Re: Campbell's even crazier than a MANIAC? (archeopteryx

[don ohmes <d_ohmes@yahoo.com>]

--- On Sun, 9/28/08, David Marjanovic <david.marjanovic@gmx.at> wrote:

> > and you can also travel much further.
> 
> Which may or may not be an extra advantage.

As a practical matter, the option is an advantage.
 
> I could imagine that flapping flight could directly evolve
> from trying to 
> catch insects with the forelimbs in mid-air while jumping
> from branch to 
> branch, and the bats are an obvious candidate for that
> having actually 
> happened. That's probably a rather useless speculation
> on my part, but, as 
> long as it isn't falsified, it means we can't
> assume that flapping must 
> necessarily have evolved from gliding in every case of a
> trees-down origin 
> of flight.

I agree w/ the general contention about what can't be assumed. The specific 
case elicits an image of a bat taking his very first glide after a million 
years of perfecting flapping flight by jumping off limbs after insects. Heh. 
Must have been a big relief.

Don