Re: Most popular/common dinosaur misconceptions

["Neil Taylor (Home)" <nf.taylor@ntlworld.com>]

Scott wrote:
>   
> > mammoths and saber-toothed cats are dinosaurs, too--and those assuredly
> > did live alongside early humans.
> >     
>
> This much ignorance I find difficult to credit. If I showed a picture of a
> saber-toothed cat to 100 people, asking, "What's this?" I would expect zero
> responses of "It's a dinosaur." Has anyone any data?
>
>   
the public might not say it face to face, but on the shelves of many toy 
shops (and - shudder - museum shops!!) there are packs of plastic toy 
beasties labelled "Dinosaurs" which frequently contain a wide range of 
non-phylogenetic dinosaurs (sabre-tooths, mammoths, plesio/pliosaurs 
(can't tell from the plastic), ...)
Just about any "prehistoric" beast can be so included, especially if it 
is in some way "monstrous".



--
Neil Taylor "Creo Imaginem Mente"