Re: a rose by any other name(was fish & dogs)

["Ken Kinman" <kinman@hotmail.com>]

Jenny,
    I love those comments, and they have hit the nail right on the head.  
If cladists had given dinosaurs plus birds a new name (instead of expanding 
Dinosauria), we wouldn't be having this debate and there would be no 
confusion.
    The major reason they were not given a new scientific name is that it 
would make traditional Dinosauria (non-avian) a paraphyletic (incomplete) 
taxonomic group, and many cladists will go to great lengths to avoid any 
paraphyletic groups (no matter how confusing it gets).
    Sometime when kids ask such appropriate questions (as those you 
quoted), you might try the following.  Ask them if it wouldn't make sense to 
classify only regular dinosaurs (non-avian) in Dinosauria, the birds in 
Aves, and just put a special marker, like {{Aves}}, within the Dinosauria 
classification next to the dinosaurs which the birds evolved from.
                     ---------Ken Kinman
********************************************************
> From: "Jenny Lando" <jenny@amnh.org>
> Reply-To: jenny@amnh.org
> To: <dinosaur@usc.edu>
> Subject: a rose by any other name(was fish & dogs)
> Date: Fri, 1 Dec 2000 22:01:24 -0500
>
> The 4th graders with whom I spoke today were intrigued by the idea that 
> shared skeletal features, and possible behavioral ones were the reasons 
> some scientists considered birds to be a type of dinosaur.   But they were 
> not convinced.....   kids comments are paraphrased below....
>
>  ----So if ONLY dinosaurs have the hole in the hip, how come we think of 
> them as reptiles..... and I do not think birds are reptiles....perhaps 
> birds and dinosaurs should both be called something else......
>
> another student piped in with
>
> -----Yeah.  They  changed the Brontosaurus' name. Why not make a new name 
> for dinobirds....or maybe just the dinosaurs that are like birds.
>
>
> Just figured I'd add their voices to the clamor......
>
> : ) Jenny
>
> Jenny Lando
> Assistant Coordinator
> Moveable Museum/Paleontology of Dinosaurs
> Education Department
> American Museum of Natural History
> CPW @ 79th Street
> NYC NY 10024
> mailto:jenny@amnh.org
> 212-769-5189
> 212-769-5329 (fax)
> http://www.amnh.org

_____________________________________________________________________________________
Get more from the Web.  FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com