Talk:Deinonychus

I can't upload it, but there is a decent image of a Deinonychus skull here. It's under the standard NSF license, which is acceptable per Wikipedia:Public domain image resources (though for some reason the {{NSFIL}} tag is not listed on Wikipedia:Image copyright tags). 68.81.231.127 22:26, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Brain-to-body mass figure of 5.5?

The human brain-to-body mass ratio is about 2.2. See "Mass of a Human brain". This means that Deinonychus was not only smarter than a human being, it was even smarter than a mouse. Check the link. --Wetman 09:49, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Not a straight ratio... the 5.5 looks about right when using Jensen's encephalization quotient. It's actually a ratio of brain mass to expected brain mass, which is calculated by using .67 power of total mass (tiny creatures, like mice, have a larger brain, and that adjusts for it). Here's a better discussion: [1]. Renaming it to encephalization quotient might fix the confusion. 68.81.231.127 15:33, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I am also adding my two cent's worth. Brain size is NOT neccessarily correlated with intelligence or for that matter any other mental ability except in a gross sense. As an example, The Neandertals had very often larger brains than modern humans, but psychologically they were different and they appear to have had less creativity.

Image

Could someone please find a better image for this page? The drawing looks like a total joke; a cross between a puffin and a parrot. Scorpionman 18:14, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I am removing that ridiculous image until something saner can be found. I know dinoguy is obsessed with the bird thing, but this borders on lunacy. That thing doesn't even have the limbs of ANY breed of dromaeosauridae. Some artist has obviously stopped smoking the crack and started living in it like a Guild Navigator --Kaz 02:10, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

User John.Conway is a respected professional paleoartist. I seriously hope you're joking. That thing doesn't even have the limbs of ANY breed of dromaeosauridae What on earth do you mean by this? And do you have a osurce to back it up? Dromaeosaurs ARE "birds", just (probably) not "Aves", and every paelontologist you might talk to agrees with this. Please do some research, or read a book published since 1996.Dinoguy2 06:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

A deinonychus has the basic set of theropod limbs, the same as the familiar velociraptor.. a pair of short arms, a pair of long legs, and a long tail. That picture has no visible limbs and no tail. I agree that it's purposely exaggerating the birdlike features.

I don't care if Conway has been annointed as a saint by the Crack Smokers of Paleontology, that picture is utterly insane. It is instantly identifiable not as a dromaeosaur, but as a puffin. I'm aware of your obsession with tying birds into dinosaurs as absolutely and extremely as possible, for whatever reason, but there's not need to burden the reader with it in a case like that laughable picture. The picture goes...it borders on vandalism to have that idiotic maladaption presented as if it somehow represented deinonychus in any way. --Kaz 04:10, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Your comments have crossed the line into ad hominem insults. Please desist immediately. This is the type of unacceptable behavior that drives valuable contributors like Dinoguy away from Wikipedia altogether. Dinoguy is a very productive and knowledgeable editor, and losing him would be a great blow to the Dinosaur Project here at Wikipedia.

As for the picture, I agree, and have stated to Dinoguy that I do not believe it should be in the taxobox. However, the picture is a valid representation of a feathered dromaeosaur. I am not sure where you get your information that Utahraptor and Deinonychus were probably not feathered, but it is certainly not in line with modern paleontological thought. There is absolutely no hard evidence about body covering in either genus as they are not preserved in sediment that would preserve soft tissue impressions. There is only speculation, and to be honest, most paleontologists would speculate that they DID have feathers, simply because most of their ancestors did. It is true that very large animals are less likely to have insulation in warm climates, which is why elephants and rhinos don't have hair today, and why many scientists think it unlikely that large tyrannosaurs had feathers. But I think you are a little confused as to the size of these animals, perhaps because of their tails adding significantly to their length. A fullgrown Deinonychus would have been just over waist high on an adult male human. Utahraptor was about the same height as an ostrich, which clearly still have feathers today, as did birds like moas that were taller than both. And if Deinonychus did have feathers, you can bet they would have patterns on them, like the majority of birds today. Would they look like a puffin? Who knows, but you cannot say it is ridiculous that they might. As for the limbs, even a basic knowledge of dromaeosaur anatomy would indicate to you that the hands are tucked up under the arm feathers as they would have been when the animal was at rest, which it clearly is in the picture. It is sitting on its long feet, with only the tips of its toes poking out from underneath its feathers. Dromaeosaurs undoubtedly sat like this on occasion, as trackways indicate, and modern bird behavior bears out. The tail clearly is not drawn short, it just goes off the side of the picture. I fail to see how the picture is anatomically incorrect in any way.

