Archeology and Dinosaur era question

[muy_thaiguy]

Where do Pterosaurs come from? They are not flying dinosaurs, but they did live at the same time. There are fossil records of many species of them, but none on origins. As far as archeology goes, this is a species of animal that seems (for the time being) to have truly popped up out of nowhere. And so some of you don't have to google what it looks like:

Click image to enlarge.

[HapSmo19]

If I said they were created would you call me crazy?

[grandin]

If I said they were created would you call me crazy?

Of course they were created. By species preceding them, by competition, by genetic drift, by ecological pressure, by the beautiful and truly aweinspiring process that is life.

[MeDeFe]

They're fish-lizards that learned how to fly with their fins.

[PLAYER57832]

Ironically enough MeDeFe, scientists once thought that to be true (in the 1700-1800's when they were first being discovered).

Mugaiy, sorry, but your information is incorrect. First, study of fossils is Paleontology, not Archeology. Archeology is the study of human historical evidence.

Second, IS evidence of evolution, both within the group and in ancestry. What is missing is the specific link to these particular animals.

You likely saw the following in Wikipedia:
Because pterosaur anatomy has been so heavily modified for flight, and immediate "missing link" predecessors have not so far been described, the ancestry of pterosaurs is not well understood. Several hypotheses have been advanced, with the most common in recent years being links to ornithodirans like Scleromochlus, an ancestry among the archosauriforms like Euparkeria (a more traditional view), or related to prolacertiformes like Sharovipteryx.[16]

They were thought to have evolved flight from some manner other than the 'tree-down' route possibly taken by birds, because pterosaurs demonstrated no adaptations useful for tree living. Most scenarios have pterosaurs evolving from long-legged, ground-running ancestors like Scleromochlus or Sharovipteryx, both of which had webs of skin from long hind legs to their bodies or tails. This suggested a 'ground-up' evolution of flight or even a route that evolved by gliding from cliff-tops.[citation needed]

However, new (2008) findings suggest that the earliest pterosaurs were small, tree dwelling, insectivorous organisms.[1]

But here is the deal. Saying there is no "missing link" is rather like saying that there is a whole in your road map, so you don't know exactly where the corner of 5th and Madison streets are. However, you can see that 5th Avenue goes on one side of the map and then off the other, AND you can see that Madison does the same. So, unless the road stops and re-starts (something which sometimes happens, but mostly when things like highways are built over and area and cut off previous throughways. )

Now, I don't think you are really suggesting this is "proof" that evolution did not occur or any such thing. I suspect you just wanted better information, which in this case does not seem to exist. If you were trying to make such an assertion, the thing to do is to realize that even if the exact descent of this particular group is not 100% known, we do know how it evolved afterward pretty well and we know how some species around (existing before, at the same time and after) evolved pretty clearly. Again, think of the road map analogy. In some cases, we might be looking at a map of the US and missing entire states, but.. even if we cannot see what precisely lies in what we call Wyoming and Oklahoma and Nevada.. whole chunks, we know there has to be something there, because we can see that land surrounds those areas.




I was going to copy the pertinent sections, but they are rather long.

UC Berkeley:
US Berkeley link: http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/diapsids/pterosauria.html
Enchanted Learning:
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjec ... saur.shtml

[Neoteny]

Anyhow, I'd say this is more a phylogenetic problem than an archaeological or paleontological problem. Unfortunately, without DNA evidence, we have to rely quite a bit on morphology, which is not a very accurate way of doing things at all. I think most people place them outside of the dinosaur clade (making them less related to birds than true dinosaurs), but there are a few similarities that a minority use to justify lumping them together. What brought this question up?

If I said they were created would you call me crazy?

Yes.

[muy_thaiguy]

Anyhow, I'd say this is more a phylogenetic problem than an archaeological or paleontological problem. Unfortunately, without DNA evidence, we have to rely quite a bit on morphology, which is not a very accurate way of doing things at all. I think most people place them outside of the dinosaur clade (making them less related to birds than true dinosaurs), but there are a few similarities that a minority use to justify lumping them together. What brought this question up?

Recently watched a show on one of the Discovery Channels about it. I watched it because when I was little, I knew more about dinosaurs then most adults/teachers (at the ripe old age of 8 and 9 years old). I still get curious about it from time to time. Also, while other kids had teddy bears, I had a stuffed stegosaurus and triceratops. When other kids read comic books, I read and watched everything I could on dinosaurs.

Okay, so it was an obsession.

Mugaiy, sorry, but your information is incorrect. First, study of fossils is Paleontology, not Archeology. Archeology is the study of human historical evidence.

Now you are just being picky.

What is missing is the specific link to these particular animals.

Try more like "links." Paleontologists around the world have classified the pterosaurs as a separate species then the dinosaurs. Birds though, are more or less direct descendants of the raptor family (hence why birds of prey are often called "raptors.")

And I already knew that most pterosaurs did not inhabit trees, though I believe some of the smaller ones did. The larger ones, as well as most others were known to live by the sea and what not, as many, if not most fed on fish.

And maybe some of what I wrote may be out dated, but it is what I was able to learn about them with what limited resources I had (this was before the internet became big, back in the 90s).

[Juan_Bottom]

Okay, so it was an obsession.

Me too.

Birds though, are more or less direct descendants of the raptor family (hence why birds of prey are often called "raptors.")

Has this become official? I haven't read much since like '02, but then there was still a debate. Though it seems obvious that birds are descendants of dinosaurs. Even T-Rex babies had feathers!

BTW I thought that this was some "Dinosaur cave paintings" thread, lol.

[Beckytheblondie]

ask this guy: i love dinosaurs

[muy_thaiguy]

Okay, so it was an obsession.

Me too.

Birds though, are more or less direct descendants of the raptor family (hence why birds of prey are often called "raptors.")

Has this become official? I haven't read much since like '02, but then there was still a debate. Though it seems obvious that birds are descendants of dinosaurs. Even T-Rex babies had feathers!

BTW I thought that this was some "Dinosaur cave paintings" thread, lol.

More or less, yes. Within the last few months, there was a program on it showing basically the incarnations of the prehistoric raptors (like velociraptor and the what not) as having feathers, and eventual evolution with fossilized remains of many raptor/bird "hybrids." Nearly all of them had feathers except for the earliest.

[neanderpaul14]

Weren't those the ones that The Flinstones used as airliners?

[muy_thaiguy]

Weren't those the ones that The Flinstones used as airliners?

The Pterasaurs? Yep.