Fw: Fw: Dinosaurs and birds

[don ohmes <d_ohmes@yahoo.com>]

Osmosis, early 'brain-washing' }:D, and luck. My mother and father were both 
interested in paleontology/natural sciences, and I was fortunate enough to 
experience the pleasures of artifact and fossil-collecting on the Aucilla River 
when SCUBA was new, (in '64, I almost got shot by an old fellow who thought I 
was a river-monster; poor guy nearly had a heart attack when he realized I was 
a teen-age human) and collecting river bottoms was still an activity considered 
(even by the majority of archeologists/paleontologists) devoid of evil. As a 
result, I met Stanley Olson when he was at the Florida Geological Survey, among 
others.

No real natural inclination on my part, but I do like the feeling I get when I 
can fool myself into thinking I know what (probably) happened. Then when I 
can't fool myself out of it even after a really sincere effort, it gets real 
good.

I do worry about the unintended (?) consequences of the apparent growing 
determination of the professional community to ensure that no unsupervised 
child or other person ever finds any in situ fossil anywhere anytime. One 
personal experience w/ undisturbed raw data, combined w/ a good education, is 
worth a million self-righteous posts on vertpaleo, if you know what I mean.

Don

----- Original Message ----
From: jrc <jrccea@bellsouth.net>
To: d_ohmes@yahoo.com
Cc: dinosaur@usc.edu
Sent: Saturday, April 7, 2007 8:40:29 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: Dinosaurs and birds


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "don ohmes" <d_ohmes@yahoo.com>
To: <dinosaur@usc.edu>
Sent: Saturday, April 07, 2007 3:21 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: Dinosaurs and birds


> Note: I first began thinking about the evolution of flight about 1965, and 
> my ideas jelled about 1995, and have changed little since.

Robert Heinlein's short story 'The Menace From Earth' got me started 
thinking about it, about the same time as you.  What got you started?

JimC