I am reinstating the picture, but placing it in the body of the article, with a caption that explicitly states that the artist is empahasizing the birdlike features of dromaeosaurs. I will also put the skull picture in the taxobox to replace it. Sheep81 11:28, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

You compare the height of utahraptor to an ostrich, but utahraptor weighed perhaps ten times as much, and the "height" of an ostrich includes its skinny neck and legs, whereas you're citing what is essentially the height of the top of utahraptor's hind limbs. Utahraptor is closer to the mass of a hippo, not an ostrich. It also lived in a warmer, more humid climate, without even a genetic history of needing cold adaptation, winters and ice ages only starting when Australia separated from South America and Australia, millions of years later. I still find it unlikely that such a large, warm-weather creature would have (retained) feathers as a significant covering.. And thus, as it's possible Deinonychus is a descendant, or descentant of a close relative, there's a reasonable chance it, also living in a very warm climate and being reasonably large and active, didn't have them either. --Kaz 19:17, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Where do you get these numbers? I would like to see published data to back it up. I happen to have the original description of Utahraptor right here. Let's see what it says. "The great size of the Utahraptor, estimated at as much as 7 m long and less than 500kg in weight" (Kirkland et al, 1993). That's barely half a ton, in comparison to river hippopotami who commonly exceed three tons (2700kg) and occasionally approach four tons (3600kg). Large, warm-weather ruminants such as gaur, banteng, eland, and African buffalo today can reach weights between 800 and 1000kg and are covered in quite dense hair. A comparison with Deinonychus (since Utahraptor is extremely incomplete) would indicate that half of the 7-meter length of Utahraptor would be tail, and that hip height would be (very) approximately 1/3 of the length, with head height close to half the length. This puts Utahraptor at about 2.3 m tall at the hip and about 3.5 m tall at the head, just about exactly the same as a giant moa (and admittedly a fair bit taller than an ostrich). As I'm sure you know, moas were quite densely feathered. None of this says that Utahraptor WAS feathered, just that there is no reason, based on its size, for it not to be.

As far as your other assertion, that Deinonychus was a descendent of Utahraptor, this is patently false, as Utahraptor has several specializations, especially the extremely laterally compressed hand claws, not seen in Deinonychus. This is blatantly spelled out in the original description of Utahraptor. Have you read it? I will give you the benefit of the doubt and quote this to refresh your memory: "Because of its specialized manual claws, it is not thought to have given rise to any of the other described dromaeosaurs." In fact, there is very little resolution even in more recent dromaeosaurid phylogenies, so I have no idea where you are getting your info from. There are two main phylogenetic hypotheses currently. Number one is the Theropod Working Group at the American Museum of Natural History, which could not achieve any resolution above Sinornithosaurus as recently as 2004 (Norell & Mackovicky in The Dinosauria II in case you were wondering, but I'm sure you have read this one too). Number two is the phylogeny of Senter et al. (also 2004) which you seem to be using as you are referring to "microraptors," a concept that was originated in this paper. But contrary to your assertions, this paper actually finds Deinonychus to be basal to the group of Achillobator/Dromaeosaurus/Utahraptor, indicating that the line that led to Deinonychus actually diverged BEFORE the line that led specifically to Utahraptor.

Deinoncyhus was only around 1m high at the hip, perhaps 1.5m at the head on a good day and weighed roughly 80kg or 175 lbs.(Ostrom, 1990, in The Dinosauria I), comparable to a mountain lion (Felis concolor) or jaguar (Panthera onca) and smaller than both lions and tigers, all of which are active predators that live in warm climates throughout at least some, if not all, of their range, and all have fur. Clearly, Deinonychus' size would not preclude it from having a body covering for insulation. Besides that, feathers clearly have other uses besides insulation on birds today, such as display and even prey capture. In addition, pretty much ALL of its ancestors had feathers. I see no reason why Deinonychus would have secondarily lost feathers. Perhaps you can enlighten me, perhaps even using published data.

As someone who is so sure of his conclusions, I can only believe that you have done quite extensive research and therefore you are aware of the references I have provided above. However, if you have misplaced them, I would be happy to provide full citations if necessary. Sheep81 03:59, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

So do these trackways of dromaeosaurs (assuming they're not microraptors) also show imprints of their feathered behinds and tails? That silly drawing would leave quite a feathery imprint. Since there is ZERO direct evidence of ANY non-microcraptor dromaeosaurs having feathers, I suspect that this includes tracks, not just bones. --Kaz 19:17, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

My mistake, the track of a sitting theropod with feather impressions actually comes from the Early Jurassic of Massachusetts, and does not represent a dromaeosaur. It has actually been known since 1865, although the feather prints were only recently identified. Apologies for that misrepresentation. Sheep81 03:59, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

There is zero direct evidence of any non-microraptorian dromaeosauridae having SKIN. Are you arguing that all life restorations should be taken off Wikipedia if they do not reflect direct evidence? If no, then what standard are you using? If I uploaded a picture of a scaly sabertooth cat, this would be better than a furry one, wouldn't it? Since no direct evidence exists that non-feline felidae had fur, I mean.Dinoguy2 13:55, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Feathers are the most likely animal surface to be preserved. It's even harder to preserve fur, and hardest yet to preserve mere skin. There are more dromaeosaur fossils than most other kinds of dinosaurs. MANY of the microraptors have evidence of feathers, though their skeletons are far rarer than big dromaeosaurs. If Deinonychus looked like that crack-induced hallucination of a pic, imagine how huge and prevalent the feathers would be, how easily they'd be preserved, compared to skin. Even if they weren't ending up in slate like the Chinese and German proto-birds, surely SOME evidence would appear. Hundreds of Deinonychus, and not a single hint of a feather?

