Re: Climate Changes Mid-late Dinosaur era.

["David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> > From: owner-dinosaur@usc.edu
> > [mailto:owner-dinosaur@usc.edu]On Behalf Of His Dark Lordship

:-D

[lots of snippage]
> *Maybe coelurosaurs were the first (only?) dinosaurs with a metabolism
> elevated enough to require insulation?

While I have the 1998 SVP meeting abstracts dug out...

C. G. Farmer: Hot blood and warm eggs, p. 40A

"Endothermy in birds and mammals may be an adaptation for incubation of
offspring as demonstrated by 1) the importance of incubation temperature to
proper development and to the length of the incubation period; 2) the common
regulatory system of reproduction and thermogenesis (hormonal secretions of
the hypothalamus); and 3) the numerous examples where metabolic heat is used
to incubate young, e. g., wasps, termites, ants, bees. This hypothesis is
distinct from previous theories in proposing that endothermy is primarily
beneficial to offspring rather than to the individual organism and is but
one character in a mosaic that are all related to parental care. I suggest
that convergent evolutionary trajectories in archosaurs and mammals were set
by this common reproductive strategy which has profoundly influenced many
physiological, morphological, and behavioural adaptations. Characters common
to both lineages that were likely influenced by selection for effective
parents include: 1) vocalization and hearing; 2) an active foraging mode and
aerobic exercise metabolism, [...] [including] upright posture [...].
Furthermore, differences in the evolutionary course of birds and mammals may
also reflect differences in their parental care, e. g., elaboration of
dental and jaw elements in mammals that enhance rapid processing of food,
which is critical during lactation, and the loss or reduction of these
elements in birds whose young are nutritionally precocial compared to
mammalian young."

Food for thought...

****************************************************
Similarly, the idea that chocolate is better than vanilla is unscientific,
even if it is true (:-).
        Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.