Magnosaurus & matrilineal dinosaurs

[StephanPickering@cs.com]

Shalom, good morning.
       Markus Moser's methodical summation of the von Huene nomenclatural labyrinths confirms my own mss. sorting out of the riddle (my communique was a short condensation of notes). I agree that Magnosaurus was revised by von Huene in 1956  as applicable to the hypodigm of Megalosaurus nethercombensis (although, it goes without saying, Megalosaurus nethercombensis cannot be diagnostically separated from the further derived Megalosaurus bucklandii on the genus level), which I should have noted in my communique to the List. Sam Welles, in his 1984 monograph (page 170), "did not take action" because he felt the matter was irrelevant. In his unpublished mss., which I am revising and updating for publication, my introductory paragraphs on Megalosaurus nethercombensis parallel Mr Moser's summation (and I shall, to be sure, acknowledge his 19 December communication).
       For those seemingly horrified by the proposition of female dinosaurs (ceratopsians et al.) being dominant (in sensu strictu, dinosaurology is ideological, contrary to Keith Parsons et al.), an ethnography of dinosaurology reuires a semiosis analysis of meaning rather than explanation. To point to extant avialian theropods, where males are often larger and more colourful, 65 million years after the K/T event(s), is meaningless. Their morphogenesis, breeding biologies, etc., are the result, I believe, of the catastrophic events of K/T. I am interested in pre-K/T behaviour (which can be inferred with careful analysis of parallel ecological niches observable in mammals; crocodylomorphs are useless). Social complexity means: dinosaurs used cognition regardless of their genomes, e.g., pack-hunting, using juveniles to chase prey into the reach of larger, slower adults, ceratopsians/hadrosaurs/sauropods migrating in herds. Herds!
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f dinosaurs (or flocks, or whatever) evolve because of ecologies (size/number of predators, foliage/meat availability, metabolic energy required for herd migration/stalking), and reproductive strategies. Herbivores would need foliage to maximize calories and energy. Linked to these is female philopatry (among centrosaurs, the "styracosaurs" could easily have been females), and the probability of some dinosaur social groups not being predicated on kinship. Adults/juveniles as group units form because of: cognitive interactions, emotions, genomes, reproductive strategies, manipulations, exploitations. The multicausality of their social patterns denotes they were sentient animals determining much of their behaviour. My other point (I am plundering my own mss. notes for an article being submitted to DINOSAUR WORLD): matrilineality among dinosaurs is perfectly logical: the physiological demands of nurturing hatchlings, providing them with food, etc., means the females had to be l!
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ger, stronger, and more survivable than males.
       Mahzel tov.