Re: Sauroparental care

["Ken Carpenter" <KCarpenter@dmns.org>]

You could indeed look for traces of mounds (I doubt sauropods burrowed, they 
lack any of the morphological features of a burrower). However, a mound would 
tell you nothing about parent care. Just the structure of the nest.
Ken

Kenneth Carpenter, Ph.D.
Curator of Lower Vertebrate Paleontology &
Chief Preparator
Dept. of Earth Sciences
Denver Museum of Natural History 
2001 Colorado Blvd.
Denver, CO 80205

Phone: (303)370-6392
Fax: (303)331-6492
email: KCarpenter@DMNS.org

For fun:
 http://dino.lm.com/artists/display.php?name=Kcarpenter


>>> <zone65@bigpond.com> 21/Dec/03 >>>
Perhaps it can be tested, by looking for evidence of mounds or burrows 
in known sauropod-inhabited areas.

In any event, I used the words "idea" and "possibility" to suggest 
these things. Even if I had said "hypothesis", that is merely a 
proposition. Had I lazily bandied about the word "theory", well, then 
you would have had a point.

Peter Markmann
Canberra


On Monday, December 22, 2003, at 12:50  AM, Ken Carpenter wrote:

> Again, I raise the point of how do you test your hypothesis? I can 
> just as as well say that little green men come to earth and took care 
> of the babies. The point is that this idea is not testable, nor, as 
> you'll note, can you disprove it as structured. A hypothesis needs to 
> be framed in such a way that it can be disproved. That is one reason 
> why debates with Creationists are futile. They tend to make statements 
> that cannot be tested.
> Ken
>
>>>> <zone65@bigpond.com> 12/20/03 22:53 PM >>>
> OK, the question of how Saurpods avoided trampling their young into
> brontoburgers must be considered... one idea is that the eggs were laid
> in rather deep/wide burrows dug in the ground. The hatchlings would
> then live there until they were large enough to emerge, and clever
> enough to avoid their elders' feet. Another possibility is the young
> lived on mud-islands created by the adults in lakes.
>
> Peter Markmann
> Canberra
>
>