Note, too, that if we were talking about the era of the first true mammals and last paramammals, then it would indeed be bad science to pretend we knew for certain which ones had fur and which did not, without evidence. Casterocauda had fur imprints, though it's far older than any Deinonychus fossil and fur is harder to preserve and recognize. If it did not, then that almost-mammal absolutely should not have been assumed to have fur, even though its lifestyle would almost have required it...something which Deinonychus' lifestyle did not do for feathers. I don't think any scientists are seriously claiming that repenomamus almost certainly had fur, though they could make that ASSumption for the same reasons one would do of Deinonychus. But they don't have the emotional motivation to drive them to such an extreme. --Kaz 18:22, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

First of all, there are not "hundreds" of Deinonychus known, there are around eight (Norell & Mackovicky, 2004). There are actually many more "microraptorian" skeletons known from the Yixian Formation of China, not all of which have been published on. Second of all, the Cloverly Formation, where most Deinonychus are known from, is composed of claystone and sandstone, some of the worst rock types to preserve soft tissue impressions (Maxwell, 1997). You will not find feathers in sandstone, even if they existed, and there are thousands of full-blown birds known from claystone and sandstone all around the world, from the Cretaceous to the Quarternary, where no feathers or even traces of feathers are preserved. I hope you are not suggesting that all these birds also secondarily lost their feathers? Third of all, I think it is actually a pretty common assumption that Repenomamus had fur, and in any case, it is not relevant to the current scenario since we KNOW that Deinonychus'evolved from ancestors with feathers, since we have found those ancestors in the Yixian and similar sediments in China. The burden of proof is on those who claim that feathers were somehow LOST on the line leading to Deinonychus. Sheep81 05:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

A deinonychus has the basic set of theropod limbs, the same as the familiar velociraptor.. a pair of short arms, a pair of long legs, and a long tail. First, maniraptorans did not have basic theropod limbs. They are defined partially by the presence of what's called a semi-lunate carpal ("half-moon shaped bone in the wrist" for those who've seen Jurassic Park ;) ) This allowed the hands to fold backwards against the forearms. Order wings from Domino's to see how this works. Evidence also suggests that at least all paravian dinosaurs had what's called a patagium, a flap of skin connecting the wrist to the shoulder, again as in modern bird wings. Greg Paul and others point out that the consistant post of the fingers in these dinosaurs' fossils (the third finger flush with the second, or even crossed over it) indicated that they were joined together by skin in life, and that only the third finger would have been free (again, as in modern bird wings). The point here is that dromaeosaur, and oviraptorosaur, and and troodont arms were built like wings, not like "standard theropod limbs", and there's no reason to suspect they wouldn't have looked like wings in life, since they *were* wings, anatomically. Also, while this is a more minor point, dromaeosaurids had among the shortest legs of theropods. Studies have shown that, unlike tyrannosaurs and ornithomimids, which had very long legs, dromie legs were stocky and built for short bursts of speed.Dinoguy2 15:12, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

This tendency you have for making such absolute statements about what must be, regardless of how trendy they are, mere suppositions is most of the problem I have with your "side" in these debates. Their limbs have not been "shown" in "studies" to be stocky, for short bursts of speed, as if it were some kind of hard research. Such "studies" are simply supposition. Similarly, you say "no reason to suspect they wouldn't look like wings", when what you should be saying is "there's no reason to think they COULD not look like wings". This still isn't sufficient to say they WOULD NOT look like them. You seem to automatically rest upon speculation as absolute fact whenever it makes dino=bird more attractive, and to absolutely rule out any possibility of anything which might even slightly mitigate the parallel. This, even more than the general tendency to make absolute statements, causes me to struggle to take you seriously. In deference to Sheepl, I'm not meaning this as an attack, but an attempt to explain why I grow so aggressive in debating you. --Kaz 19:17, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Such "studies" are simply supposition. The study of biomechanics is "supposition"? It's not "hard research"? A lot of scientists would take issue with this.

You seem to automatically rest upon speculation as absolute fact whenever it makes dino=bird more attractive No, just when they are the most parsimonious. The simplest explaination is assumed to be most likely until other evidence makes something else most likely. All published scientific papers in the last 20 years find that dromaeosaurs are either a) the closest relatives of Archaeopteryx or b) more advancd than Archaeopteryx. If John Conway's image had been labeled Archaeopteryx instead of Deinonychus, would you have had a problem with it? If not, isn't that telling? Arbitrary taxon labels aside, the skeletal difference between Deinonychus and Archaeopteryx is equal to the difference between a lion and a cheetah. Is it possible Deinonychus looked very unbird-like, while Archaeopteryx is obviously very bird-like? Yes, it's possible, but is it plausible? Is it parsimonious? No. The simplest answer is that both were pretty dang birdlike in appearance. All paleontologists today *assume* this because it best fits the current evidence, just as they assume Smilodon was pretty dang cat-like, or tht Mosasaurs were pretty dang lizard-like (because Smilons basially *were* cats, Mosasaurs basically *were* lizads, and Deinonychus basically *were* birds). I challange you again to bring up this debate on the DML. Here's an easy test--post links there to John Conway's image, and an image of a lizard-like Deinonychus (if, that is, you can find one that's less than fifteen years old, which is a duanting and task in itself). Ask the real live paleontologists on that list which they think is the more accurate representation.

