Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 (edited) One fine day last year, I finished up a module in Hong Kong University's Dinosaur Ecosystems course about Saurichians and Ornithischians and then went to the news. There, to my surprise and slight discontent, was an article announcing everything I just learned was wrong. The Clade Ornithoscelida had been erected which violently yanked theropods from Saurischia and placed them alongside ornithischians. This left poor old Sauropods alone with herrarosaurs. At first it made no sense, but then a picture formed in my head of evidence supporting it. The proto feathers of Psittacosaurus make more sense if they are grouped with Theropods, and both tend toward bipedalism. And with such a dramatic result, I assumed the reasoning was mighty well vetted. Fast Forward to few days ago as I take a dinosaur 101 course with University of Alberta. It begins the explanation for the placement of dinosaurs and their relations. Then it explains ornithischians and.... Wait a minute! You can’t put theropods next to sauropods like that, we just learned that was wrong! Wait, did we? Has the scientific community discredited this revision, is it arguing it, or is it simply sluggish to implement it? @Troodon maybe you could shed some light. Edited August 22, 2018 by WhodamanHD Corrected apostrophe error. 2 “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Innocentx Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Dang revisers, how many assertions have been discredited now? I'd put the laughing emoticon but many won't find this funny. "Journey through a universe ablaze with changes" Phil Ochs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troodon Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 I have not spoken to anyone about this subject so no idea where the scientific community stands on it. Since its all subject to revision have not paid much attention to it. I have read that there are a few rumbles from some and on blogs and a rebuttle paper was written by Darren Naish in Nature but its paywalled, see below. Have no idea if the course was developed before of after Baron's paper. https://www.nature.com/articles/nature24012 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 1 minute ago, Troodon said: Have no idea if the course was developed before of after Baron's paper. That is possible, but they ran it in a timed way, so someone must have pressed the button to start it again. If they had any new information, you’d think they’d edit in a note or something. “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 4 minutes ago, Troodon said: I have not spoken to anyone about this subject so no idea where the scientific community stands on it. Since its all subject to revision have not paid much attention to it. I have read that there are a few rumbles from some and on blogs and a rebuttle paper was written by Darren Naish in Nature but its paywalled, see below. Okay, so perhaps too early to tell? “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troodon Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Well contact Phil Currie, its his course, I will PM you his email. Its digging season so he might not be home Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 32 minutes ago, Troodon said: Well contact Phil Currie, its his course, I will PM you his email. Its digging season so he might not be home Thanks! It is his course. There is a forums area on the course so I’ll ask there first, but I’ll keep Dr. Currie in mind if there is no answer there, I just feel with dig season and that new museum, he may be a bit busy. “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troodon Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 10 minutes ago, WhodamanHD said: new museum, Which one? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 Just now, Troodon said: Which one? Philip J. Currie Museum “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troodon Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 He's associated with the University of Alberta and his research is tied there. I believe the museum just uses his name and why not. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 4 minutes ago, Troodon said: He's associated with the University of Alberta and his research is tied there. I believe the museum just uses his name and why not. Ah, okay then. I’ll send him an email as well. Thanks again! “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 Got an automated email back saying he’s out of office and basically won’t be able to respond to emails for a while and probably won’t get to mine for a long long time. Worth the try, though. “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troodon Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Digging season, ends in August, school begins Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 2 minutes ago, Troodon said: Digging season, ends in August, school begins Yeah, email said he gets out of the field in September “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 Hey @CBchiefski, your a student, right? I know dinosaur reproduction is your main study, but what’s your gauge of the community on the subject? “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBchiefski Posted August 25, 2018 Share Posted August 25, 2018 (edited) On 8/22/2018 at 5:09 PM, WhodamanHD said: Hey @CBchiefski, your a student, right? I know dinosaur