weaver
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Icon by the great Djinni!
Posts: 156
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Post by weaver on Nov 14, 2011 11:25:36 GMT
Not so much a misunderstanding but some folks are really surprised when I mention prehistoric amphibians such as Diplocalus and Beelzebufo. It's like the thought of ancient amphibians has always been there but never paid much mind too.
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Post by dyscrasia on Nov 14, 2011 12:51:45 GMT
6- What are dinosaurs? Well, all the extinct reptiles: dimetrodons, plesiosaurs, pterodactlys and mammoths. EEEK! I was actually quite surprised when I found out that a lot of ppl around me considered mammoths as dinosaurs... |
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Post by takama on Nov 14, 2011 23:49:42 GMT
I one time tried to challenge my friends child to a little game were he had give me the names of 5 dinosaurs. I expected some of the most common ones(Stegosaurus t-Rex Velociraptor etc) but he said pterodactyl, i then had to correct him, but my mom said "yes it is"
I then had to explain it to her and the boy that day
after all my childhood years obsessing over prehistoric creatures i thought she would have known that Pterodactyls were not dinosaurs. As she watched me listen to a computer program and then i lecture to her like a little professor
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Post by bowheadwhale on Nov 16, 2011 19:39:20 GMT
I one time tried to challenge my friends child to a little game were he had give me the names of 5 dinosaurs. I expected some of the most common ones(Stegosaurus t-Rex Velociraptor etc) but he said pterodactyl, i then had to correct him, but my mom said "yes it is" I then had to explain it to her and the boy that day after all my childhood years obsessing over prehistoric creatures i thought she would have known that Pterodactyls were not dinosaurs. As she watched me listen to a computer program and then i lecture to her like a little professor . Annoying, indeed.  It feels like being forced to explain that the Lusitania was not the sistership of the Titanic...  Don't laugh, I had to do it once!  |
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Post by rabies on Jan 2, 2012 16:19:32 GMT
When I told to my friend that Giganotosaurus was discovereid in 1993, she said "that's impossible, all dinosaurs were discovered many years ago!"
"There were also some flying dinosaurs" said my biology teacher
"Pterosaurs were not dinosaurs" I corrected
also my biology book says that Diplodocus lived in swamps, plesiosaurs did swim like swans keeping their heads and necks high above the water, Stegosaurus and Tyrannosaurus lived at the same time, and the book is printed in 2007! This is wat they teach to us about dinosaurs in Finnish schools!
The biology teacher also said that birds evolved after dinosaurs had become extinct.
And I have one plastic Parasaurolophus and in it's belly is a text that says that the dino is Lambeosaurus.
All dinosaurs were big and Tyrannosaurus rex was the biggest dino
Prehistoric people lived in caves and hunted dinosaurs
Mammoth, Dimetrodon and Glyptodon were dinosaurs
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Post by brontozaurus on Jan 4, 2012 1:06:09 GMT
Technically there are flying dinosaurs, we just call them birds.
On a related note, there was one allegedly educational puzzle at my former workplace that used a picture of a pterosaur to illustrate a piece about bird evolution. Said pterosaur was sitting awkwardly in a tree with a very bird-like nest of eggs.
Look, it was a very cartoony puzzle aimed at preschoolers, but this isn't an excuse to do things like that, specially when other media aimed at this demographic (namely Dinosaur Train) get it right.
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Post by takama on Jan 4, 2012 2:36:55 GMT
My Grandpa always teases me that he was around the time of dinosaurs and hunted brontosaurs for soup. an old man from old times when brontosaurus and Flintstones was all in the media. but I ain't blaming him.  |
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Post by bowheadwhale on Jan 24, 2012 20:28:57 GMT
My Grandpa always teases me that he was around the time of dinosaurs and hunted brontosaurs for soup. an old man from old times when brontosaurus and Flintstones was all in the media. but I ain't blaming him. Your grandpa is just making jokes to see how you will react, that is for sure!  It's not like that lady who, looking at a Playmobil Pteranodon kit in a store, was looking for the price of that "prehistoric BIRD toy"...  |
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tyrantqueen
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I'M OFF TO EAT SOMEONE'S PARENTS :D
Posts: 137
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Post by tyrantqueen on Jan 25, 2012 0:29:12 GMT
Pterodactyls confuse me...they're not birds, but not dinosaurs either?
Just what are they? They're reptiles, right??
In have a dinosaur book called "In The Presence Of Dinosaurs", and the illustrator (for whatever reason) gave the Pteros feathers so that they looked like gannets.
What are they classified as?
I'm not a paleontologist, so try not to judge me too unkindly for not knowing this....