See, I just think wikipedia should eflect the current state of a science. Are there any scientists who think Dromaeosaurs were not birdlike, did not have wing-like arms, etc? That's ot a rhetorical question. Find a ref. If you can't, than the multitude of refs I have provided to support my position must win out. This is the key fact that makes Wikipedia work. It has been criticized for supporting a culture that shuns expertise, treating expert opinion as equal to layman opinions. The fact that things must be sourced is the only protection against this. I'll keep stressing the bird-like nature of these animals in the text because that's what the *scientific* consensus is, and I have refs to prove it. Dissenting opinions will be given weight proportional to the references available. That's what it comes down to.

What was your reason to remove that image? It didn't look right to you (this is all you state on the talk page)? Have you published a paper stating that droameosaurs don't have wings? Have you published a refutation to the printed work that states they do? Have you any published material written by others that states these things? If not, your removal of the image was absolutely unjustified.Dinoguy2 20:26, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

OK, give me some references which say that dromaeosaurs, outside of microraptors (which may well end up being categorized separately), flew, or did anything like flying. That ludicrous picture shows wings which have WHAT function for the predatory, purely flightless deinonychus? How is it going to use its claws or hands, in predation? "But maybe they had wings" FEELS nice, if one's determined to have a pet dinosaur sitting there on a perch asking for a cracker, but what POSSIBLE evolutionary advantage could there be for that completely flightless, predatory animal which still invested resources and evolution in functional hands and claws, to have feathers covering those claws and its arms held backward like a bird? This isn't some ostrich with tens of millions of years of fully handless wings and no way to practically convert them back into tools for its mouse-hunting.--Kaz 17:57, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, in order for the first birds to fly, they would have already had to have feathers, right? So clearly feathers evolved prior to flight. And since evolution doesn't progress TOWARDS something, each individual adaptation must correspond to its own individual increase in fitness. Basically, a pre-flying theropod would not evolve feathers with the idea that one day, its descendents would use them to fly. The feathers had to have a positive or neutral effect on the survival of THAT animal, not its descendents, or they never would have proliferated in the first place. The mere fact that feathers continued to exist proves that they MUST have had an evolutionary advantage. There are many uses for wing feathers besides flight. Let's try to think of some. How about display? Look how cranes and ostriches display their wing feathers today. How about brooding? Look at the Oviraptor skeletons found in Mongolia, sitting on their nests, with the arms tucked back over the nest like a bird. We know that living birds use their wings in this way, to cover and incubate the eggs. Oviraptor is roughly the same size as Deinonychus, and feathers were not preserved (since it was sandstone), but why would they be in this posture if they didn't have feathers? How about prey capture? Look at various birds that actually use their wing feathers to help catch their prey in different ways, from pelicans to cormorants to secretary birds. Look at Archaeopteryx itself! Fully functional feathered wings WITH fully functional clawed hands on top! Sheep81 05:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

If Conway's pic had been labelled Archaeopteryx, I would have had less objection because, and this is key, that creature COULD FLY. Under no circumstances could deinonychus possibly have done so. Not even if you glued actual wings on its arms. Also, we have PROOF that archaeopteryx, as well as various microraptors, had feathers. We have, to this very day, ZERO evidence that ANY dromaeosaur outside of the microraptors did. If they looked like big, fat puffins...which would be damned awkward for hunting...surely SOME of the literally hundreds of deinonychus fossils would have had SOME hint of a feather. Not to mention having, maybe, had their fossil arms held like pidgeons instead of carnosaurs. ALL of them died with their hands held in an unnatural way? But, by the way, I still would have objected, because while you could FORCE an archaeopteryx skeleton into that posture, it isn't consistent with its apparent lifestyle. That quack Conway didn't even bother trying to make it look like a predatory bird. He was too busy trying to make it look as bird-like as possible, far beyond what would be reasonable given the animal's lifestyle. Or do you have some evidence that deinonychus spent long-snowy winters diving for fish in the fjords?--Kaz 17:57, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Again, not hundreds of Deinoncyhus fossils have been found, but around eight (see above). And they are found in sediments that do not preserve feathers under any circumstances, even on full-blown birds. And not all of these skeletons completely preserve the arms. AND, these skeletons are not always articulated, meaning that the bones are not always arranged in any sort of order except where water currents or gravity carried them. So it would be hard to discern their arrangement just from where you found them in the ground. But biomechanics studies show that the arms would be folded back against the body except when used for prey capture, not just dangling like a carnosaur (Ostrom, 1997). In fact, this arrangement is seen in all maniraptorans (oviraptors, therizinosaurs, troodontids, dromaeosaurs, and birds) due to their semilunate carpal bones which specifically allow them to be held in this position when at rest. This is not "speculation," this is biomechanics. Sheep81 05:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

OF COURSE it's plausible that Deinonychus, a ten foot long, running predator, would look far less like a bird than the flight-adapted archaeopteryx. "But it's simpler if they look alike" is irrelevent. Ockham's razor is a favorite tool of the junk scientist, today. "The simplest answer is the best" is pure nonsense, which would result in almost all of what we know today being trumped, at one time, by the myths of the past. The spontaneous generation of microorganisms was simpler than for them to be spread around the world as spores. Plate tectonics were dismissed on PRECSELY that kind of reasoning, as well. A god making everything is simpler than evolution. When a study was done that said people who ate oat bran had less heart disease, the simplest answer was that eating oat bran caused heart disease. So that's what the junk scientists said. But the REAL answer was that people who eat more oat bran also do many other things differently than normal people, and THOSE were the factors which made the difference. --Kaz 17:57, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

