Re: Tyrannosaurus vs. "larger" Theropods

[Robert Clements <clemensr@one.net.au>]

Date:         Thu, 25 May 2000 22:38:59 EDT 
  From:         Buckaroobwana@aol.com
    To:         j_mallon@hotmail.com, dinosaur@usc.edu

>Greetings,
>It seems to me that the major reason for the development of binocular vision
>in predators would be to increase the accuracy of a bite. This would be
>especially important when chasing prey at high speed. A scavenger would have
>little use for binocular vision to the degree that tyrannosaurs possess. Now
>someone tell Jack Horner, then tell him again.
>                                    sick of the damn scavenger theory,
>                                                        Buckaroobwana

But the imperfect binocularity (those eyes are set a long way back) might 
only tell us that the late tyrannosaurids had evolved quickly from smaller 
critters which definitely were predators; which means you can't get rid of 
Horner so easily. Perhaps we shouldn't want to... it's difficult to accept the 
idea that the bigfella tyrantlizardking was a big wuss who couldn't make his 
own 
kills, but it does flesh out a late Cretaceous ecology which seems to lack 
obvious big scavengers.

All the best,


Robert Clements <Robert.Clements@dva.gov.au>