why do people believe dinosaurs exist

[JesseCuster]

Radiocarbon dating is quit accurate. Its the messure of how radiation decays

I agree. I didn't say it wasn't accurate. I just said it was only accurate up to a certain limit (c. 50,000 years) and only for items of organic material. You can't carbon date a flint axe, but you can perhaps indirectly date it via carbon dating associated organic artefacts.

My post wasn't meant as a slight against carbon dating, it's just that people sometimes equate it with radioisotope dating and other dating methods in general. Dinosaur fossils aren't carbon dated because there is no organic carbon in a 100 million year old bone fossil. That was my point.

Other radioisotope dating methods (like K-Ar) are used for things much older than the limits of carbon dating.

[Everdred]

My post wasn't meant as a slight against carbon dating, it's just that people sometimes equate it with radioisotope dating and other dating methods in general. Dinosaur fossils aren't carbon dated because there is no organic carbon in a 100 million year old bone fossil. That was my point.

Plus the vast majority of these fossils are petrified, meaning the actual bone was replaced by rock, preserving the shape but none of the original organic material.

[keninsc]

I don't understand how people can believe in them existing. it's just not likely at all. the food they'd have to eat would be imense, how would they survive exinction, the atmosphere and climate is totally different. its just not possible. but people still inisist on seeing them.

why?

Not only that but the oxygen levels are a lot lower than they were back in those days as well. People want to believe in stuff like this same as they want to believe in anything else, including Santa and the Tooth Fairy.......although, I am holding out for Santa myself.

What?

[DBunker]

I don't understand how people can believe in them existing. it's just not likely at all. the food they'd have to eat would be imense, how would they survive exinction, the atmosphere and climate is totally different. its just not possible. but people still inisist on seeing them.

why?

People love to think about these things. They love the "what if"..... thats why we have Bigfoot, Nessie, Alien spaceships, Ghosts and Angles all over the place.

[keninsc]

People love to think about these things. They love the "what if"..... thats why we have Bigfoot, Nessie, Alien spaceships, Ghosts and Angles all over the place.

Oh yes, angles........and Plane Geometry as a result as well.

[krypter3]

I don't understand how people can believe in them existing. it's just not likely at all. the food they'd have to eat would be imense, how would they survive exinction, the atmosphere and climate is totally different. its just not possible. but people still inisist on seeing them.

why?

You're having a laugh right?

[TheLastLazyGun]

the food they'd have to eat would be imense

Nonsense. Some dinosaurs were the size of chickens.

[TheLastLazyGun]

And considering that most of the dinosaurs were lizards or partial lizards meant that they did not need to eat as often as mammals PLUS many were probably opportunistic feeders or carrion eaters.

Dinosaurs weren't lizards.

The word "dinosaur" was coined in 1842 by British paleontologist Sir Richard Owen. It comes from the Greek words "deinos" ("terrible") and "sauros" ("lizard"). Many people therefore translate "dinosaur" as meaning "terrible lizard" and therefore think the dinosaurs were lizards. But "sauros" not only means "lizard". It also means "reptile". And the dinosaurs were a separate group of reptiles from lizards. So "dinosaur" should be translated as "terrible reptile".

The English were the ones who discovered dinosaurs. Or, to be more precise, they were the ones who started to realise in the late 17th century that giant bones discovered around the world weren't those of dragons or other mythical creatures, as many people believed, but were actually of some large unknown creatures.

Lhuyd

In 1699, Edward Lhuyd, a friend of Sir Isaac Newton, was responsible for the first published scientific treatment of what would now be recognized as a dinosaur when he described and named a sauropod tooth, "Rutellum implicatum", that had been found in Caswell, near Witney (which is currently the constituency of David Cameron), Oxfordshire. It was the world's first known dinosaur.

Rev Buckland

Between 1815 and 1824, the Rev William Buckland, a professor of geology at Oxford University, collected fossilized bones of the dinosaur which would become known as Megalosaurus and he became the first person to describe a dinosaur in a scientific journal.

Mary Ann Mantell discovered Iguanodon, the second dinosaur to be discovered, in 1822 when walking in the English countryside

The second dinosaur genus to be identified was Iguanodon. It was discovered in 1822 by Mary Ann Mantell – the wife of English geologist and obstetrician Gideon Mantell. One day in 1822 Mary accompanied her husband on a house call. While he visited his patient, she took a stroll down a country lane and found a tooth that she presented to her husband after he finished his visit. Gideon Mantell recognized similarities between his fossils and the bones of modern iguanas, and so called the animal Iguanodon ("iguana tooth").