We'll put aside for the moment the fact that Ockham's Razor has been a foundation of modern science since before it was even called Ockham's Razor. Ockham's Razor says that the simplest explanation of the evidence is usually the best one, NOT that the first explanation to come to mind is the best one. Spontaneous generation is NOT simpler than biological reproduction, because there is no known mechanism for fully-formed maggots to just appear from rotten meat, for instance. You would be forced to invent one, and explain why all the evidence that maggots are fly larva is wrong, in order for it to be true. Not simpler. Similarly, plate tectonics may not appear to be the simplest explanation superficially, but it IS far simpler to assume that there moving tectonic plates explain the evidence (fossil distributions, volcanic hot spots, et cetera), than to assume that the surface of the Earth is static. And evolution IS the simplest explanation of all the evidence from fossils and modern life, because otherwise you have to account scientifically for where this supernatural Creator came from (not that there isn't one, just that it is hard to prove scientifically), AND why there is so much evidence that seems to support evolution.

If you are going to say that dromaeosaurids like Deinonychus didn't have feathers, you are going to have to provide a simpler explanation that accounts for the fact that all of their ancestors had them. Why would they lose them and what is the evidence that they did? Until you can lay that out, the simplest explanation will remain that they did. Ockham's Razor doesn't say that the simplest explanation is ALWAYS right, just that when you have no reason to assume otherwise, the simplest explanation (taking into account ALL the evidence) is the best. Sheep81 05:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Ockham's Razor is the creedo of junk science...which means mainstream science, far too often today. It's not an actual argument to prove anything, but more of a sign that something's wrong with the rest of the arguer's arsenal. It tends to say "this guy has an agenda, he reached the conclusion first, and then looked for 'science' to fit"--Kaz 17:57, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to ignore your dismissal of mainstream science as "junk", and ask you the following: Which specimens of Deinonychus preserve articulated hands in an allosaur-like pose? Please provide a reference if you can, as I wasn't aware of any articulated specimens. What geological property of the rocks in which Deinonychus is preserved leads you to believe that feathers would be readily preserved? I thought that kind of prservatio was only possible in deposits formed by stagnant lakes and lagoons, as the microraptorians and archaeopteryx are found in, but apparentl I am misinformed. With the "literally hundreds" of specimens that have been found, what can you tell us about the skin texture of Deinonychus? Where are the scale impressions? Lastly, out of curiosity: How would you restore the flightless, predatory terror birds? Or the Mihirngs? Surely they too would have similarly lost their feathers as an adaptation to hunting, as you speculate for Deinonychus. And yet, many entries on them here at Wikipedia (such as Phorusrhacoid) shows a hilariously crack-induced painting of things that look like big chickens, no the fearsome predators they obviously were.Dinoguy2 18:46, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, have you asked any real paleontologists about this yet? Even just a quick message to the DML [2], or any individual professionals on it. They won't bite, I talk to members there all the time. Or don't you think taking the state of professional opinion into accout is worthwhile? Their opinions should certaily hold more weight than us amatures.Dinoguy2 19:05, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Deinonychus had a stiffened tail that was slgihtly longer than its body, didn't it? This picture doesn't seem to have one, so no matter how bird-like the limbs were, I don't think it gives a particularly good idea of how the animal was built. Josh

Yes, it does. The animal in that picture is sitting down. he tail can be seen on the ground and fading out at the edge of the pic, since it wouldn't fit on the page. If I had permission, I'd use a current skeletal diagram instead. The most recent one was done by Geg Paul after his re-study of the Deinonychus skull. I have it on my HD if someone wants a copy.

Anyway, the pic that's now in the taxobox doesn' even show a body. Deinonychus was more than just a head, so does that make it inaccruae? ;)Dinoguy2 20:26, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Look, I didn't want to start a monstrous, mile-long discussion, I just wanted to find a better image. And the image does NOT look like a deinonychus; if that's a deinonychus then I'm an elephant. The "dinosaur" here looks like a cross between a puffin and a chicken! It looks nothing like a reptile; it looks like a bird! No, dinosaurs are not birds, that's evolutionist BS. Deinonychus had long legs; the bird in this picture has short, stubby bird legs! You think an animal like that was going to be able to run and catch prey? You're nuts, like Kaz said! Scorpionman 21:45, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

It's sad how the hollywood, action action action image of dinosaurs has obliterated the idea that they were real animals like any other in a lot of peoples minds. As I've said several times-the Deinonychus in the picture is sitting down. Yes, dinosaurs sometimes sat down. I know, it's hard to believe that a man-eating bloothirsty killing machine ever did something so mundane. I'm sure you're legs don't look as long when you're in a sitting position either. No, dinosaurs are not birds, that's evolutionist BS. I hate to break it to you, but even many creationists, in an attempt to explain feathered dinosaurs, have decided that Deinonychus and its family are not dinosaurs after all, but actually birds.Dinoguy2 02:47, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

