Arachnar;814558; said:
cool ,i've always loved dinosaurs but the theories are tedious and varied at best. it seems they could fit in a category of their own as neither herp or mammal
Ophiuchus;814692; said:
I agree. Dinosaurs are neither reptile, nor bird nor mammal; they're dinosaurs. Their anatomy and physiology are fundamentally different than all of the above.
I love dinos, too and could talk about them all day.
Perhaps in Linnaean classification, but the problem with Linnaean classification is that it sometimes arbitrarily defines classes and families, etc, and makes them paraphyletic. In Linnaean classification the class Reptilia is defined as being exothermic, which excludes many things we know to be reptiles which were no longer exothermic, such as dinosaurs and birds.
With (new and improved) phylogenetic classification, cladograms are arranged in a nested heirarchy and it is understood that nothing can really evolve out of its ancestry. After all, we're all still eukaryotes, deuterostomes, chordates, vertebrates, etc. It's a bit confusing sometimes, especially since snakes are still within Tetrapoda, but it works out nicely.
Since the order Dinosauria evolved within the clade of Reptilia, dinosaurs are still reptiles. Since the class Aves evolved within Dinosauria, birds are dinosaurs. Which means they're also reptiles, and amniotes, etc.
Arachnar;816548; said:
dinosaurs could live in my yard anytime if they were alive now,they're totally awesome,i found that the book Dinosaur which was based on a television special was very good in explaining them,though i gotta find more books that deal with more detail about dinosaur behavior and anatomy-nice ball python always wanted one=)
Birds.