Mistaken Extinction : Dinosaur Evolution and the Origin of Birds

by DINGUS L

• ISBN13: 9780716741657
• ISBN10: 0716741652
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-04-01
• Publisher: W H Freeman & Co (T)
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Summary

For centuries, science has been searching for clues to the disappearance of the dinosaurs without answering a critical question: Are all the dinosaurs really extinct? In The Mistaken Extinction, paleontologists Lowell Dingus and Timothy Rowe take us back to the "murder scene" at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary of geologic time. And they force us to face a shocking truth -- the answer to that critical question is no.

First the authors explore two events that scientists believe effectively exterminated many of Earth's inhabitants -- including the dinosaurs. Researchers who favor a more gradual theory of extinction posit that a cataclysmic series of volcanic eruptions is responsible. Others see the culprit as an Earth-rending asteroid crash near what is now the Yucatan Peninsula.

Translating the terminology and tools of paleontological detective work as they go, Dingus and Rowe explain why most researchers now believe that birds and other dinosaurs sprung from the same ancient ancestor. The dinosaurs did not die out; they "were merely defined out of existence