The only creationists who believe that are old-earth creationists, who are almost equivalent to evolutionists. Scientists like Ken Ham don't believe such nonsense. If deinonychus was a bird, where's the proof? I don't see any evidence supporting this. The skull doesn't even resemble the head of the "dinosaur" in John Conway's drawing. I tell you, that is not a deinonychus. Deinonychus had long legs and long sickle-claws on its feet, which I can't see in Conway's drawing either. How do you explain feathered dinosaurs? Well, how do you even know dinosaurs had feathers in the first place? You don't! That's purely hypothetical! Dinosaurs did sit down, yes. But so do chickens, and that looks like a chicken sitting down! Even when the deinonychus sat down, I'm sure its feet were larger than that! It's sad how the Hollywood, action action action image of dinosaurs has obliterated the idea that they were real animals like any other in a lot of people's minds. That may be true, but keep in mind that the velociraptors in Jurassic Park III were made more "realistic" in following the recent findings. But I think that the images of raptors in the first two films were perfectly realistic. What evidence is there that they and deinonychus had feathers? The image of deinonychus takes away significantly from its ability to hunt and capture prey! If it was carnivorous, it would have had to had the image from the velociraptors of the first two Jurassic Park films. Scorpionman 04:11, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, the deinos likely had feathers, but not THAT thick. How could it have hunted with that coat weighing it down?

Right, there are certainly no predators today with thick fur or feathers! </sarcasm>

Sheep81 06:09, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Anatomy of a lifelike Deinonychus

I've outlined the skeletal/muscular anatomy of Conway's image [3] to hopefully make this more clear. I assume all the puffin comments come from the shape of the head, which really is the most obviously correct part of the drawing, especially when it's right next to a photograph of the skull in the taxobox, which clearly matches that shape! Here for reference/comparison is a skeleton of the similar Velociraptor [4] and a discussion of dinosaur musculature [5].

The puffin comments come mainly from Conway's deinonychus being completely covered in feathers. Of course, the head looks a lot like a puffin's in this drawing too. I checked out the links, and although the outline matches the skull, the details that Conway drew on are too bird-like to be a dinosaur. It looks like a beak (which the deinonychus obviously did not have, according to the skull), and there's a dark area around the mouth, which looks either like a parrot or a toucan. When I first looked at this image, I thought it was a puffin (until I saw the subtitles)! If Conway's going to draw a deinonychus, he'd better do a better job at making it looks like a dinosaur, not a bird. Scorpionman 15:59, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

There are some scientists woh think Deinonychus is a bird and not a dinosaur (though what the difference between those terms is varies from person to person). These links are cited on several pages, including Dromaeosauridae. Most scientists who think it was a dinosaur and not a bird mean that in a purely cladistic sense, the same way a Dimetrodon is not a reptile (but sure looked like one). If you have any sources to contradict the many I've listed that state Dromaeosaurs are birdlike or are birds, please list them. Until you do, your comments are irrelevent.Dinoguy2 21:21, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I could list evidence against it, such as the fact that archaeopteryx was thought to be a cross between a bird and a reptile, but turned out to be just a bird. But you wouldn't listen. Scorpionman 00:39, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I didn't say list any evidence. I'm not interested in your original research. List citations that refute the citations I've included in Dromaeosauridae.Dinoguy2 00:54, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Look, can we just have an image of the complete skeleton of a deinonychus? Then we'll see just how well it compares to the drawing. I don't mean an image of the skeleton sitting, I'd like to see an image of the deinonychus standing up with its claws and arms outstretched. Scorpionman 03:36, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Go find one. The debate on this subject is getting tiresome and pointless. Dinoguy is correct in that most modern paleontologists would find the image completely plausible (look at the cover of the second edition of The Dinosauria if you need quick confirmation of this... or write some emails if the cover of a book designed to be a compendium of modern dinosaur knowledge, with chapters written by many of the major dinosaur paleontologists in the world, does not convince you). Scorpionman (and Kaz) are correct in that the image is a little "out there" and may not be recognizable as a Deinonychus by the common reader. So how about instead of arguing in circles when both parties are actually more or less correct, and maybe getting into a completely off-topic argument about evolution, someone just add another, more "traditional", image of Deinonychus to the article for comparison? Holy cow.Sheep81 04:11, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Then quit arguing about it and find a deinonychus skeleton! Where am I supposed to get one? You're the one who seems to know everything there is to know about deinonychus, so you find one! And by the way, I don't care if the image is considered "plausible" by modern paleontologists, that doesn't mean one bit that deinonychus looked like that! There could be a picture of a puffin that looks like an iguana and that wouldn't make it correct! And this argument is pointless, so just find a skeleton, post it, and we'll compare it! Stop ranting and raving about this stuff; all I asked for was a skeleton! Scorpionman 01:48, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Weird how every single one of your sentences ends in an exclamation point, yet *I* am the one ranting and raving. Dinoguy provided three different links in the first paragraph of this section, which you have yet to comment on. I am not going to waste my time looking for a publically accessible picture when I am not the one who has a problem here. Anyway, how qualified are you to argue about Deinonychus anatomy if you don't even have access to a picture of its skeleton? Sheep81 06:24, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

For what it's worth, here is Greg Paul's latest reconstruction of the Deinonychus skeleton [6]. Note that the skull differs slightly from those pictured (Paul has done new research on the known, poorly preserved skulls, and come to this conclusion about its shape). Note also that we do not have permission to use it in the article (and I'm probably stretching it to have it up on my web site at all, as I'm not even sure it's been published yet, so take a good look because I'll be taking it down in a day or two).Dinoguy2 14:37, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Model Image

