Re: vaulting pterosaur launch: I give up

[Mike Habib <habib@jhmi.edu>]

Illustrations will be forthcoming when I have the time and energy to  
do it right - those sorts of technical illustrations require time and  
patience (not to mention a lot of precision), and I am reluctant to  
just rush off something rapid.  I can do some actual "sketches" in  
short order, in the rough and quick sense, but they'll only give a  
rough idea - hardly appropriate for detailed critiques.

I wouldn't become too overly focused on illustrations as  
demonstration, in any case.  Visualizing a dynamic process like launch  
is very helpful, but the illustrations themselves are more a depiction  
of the conclusions than a source of evidence (and leave lots of room  
for artistic license, if not constrained by quantitative evidence).   
The evidence really comes, in this case, from the structural mechanics  
and quantitative analysis.  I'd be more than happy to chat further  
about the numbers, which really make the case, or the specific  
qualitative characters that further bolster the argument.  I'm also  
happy to provide illustrations, but that will require some time - I'm  
rather swamped writing manuscripts at the moment.

Cheers,

--Mike


Michael Habib, M.S.
PhD. Candidate
Center for Functional Anatomy and Evolution
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
1830 E. Monument Street
Baltimore, MD 21205
(443) 280-0181
habib@jhmi.edu



On Jun 11, 2008, at 11:05 AM, David Peters wrote:

> Well, I asked my 20 questions and still didn't get a sketch. So I  
> guess I'll just mosey on off and WFTP.
>
> Good luck. Hope you're right.
>
> At the risk of opening up a new torrent, in your hypotheses, do  
> pterosaurs stick landings?
>
> David Peters
>
> davidpeters@att.net