen (don't know if it was only one
specimen) are 20% larger than Tyrannosaurus Rex.  Does that ring true?

Dwight

        -----Original Message-----
        From:   T. Mike Keesey [SMTP:tkeese1@gl.umbc.edu]
        Sent:   Thursday, August 27, 1998 10:05 PM
        To:     dinosaur@usc.edu
        Subject:        RE: [Fwd: Dinosaur Society]

        On Thu, 27 Aug 1998, Stewart, Dwight wrote:

        >  Speaking of birds & dinosaurs, I have a question for the list:
am I
        > correct in assuming that (ironically) the order Saurischia is
closer to
        > birds that the Ornithischia?  I'm sure this has probably been
addressed
        > before, sorry. 

        According to the Linnaean system, yes. The ornithischian pelvis is
only
        superficially bird-like, so the name is a misnomer.

        Under the increasingly popular cladistic system (which I would guess
that
        more people on this list, and perhaps in the profession, use), birds
*are*
        saurischians! (And Saurischia is not an Order -- cladistics doesn't
use
        absolute ranks higher than Genus.) The situation becomes even more
ironic
        ...

        --T. Mike Keesey
<tkeese1@gl.umbc.edu>
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