Edited February 27, 2013 by TheLastLazyGun

[scowl]

Are... are you serious?

Yes. Of course I believe dinosaurs existed, but I'd love to know how these things moved around enough to eat tons of food every day, how their gigantic internal organs were able to digest this much food, how their gigantic hearts managed to pump blood without exploding, and so on. Some of these creatures are beyond the limits of biology as we understand it today.

[scowl]

It's easy to get the food you need in a world where everything is as big as a car.

I thought the super gigantic Sauropod dinosaurs were plant-eaters. It seems that they didn't have to travel very much to get food. But 120 feet long? Vertebrae that are four feet wide? These sound more like heavy machinery than animals.

But you're right. In the modern world, where things are much smaller, a dinosaur-sized creature probably could not survive outside of the water without an extremely low metabolic rate.

The most common theory is that there was a lot more available food around during the period. If animals don't have to work hard to get food, they get bigger and bigger until they reach biological limits. There must have been a lot of food laying around.

[acute]

We know dinosaurs existed, because of the many drawings of them by cavemen.

[keninsc]

We know dinosaurs existed, because of the many drawings of them by cavemen.

I think several of those cave painting showed a Bigfoot riding on them as well.

[MetalShinobi]

Same thing as religion, your told some thing is real since your a child so you just accept it as fact. Only difference in the instance of dinosaurs there is hard evidence.

[ReaperS_ParadoX]

So are the dinosaurs at the natural history museum all a farce? Are the fossils all a farce?

Dinosaurs were on this planet far longer than humans have been.

Yeah it would have to be one of the biggest farces in history

[spartan max2]

The heart of a blue whale weighs about 1,300 lbs

Holy shittttt!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Insanity]

Yes. Of course I believe dinosaurs existed, but I'd love to know how these things moved around enough to eat tons of food every day, how their gigantic internal organs were able to digest this much food, how their gigantic hearts managed to pump blood without exploding, and so on. Some of these creatures are beyond the limits of biology as we understand it today.

Not all the dinosaurs were massive, most of the therapods fell within 100 to 1,000 kgs (220 to 2,200 lbs).

While the sauropods were certainly the largest dinosaurs, their biology is not really beyond current understanding. In fact it is likely that many of the estimated body weights are overestimated. Many sauropod skeletons suggests they had air sacs throughout their bodies, much like modern birds. Even some of their bones were file with these air sacs and were hollow, again much like modern birds. The limb bones appear to be denser, which makes sense for a load-bearing structure, but a majority of the rest of the skeleton may have been lighter than expected.

Being large does have advantages, metabolic rate is somewhat lower as larger bodies retain heat better then smaller ones. Larger animals are also more efficient at food digestion as food remains in the digestive tract longer. This also means larger animals can feed on food sources that are lower in nutritional value. It is possible that sauropods may have feed on the poorer quality food than other herbivores of the time.

Additionally, the oxygen content of the Earth's atmosphere during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods were higher than today, as much as 30% compared to the current 21%. It is speculated that higher atmospheric oxygen content does contribute to larger terrestrial animals.

[danielost]

Not all the dinosaurs were massive, most of the therapods fell within 100 to 1,000 kgs (220 to 2,200 lbs).

While the sauropods were certainly the largest dinosaurs, their biology is not really beyond current understanding. In fact it is likely that many of the estimated body weights are overestimated. Many sauropod skeletons suggests they had air sacs throughout their bodies, much like modern birds. Even some of their bones were file with these air sacs and were hollow, again much like modern birds. The limb bones appear to be denser, which makes sense for a load-bearing structure, but a majority of the rest of the skeleton may have been lighter than expected.

Being large does have advantages, metabolic rate is somewhat lower as larger bodies retain heat better then smaller ones. Larger animals are also more efficient at food digestion as food remains in the digestive tract longer. This also means larger animals can feed on food sources that are lower in nutritional value. It is possible that sauropods may have feed on the poorer quality food than other herbivores of the time.

Additionally, the oxygen content of the Earth's atmosphere during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods were higher than today, as much as 30% compared to the current 21%. It is speculated that higher atmospheric oxygen content does contribute to larger terrestrial animals.

[TheLastLazyGun]

ali smack, on 26 February 2013 - 06:15 PM, said:

I don't understand how people can believe in them existing. it's just not likely at all. the food they'd have to eat would be imense

Blue whales don't seem to have a problem existing, and they're the biggest creatures which EVER lived that we know about, bigger than any of the dinosaurs that we know about.