The image is good in terms of accuracy (the hands are slightly off, but that's a minor issue), but I seriously doubt it's fair use unless specifically discussing that model or its sculptor.Dinoguy2 16:12, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

In fact, now that I've checked, this probably applies to the image of the model skull as well.Dinoguy2 16:13, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

If you have a problem with the model skull, maybe you could find a real one somewhere? Scorpionman 02:46, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Even if I could, I wouldn't have permission to use it. I do have a picture I took of the mounted Deinonychus skeleton at the AMNH, but it's in front view. [7] Dinoguy2 03:37, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Formatting problems

I can see that Dinoguy2 really wants the bird-like Deinonychus image in the article. Ok, but it's causing problems with the presentation of the article. I'm going to shorten it's description, and tweak the formatting so it fits nicely. Malamockq 15:54, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing that up. I feel very strongly that science-based illusrations should have precendence over those from movies in these articles, though including both is obviously a good comprimise. Dinoguy2 16:48, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Image revision

Deinonychus

I hope this image should be Deinonychus. Please, check it. --Snek01 16:48, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

It's not bad from an artistic standpoint, but it does not resemble Deinonychus close enough and would be excluded based on Wikiproject:Dinosaurs guidelines.Dinoguy2 19:37, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Maybe could be good to cut out the first specimen only? I can send you the original photo taken at the exhibition if you want. --Snek01 08:20, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Unfortnuately, no. Again, it's good from an artistic standpoint, but it fails the follwoing Image Use Guidelines (found on Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs:

• Image differs appreciably from known skeletal elements. (The skull actually resembles Dromaeosaurus more, and the tail is far too short).
• Image pose differs appreciably from known range of motion. (It has the common "bunny-hands" mistake cited as an example on thel inked page).

The image would be perfectly appropriate, and a welcome addition to a section on Dinosaurs in Art, or Deinonychus in art if you wanted to create such an entry.Dinoguy2 14:37, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Scorpionman's Images

While I appreciate the effort to add images to these articles, the last few images Scorpionman has added have been removed under the following WP:Dinosaurs guidelines:

Image differs appreciably from known skeletal elements.

Image pose differs appreciably from known range of motion.

Specifically, on the latest image [8]--The length of the neck is too long, the shape of the skull in incorrect, the proportions in the arms and legs are incorrect, the hands are oriented in a pronated position impossible in life, the lengs of the fingers are incorrect, the size and shapes of the claws are incorrect, and the tail is too short and too flexible.

Again, despite my criticism, I really appreaciate the effort. Maybe we could set up some sort of image review sub-page at WP:Dinosaurs to discuss images that could be added? I'll re-post this on the talk page there for discussion of this point.Dinoguy2 17:16, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Hey Dinoguy, I appreciate your concerns. I admit that I'm not a paleoartist, but I really haven't had much time to study the skeleton. As for "known movements", however, you are wrong because we don't know how they moved. This is a speculative subject. But, if you could show me a skeleton, I would be happy to study it and to make my drawings more anatomically correct. Regards, Scorpionman 23:59, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

The wonderfully talented fantasy/paleoartist Kyoht Luterman has a pretty good tutorial on how to draw dromaeosaurs, with a good summary of the anatomical details, figures of the skeleton and range of motion, etc. http://personal.kyoht.com/Tutorial/Raptor/index.html Dinoguy2 14:08, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

We may not know exactly how they moved but we can be pretty sure how they didn't move (ie, the animal probably didn't dislocate its wrist on a regular basis just to achieve pronation). Sheep81 00:20, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Just to show I've read this string, I've edited the title! - Ballista 04:38, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Dinoguy, the link you provided only shows how to draw raptors. The images I am attempting to create are of deinonychus. Scorpionman 18:09, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Deinonychus is a type of "raptor"--that site used "raptor" in the vernacular sense to mean dromaeosaurid. You'll find exacmples and diagrams based mainly on Deinonychus, with a few of Velociraptor and Bambiraptor.Dinoguy2 19:14, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Incidentally, this [9] Deinonychus skeleton is the best one I can find online. It's from 2002, wheras most I can find on google look like they're based on outdated reconstructions from the '70s.Dinoguy2

Well, I'll try to get an image drawn, but as I am about to send my computer to someone to get it fixed I won't be able to use the scanner for a little bit. Thanks for your help Scorpionman 20:26, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Never mind the scanner still works. Tell me what you think of this one: Scorpionman 21:36, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Better! The skull in particular is very accurate. Put it up on the WP:Dinos image reviews page for voting.Dinoguy2 23:59, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Just like to make my support for Scorpionman's efforts public here. His pictures are getting better each time and I wish him the best of luck in the endevour. Jefffire 14:14, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I like that image a lot, especially the head. I had forgotten how long their arms were! Sheep81 15:21, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your support! Before I put it on for voting, however, does anyone think it should be enhanced at all? I think it should be a little darker. Anyone else? Scorpionman 16:10, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

A little work on refining the hands as they are a little rough. Jefffire 16:27, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

You could probably do a bit more to define the edges, especially around the darker areas, by layring on more contrast. This would also help the overall look of the feet and hads, as it is a bit "sketchy" at the moment.Dinoguy2 17:22, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, if I had one complaint, it's that it doesn't look "finished" yet. Perhaps you can refine it so that it changes from a sketch (a VERY good sketch, mind you) to a more complete drawing. Sheep81 01:07, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately my photo editor isn't working right now. If one of you has a program that allows for the enhancement of this image, I give you permission to do so. Scorpionman 00:48, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

It's something that would have to be done on paper, I think, for best results.Dinoguy2 14:10, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I could do that although I'm worried that I might mess something up. Scorpionman 16:08, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I have another "finished" image; see if it's satisfactory. File:Deino3.JPG

I prefer the first, these aren't as detailed, and a little rougher. Also, it might be better to just post a wiki-link to save on take page confusion. Jefffire 20:11, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

So what happened to those sketches?