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Post by sbell on Jan 25, 2012 0:43:49 GMT
Pterodactyls confuse me...they're not birds, but not dinosaurs either? Just what are they? They're reptiles, right?? In have a dinosaur book called "In The Presence Of Dinosaurs", and the illustrator (for whatever reason) gave the Pteros feathers so that they looked like gannets. What are they classified as? I'm not a paleontologist, so try not to judge me too unkindly for not knowing this.... They are pterosaurs. It's a group of flying reptiles related to dinosaurs, but not dinosaurs. And they didn't have feathers, but there are a few different species that have been found to have a kind of hair on them. |
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Post by takama on Jan 25, 2012 1:39:19 GMT
Pterodactyls confuse me...they're not birds, but not dinosaurs either? Just what are they? They're reptiles, right?? In have a dinosaur book called "In The Presence Of Dinosaurs", and the illustrator (for whatever reason) gave the Pteros feathers so that they looked like gannets. What are they classified as? I'm not a paleontologist, so try not to judge me too unkindly for not knowing this.... They are pterosaurs. It's a group of flying reptiles related to dinosaurs, but not dinosaurs. And they didn't have feathers, but there are a few different species that have been found to have a kind of hair on them. Also Pterodactyls, describes the species Pterodactylus in groups. |
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tyrantqueen
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I'M OFF TO EAT SOMEONE'S PARENTS :D
Posts: 137
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Post by tyrantqueen on Jan 25, 2012 9:47:50 GMT
So they're a species unto themselves....thanks for clarifying |
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Post by sbell on Jan 25, 2012 13:51:42 GMT
So they're a species unto themselves....thanks for clarifying No, Pteranodon sternbergei is a species. Pterosaurs are a large clade coprised of lots of different pterosaur taxa (Dsungaripterus, Quetzalcoatlus, Ornithocheirus, Rhamphorhynchus, Dimorphodon, et cetera). |
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Post by Horridus on Jan 25, 2012 18:42:03 GMT
Think of 'pterosaur' as being at the same level as 'dinosaur'. Both groups are themselves united under a big clade (group), the Archosauria, which also contains crocodiles and their relatives. Also... Pterodactyls confuse me...they're not birds, but not dinosaurs either? Birds ARE dinosaurs! |
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tyrantqueen
Full Member
I'M OFF TO EAT SOMEONE'S PARENTS :D
Posts: 137
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Post by tyrantqueen on Jan 25, 2012 19:05:32 GMT
Then why do we have a separate name for them?  |
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Post by Horridus on Jan 25, 2012 19:13:52 GMT
Then why do we have a separate name for them? Because they are a specific type of dinosaur...? |
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Post by bowheadwhale on Jan 25, 2012 21:01:20 GMT
Pterodactyls confuse me...they're not birds, but not dinosaurs either? Just what are they? They're reptiles, right?? In have a dinosaur book called "In The Presence Of Dinosaurs", and the illustrator (for whatever reason) gave the Pteros feathers so that they looked like gannets. What are they classified as? I'm not a paleontologist, so try not to judge me too unkindly for not knowing this.... Pterosaurs are a distinctive group because their wings work in a different way to both birds and bats. OK, all wings are made with the same bones and articulations; the same as a human arm or a horse's front leg; but they work in a different way. If you look at the skeletton of a bird wing, you will see that its fingers are welded together and that the feathers do the whole work of "air bearing". If you look at a bat's wing skeletton, you will see that the fingers are not welded at all like in the birds' body, but are seperated and very long; the "air-bearing" work is indeed done by the webs held between the five fingers, as well as between the hand and the body. Now, if you look at a pterosaur's wing skeletton, you will see it's very distinctive also. The fingers of the hand are not welded like in a bird's body, but are not seperated either like in a bat's body; they are held very close to each other, shaping a very slender hand. The work of the "air-bearing" is all made by a single web held by the last finger only, which is highly developped, and the body of the animal; only pterosaurs had wings like that. Now, I hope you understand exactly why pterosaurs is a distinctive group. |
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Post by sbell on Jan 25, 2012 21:58:48 GMT
Then why do we have a separate name for them? That's like asking why we have different names for rodents and primates. |
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Post by takama on Jan 25, 2012 22:51:12 GMT
Then why do we have a separate name for them? because the Term Bird came "LONG" before it was thoght that dinosaurs were birds, or discoverd at all. |
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Post by stoneage on Jan 26, 2012 4:28:39 GMT
Think of 'pterosaur' as being at the same level as 'dinosaur'. Both groups are themselves united under a big clade (group), the Archosauria, which also contains crocodiles and their relatives. Also... Pterodactyls confuse me...they're not birds, but not dinosaurs either? Birds ARE dinosaurs! So Diplodocus is a bird? |
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It feels like being forced to explain that the Lusitania was not the sistership of the Titanic... 
Don't laugh, I had to do it once! 
