Dinosaurs And Cave People
Even if you don't love science, you will likely have a sneaking fascination for dinosaurs - those enormous lumbering beasts from days gone by. There are many beliefs about dinosaurs, but the most popular of the Top Ten Dinosaur myths (according to the New Scientist magazine) is that we humans lived at the same time as the dinosaurs.
Dinosaurs first evolved around 228 million years ago, and survived for a very long time, to around 65 million years ago. (For comparison, we humans have been around for only 3 million years.) Dinosaurs are different from modern reptiles by having five vertebrae in their hips (rather than two). They also have their limbs directly underneath them, rather than sprawled out to the sides, and this lets them run faster than a modern croc. The first known dinosaur fossil discoveries were in Si Chuan in China around 300 BC, when Chang Qu wrote about "dragon bones" - which were actually dinosaur bones.
But the modern era of dinomania began in the 1820s when the clergyman, William Buckland, and the physician, Gideon Mantell, separately discovered strange enormous bones in quarries in Southern England. In 1842, the English anatomist, Richard Owen, proposed that these giant extinct animals should be called "dinosaurs", from the Greek words meaning "terrible lizard". The flood gates of dinosaur fascination were well and truly opened.
The first verified movie dinosaur had its guest appearance in D. W. Griffith's 1912 film, Man's Genesis. But the first dinosaur movie to catch the imagination was Gertie the Dinosaur, a cartoon movie of 1914. Since then, hundreds of movies featuring dinosaurs have been made, including the wonderful 1966 offering of One Million Years B. C., in which Raquel Welch (complete with a fetching fur bikini, waxed armpits, and shining yet manageable hair) co-exists with dinosaurs. Dinosaurs and humans continue to co-exist in cartoons like The Flintstones, in popular books like James Gurney's Dinotopia series, and on stage with "The Wiggles" and their friend, "Dorothy the Dinosaur". You can also find humans co-existing with the dinosaurs in books of knitting patterns, and in the teachings of many different Christian fundamentalist religious groups who believe that the world is about 6,000 years old.
But this is nothing but fantasy. Geology has many separate, accurate and reliable dating techniques. They all confirm that dinosaurs had pretty well died out by 65 million years ago. Humans, on the other hand, didn't really begin to evolve into their current form until a few million years ago. But in this case, science gives us a romantic way out to believe in dinosaur/human co-existence.
Birds, which evolved about 150 million years ago, can be counted as dinosaurs. So if we don't live with dinosaurs, at least we live with their immediate descendants, which now have feathers, and can sing as well.
Now according to the New Scientist, after the "Dinos and people lived at the same time" myth, the next nine most popular in their list of the Top Ten Dinosaur Myths are:
- Mammals appeared on the planet only after the dinos died out (wrong);
- Dinosaurs died out because mammals ate their eggs (wrong); and
- Dinosaurs were wiped out by a single event, the big asteroid hitting the Earth 65 million years ago, near what is today the Gulf of Mexico (wrong);
- The 5th most popular dinosaur myth is Dinosaurs died out because they were unsuccessful in evolutionary terms (wrong);
- All the dinosaurs died out 65 million years ago (wrong);
- All the large reptiles from pre-historic times were dinosaurs (wrong again);
- The marine reptiles (such as plesiosaurs and ichthyosaurs) were a variety of dinosaur (wrong);
- Flying reptiles were also dinosaurs;
- Dinosaurs were slow and sluggish creatures.
How can we walk around with so much wrong stuff in our brains, especially about creatures as cute as dinosaurs?
Published 14 April 2005
© 2018 Karl S. Kruszelnicki Pty Ltd