Talk:Archaeopteryx

Amongst pro-evolution scientists Feduccia's research is considered to be completely disproven. Referencing his research without mentioning the dozens of papers that refute it makes the conservapedia appear biased and/or out of date. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by token (talk)

Italics

Folks, please. No matter what your view, it's proper scientific style to use italics. Sterile 22:21, 19 April 2007 (EDT)

Removed paragraph

I've removed the following paragraph because I question it's accuracy:

More recently, CT scans of an Archaeopteryx braincase were compared to the brains of modern and more advanced fossil birds. It was demonstrated that the brain of Archaeopteryx is not like modern birds. Instead, the authors concluded that like its ankle, feet, and skull, the brain or Archaeopteryx is more like predatory dinosaurs than modern birds.

It referenced a paper that is not available freely on-line (it needs to be purchased), but the on-line abstract[1] says the following:

Fossils preserving traces of soft anatomy are rare in the fossil record; even rarer is evidence bearing on the size and shape of sense organs that provide us with insights into mode of life. Here, we describe unique fossil preservation of an avian brain from the Volgograd region of European Russia. The brain of this Melovatka bird is similar in shape and morphology to those of known fossil ornithurines (the lineage that includes living birds), such as the marine diving birds Hesperornis and Enaliornis, but documents a new stage in avian sensory evolution: acute nocturnal vision coupled with well-developed hearing and smell, developed by the Late Cretaceous (ca 90Myr ago). This fossil also provides insights into previous ‘bird-like’ brain reconstructions for the most basal avian Archaeopteryx—reduction of olfactory lobes (sense of smell) and enlargement of the hindbrain (cerebellum) occurred subsequent to Archaeopteryx in avian evolution, closer to the ornithurine lineage that comprises living birds. The Melovatka bird also suggests that brain enlargement in early avians was not correlated with the evolution of powered flight.

That suggests to me that, contrary to the paragraph removed from the article, CT scans were done of a different bird, not of Archaeopteryx.

If someone has access to the full paper and can confirm that the paragraph is accurate, it can go back in.

Philip J. Rayment 05:47, 11 July 2007 (EDT)

The brain of Archaeopteryx had already been CT scanned, see here:http://www.utexas.edu/opa/pubs/oncampus/02oc_issues/oc020702/oc_brain.html. Archaeopteryxs brain was not like modern birds, so it was harder to interpret; the new paper scanned an intermediate bird's fossil skull, which greatly helped paleontologists understand the orginal CT scan of Archaeopteryxs brain. It was not like that of modern birds, it is more like a Velociraptor or oviraptorid in organization.

When the first paper came out the press carried the headlines "Archaeopteryx has bird-like brain" because the orignal study onlyused an alligator, and Allosaurus (a meat-eating dinosaur not very close to birds) and a modern bird. When maniraptoran dinosaurs and other extint birds were examined, it became clear that Archaeopteryx had a brain that is sort of birdlike, but no more so than Velociraptor and it's other close cousins.

If you are going to remove actual peer-reviewd data because "it requires payment" (I don't like it either, but they have to make money somehow) while keeping easily-refuted information that has never made it to a scientific journal in your entries then you are making the conservapedia into a joke.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Token (talk)

Interesting comment about peer review. Do you also feel that so-called "professors" who were not selected based on peer review should not be taken seriously?--Aschlafly 09:53, 14 October 2007 (EDT)

(replying to Token):

• First, thanks for the additional information about the brain scans of Archaeopteryx being done earlier. It does clarify the situation somewhat.
• However, I still can't see that the text I removed was justified in being there. The abstract of the paper doesn't seem to go as far as the removed content.
• I did not remove data 'because "it requires payment"'. I removed it because I suspected that it was inaccurate and pending someone demonstrating its accuracy.
• Your swipe about including "easily-refuted" information was less than helpful, given that you didn't say what information is supposedly "easily refuted".

(to Aschlafly):

Andy, there was nothing "liberal" about what you removed and changed in the article. Apart from Hoyle and a few isolated creationists basing their view on Hoyle, essentially nobody believes that the fossils have been faked and essentially everyone accepts that Archaeopteryx really existed. The only real dispute is over whether it was a true bird or an intermediate form.

Philip J. Rayment 23:48, 14 October 2007 (EDT)

Philip, many people (including books on the topic) consider the fossils to be fakes. Hoyle is the best British scientist of the 20th century, and he considered it a fake also. The evidence speaks for itself in suggesting forgery, just as other fossils (e.g., the bird-dinosaur National Geographic fossil) are fakes. You don't really think that an "Archaeopteryx" existed only in pro-evolution parts of England in Germany, do you??? That's the only source of these unusual "fossils".--Aschlafly 23:52, 14 October 2007 (EDT)

I would be interested in know who these "many people" and book are, because I know of very few. I agree that the late Fred Hoyle is not someone to be ignored, but I do believe that he was something of a loner on this issue (as he was on a number of issues), and the evidence has been reexamined and not just doesn't support, but actually refutes, his claims of forgery. To quote from Dr. Jonathan Sarfati (whom you reference in your changes) referring to Dr. Menton whom you quote, he "totally reject[s] the charge of forgery. Dr Menton points out that the Archaeopteryx bones have tiny bumps where the feathers were attached to the bones by ligaments. This was unexpected, so impossible to attribute to a forgery. So it is simply wrong to say that the feathers are just imprints added to a dino skeleton.". That is quoted from here, and that article includes several other reasons for rejecting the claim of forgery. (Incidentally, it also refers to the brain scans of Archaeopteryx.)

Many fossils are only found in particular locations around the world. The fact that the Archaeopteryx fossils are only found in two parts of Europe is not all that unusual.

Philip J. Rayment 00:32, 15 October 2007 (EDT)