reproduction is your main study, but what’s your gauge of the community on the subject? Indeed, I am involved in various projects but that is my main currently. First, background for those who are not aware, Baron et al. 2017 proposed that theropods, when not containing the herrerasauridae, are more closely related to ornithischians than to the sauropods. This is at odds with the prior convention which grouped sauropods and theropods more closely then ornithischians. One key change in how Baron et al. ran the data analysis from others before is that they used rather novel characters, a point which drew much criticism and in my opinion rightly so. The quality of characters used for phylogenetics is very important as trash in will yield trash out, and conversely, high quality in yields solid robust results. Using characters not previously vented to then make such an extraordinary conclusion is not ideal. To your actual question, in short, the community is mixed however the trend is toward accepting the basic hypothesis Baron et al. proposed with the revisions or rather improvements Parry et al. 2017 made by conducting a robust comparison of the data under different phylogenetic methods. The most interesting finding of Parry et al. was this new phylogenetic tree, which gives the same overall result as Baron et al. yet the analysis was over different methods, and excluded the novel, strange characters Baron et al. had used. See the image below. There are of course other publications on this but those are the two I consider most relevant, and yes I am cutting many, many details out. No need to throw away all the literature up to now as we are only about 18 months since the initial proposal. Science, at least good science, takes time and there is so much to resolve with this, give it time. Phil Currie should be able to elaborate and provide a greater insight than I can. If you have a decent understanding of cladistics and such, here is Parry et al. but be warned, without some basic understanding it gets technical. Also if you want, I can PM you all the relevant publications: http://rsos.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/4/10/170833 Edited August 25, 2018 by CBchiefski Typo 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 25, 2018 Author Share Posted August 25, 2018 Thanks @CBchiefski! I know enough cladistics for it to make adequate sense. It seems well supported. I guess either the course was written beforehand and not changed (most likely) or Dr. Currie doesn’t agree. Thank you for your insights. “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBchiefski Posted August 26, 2018 Share Posted August 26, 2018 6 hours ago, WhodamanHD said: Thanks @CBchiefski! I know enough cladistics for it to make adequate sense. It seems well supported. I guess either the course was written beforehand and not changed (most likely) or Dr. Currie doesn’t agree. Thank you for your insights. Glad to hear, and yes it is supported for the most part. There are a few points which still need to be resolved but many of the problematic morphological data, which currently tends to falsify the hypothesis could simply be the result of convergent evolution. At least applying Occam's razor greatly helps with the mess that is phylogenetics based only on osteological data. Funny, if we ever do find DNA (I know, no real chance of that), the public will be asking can you make a clone while the scientist will all be saying no, we need to finally figure out where this dinosaur fits with the rest of life! Glad I could help, I have not spoken with Phil about this so actually have no idea on his stance. My last two conversations with him were very brief, sadly. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted August 30, 2018 Author Share Posted August 30, 2018 Hello everyone! If your still here, Dr, Currie got back to me, way quicker than I thought, with this: Hi Mason. I am indeed in Mongolia right now, so will keep the answer short. Basically, the course was done before the paper came out. However, I am not sure we would have changed anything at this stage. As you suggest, many people disagree and there needs to be a period of gestation and counter-argument before the dust settles. It is an intriguing idea, but needs more character analysis. Cheers, Phil This is more or less confirms everything said here. Thanks everyone for your inputs and stay tuned to literature to see if it sticks! P.S. I now realize I’m the past week I’ve asked questions to a top Devonian fish expert, top shark expert, and now a top dinosaur expert and every single one responded. Proves once again that paleontology is home to some of the kindest and most helpful people. 3 “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CBchiefski Posted October 26, 2018 Share Posted October 26, 2018 Just to add, several of the relevant papers are here: 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miocene_Mason Posted November 17, 2018 Author Share Posted November 17, 2018 Not to revive a dead thread, but to those who are interested, but Mortimer released a paper refuting the Perry et al and Baron findings at SVP. They said the data set was riddled with outdated information and some convoluted rules. Their finding supported the normal classification. 1 “...whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” ~ Charles Darwin Happy hunting, Mason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts