Re: The 51st SVPCA

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

----- Original Message -----
From: <darren.naish@port.ac.uk>
Sent: Thursday, October 02, 2003 3:53 PM

> _Elginerpeton_ is quite similar to _Ichthyostega_ and the two might
>  belong to a monophyletic ichthyostegid clade.

Quite a difference to the good old normal times when *E.* was thought to be
so basal that it was considered unknown if it had fin rays or digits, while
*I.* was thought to be the sistergroup of *Tulerpeton* + the pentadactyl
ones.

> _Casineria_ (published
> recently as the oldest tetrapod with a pentadactyl manus)
> grouped close to microsaurs

Oh no. Not another not-amniotomorph like Lizzie.

> _Laccotriton_ and _Sinerpeton_ [...] are Early Cretaceous
> and not Jurassic as claimed, and the same is probably true
> for the Jiulongshan Fm's _Chunnerpeton_

Awww. I was already hoping for LJ feathered dinos... :.-(

> Paul Barrett spoke about new material of the
> procolophonoid _Barasaurus_ and of younginiform
> tangasaurid material from Madagascar which show that
> these two taxa survived the PT event.

Wow.

> AND, they alternative such that the curve of
> the D faces left on one spine, right on the next, left on the
> next and so on. Very odd.

Flabbergasting!

> Paul Maderson (a Rubenite/Feducciary) stood up and said
> how _appalled_ he was that Dave and his colleagues are still
> proclaiming that pterosaurs had body hair, whereas in fact
> they clearly had reticulate scales like those of rattlesnakes.

Why on the planet reticulate (almost wrote ridiculous) scales? I know some
people haven't got it that, while the fibres in the wing membranes are not
hair, the others _on_ the body are; but scales?

> Indeed (Maderson argued), Lingham-Solaire has just shown
> that hair-like fibres can be the result of decomposition of
> collagenous skin layers.

And not scales.

> In reviewing other ornithischian groups, he
> noted that Lucas' identification of  _Tatisaurus_ as a
> scelidosaur was completely wrong, [...] new
> ornithischian taxa presently in the works will disturb the
> present, 'stable' phylogeny of the Ornithischia.

May you live in interesting times, hm?

> Paul showed the new phylogeny in press
> (?) for _Dinosauria II_ and _Cetiosaurus_ is part of a clade
> including _Barapasaurus_ and _Patagosaurus_.. so,
> monophyletic Cetiosauridae after all.

Yet another idea going full circle! That's a conspiracyyyy!!!

> Paul Maderson spoke about feather development, how
> ridiculously complex it is, and how no-one has even
> published a proper description of the whole process. He is
> not happy with the Prum & Brush model

Is it still too simple? :-)

> Robert Asher (et al.) showed how _Necrolestes_ is most
> likely a metatherian..

Hear, hear.

> what will be interest to some here
> however is that Asher clearly stated at the beginning of his
> talk that most data now indicates that
> insectivores/lipotyphlans are not monophyletic and he
> therefore seemed positive to the idea that tenrecoids are part
> of Tenrecoidea.

Of Afrotheria?