The largest-known dinosaur, Bruhathkayosaurus, was up to 90–110 feet in length (nobody knows for sure exactly which), whereas the blue whale can be up to 98 feet in length (54 blue whales laid in a line would be a mile).

The heaviest-known dinosaur, Amphicoelias, weighed 135 tons. Blue whales, however, weigh a massive 190 tons.

Here's a good diagram which shows how small even the larger dinosaurs were compared to the mighty blue whale (and how small humans are).

Edited March 24, 2013 by TheLastLazyGun

[danielost]

Not all the dinosaurs were massive, most of the therapods fell within 100 to 1,000 kgs (220 to 2,200 lbs).

While the sauropods were certainly the largest dinosaurs, their biology is not really beyond current understanding. In fact it is likely that many of the estimated body weights are overestimated. Many sauropod skeletons suggests they had air sacs throughout their bodies, much like modern birds. Even some of their bones were file with these air sacs and were hollow, again much like modern birds. The limb bones appear to be denser, which makes sense for a load-bearing structure, but a majority of the rest of the skeleton may have been lighter than expected.

Being large does have advantages, metabolic rate is somewhat lower as larger bodies retain heat better then smaller ones. Larger animals are also more efficient at food digestion as food remains in the digestive tract longer. This also means larger animals can feed on food sources that are lower in nutritional value. It is possible that sauropods may have feed on the poorer quality food than other herbivores of the time.

Additionally, the oxygen content of the Earth's atmosphere during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods were higher than today, as much as 30% compared to the current 21%. It is speculated that higher atmospheric oxygen content does contribute to larger terrestrial animals.

Elephants only digest about half of what it eats.

[pallidin]

I don't understand how people can believe in them existing. it's just not likely at all. the food they'd have to eat would be imense, how would they survive exinction, the atmosphere and climate is totally different. its just not possible. but people still inisist on seeing them.

why?

Right. Very few, if any, would have survived extinction.

However, especially with sea creatures, this might be possible.

But land-based dinosaurs, even in remote jungles, seems unlikely. During such a long time, one would think there would be significant evolutionary changes(such as birds), as opposed to a massive dinosaur family roaming remote jungles. But who knows!

Maybe one will turn-up. Not holding my breath on that, though.

[danielost]

Right. Very few, if any, would have survived extinction.

However, especially with sea creatures, this might be possible.

But land-based dinosaurs, even in remote jungles, seems unlikely. During such a long time, one would think there would be significant evolutionary changes(such as birds), as opposed to a massive dinosaur family roaming remote jungles. But who knows!

Maybe one will turn-up. Not holding my breath on that, though.

All dinos lived on land. The flyers and swimmers were lizards, like the crocs. today are.

[pallidin]

From: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090622173307AAsoOQ6

Yes there were no sea dinosaurs, as you said there were other non-dinosaurs marine reptiles such as Ichthyosaurs and Plesiosaurs, etc.

Technically today's penguins are avian dinosaurs, so they're sea dinosaurs, and during the Cretaceous there were a strange set of sea birds which had nearly lost their wings and swam with their giant splayed feet - http://www.dinosaurjungle.com/prehistori…

[TheSearcher]

Same thing as religion, your told some thing is real since your a child so you just accept it as fact. Only difference in the instance of dinosaurs there is hard evidence.

OK please start providing said hard evidence. Contrary to what you say, not everyone accepts things as fact, I for one rarely have.

All dinos lived on land. The flyers and swimmers were lizards, like the crocs. today are.

I don't think "lizards" is the right word. Marine reptiles covers all the bases, ancient and new.

[Insanity]

Elephants only digest about half of what it eats.

Correct, and as it is with many herbivores, their typical food is fairly low in nutrients. I'd be willing to bet if we to try to survive on the same sustenance, we'd died from malnutrition in short time. Incidentally, human digestion apparently has a maximum efficiency or bioavailability of 80%, though the average seems to be 50% to 60%.

[danielost]

Correct, and as it is with many herbivores, their typical food is fairly low in nutrients. I'd be willing to bet if we to try to survive on the same sustenance, we'd died from malnutrition in short time. Incidentally, human digestion apparently has a maximum efficiency or bioavailability of 80%, though the average seems to be 50% to 60%.

Survival experts say if you have to survive eat what the little mammels eat not the large ones. Although you can eat bark, lots of fiber there.