I notice the puffin/chicken is still featured on this page, vs. some of the more traditional-looking dipictions such as those sketches above. It's been months since that was posited, so what happened?

Addendum, I thought the displays at the Natural History Museum in my native San Diego made quite a convincing argument for the "feathered dinosaur" argument. [10] MalikCarr 23:03, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

The more "traditional" sketches are not scientifically accurate, and violate the rules for image inclusion of WP:Dinosaurs. The bird-like drawing is accurate both in anatomy and in extent of feathers, based on what's known of other dromaeosaurids like Microraptor, Sinornithosaurus, etc. The model you linked too is ok, but I don't like it much aesthetically--it looks unnatural, like a 'traditional' Deinonychus with feathers glued on a bit haphazardly (which is exactly what it is, by the way--I remember a story a few years ago about the 'feathering' of those old deinonych models). There's also no evidence that any dromaeosaurids lacked feathers on the head/face, and both known relevant feather impressions from this family have them, but that's more an artistic decision.

I'd love to see some pics of the life-sized Therizinosaurus they have in that display! :O Dinoguy2 03:33, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Running speed

The section on the running speed of Deinonychus cites the animal's low foot-tibia ratio when saying that it probably wasn't particularly fast. But what if Deinonychus was an ambush predator? I give the example of modern ambush predators: the big cats. These animals do not have the sort of foot-tibia ratio that would identify them as being particularly fast, but they can achieve the same speeds over short distances that more obviously fleet-footed animals such as ostriches and gazelles can. An extreme example is the cheetah - you wouldn't guess it could run at 60 miles per hour simply by looking at its foot-tibia ratio. The low ratio Deinonychus does not necessarily preclude it from being a fast runner (at least over short distances) - this should be mentioned in the article. 209.244.31.53 20:34, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

You may be right, but it would be original research. The portion describing its slow speed is from a published source. Also, any source making this argument would have to account for the differences in locomotion between bipeds and quadrupeds. There are probably different leg ratio/speed correlations involved for big cats, etc. Dinoguy2 07:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Deinonychus (6 votes)

Nominated February 24th, 2007;

Support:

1. .Cas Liber 05:59, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
2. M&NCenarius 22:47, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
3. Dropzink 01:32, 27 February 2007 (UTC)]
4. Spawn Man 07:09, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
5. Dinoguy2 03:11, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
6. ArthurWeasley 17:44, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Comments: Pros: loads of potential information, its role in the evolution of thought on warm-blooded dinosaurs is really interesting. Some nice images Cons:Needs alot of work and could be considered too close to Velociraptor I guess. Cas Liber 05:59, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

• Jurassic park raptors based on it, vital in evolution & warm blooded debates. An essential dinosaur that needs a proper article... "Oodles" of info too. ;) Spawn Man 07:09, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Theropod bias! I mean um... one of my personal favorites ;) Dinoguy2 03:11, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Righto then, a to-do list

OK, I feel a good thing to do would be try and elaborate some more on some of the controversy around the description of the critter...anyone have Hot-blooded dinosaurs? cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 09:56, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

While we're speaking of to-do lists, this article is missing... well, a lot. I've just added very short sections for Description, Popular culture, and External links, the See also section was blank, and there are no Diet, Classification, Origins, or Discovery and species sections. Basically, this article is only 1/4th complete (almost no references, and missing half the sections our articles normally have). Firsfron of Ronchester 10:11, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, um, yeah, those too.......(thanks...) ;) cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 10:42, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Adrian J. Desmond's Hot Blooded Dinosaurs? I have a copy of that, which citations do you need confirmed? Mistyschism 13:50, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Umm...cool. just going through it now. If you can see any obvious refs from book go right ahead.cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 13:06, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

PS: Bluelinked Cloverly Formation...but stubby as all get-out...cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 13:06, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Skull image

I'm not sure what to make of the status of the skull image currently in the taxobox. That particular replica is a commercial product available from here.[11] Using Google, I also found that photo and other photos of the same model listed on a number of stock photo sites. Does any of this impact the validity of the public domain tag, or the inclusion of the photo in the article? Dinoguy2 09:39, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

This will need looking into; thanks for catching this potential problem. The uploader was active as of January, so there is a chance we will have luck leaving a message on his talk page. However, his e-mail isn't enabled, so there may be no other way to contact him. Given the evidence, if more information isn't forthcoming, the image could be deleted. On a (completely unrelated) side-note, I hope things are going well for you in Australia. Firsfron of Ronchester 09:50, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not really fussed about it. We coud ditch it if there's a doubt and use the photo of the skeleton halfway down the page.cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 09:54, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

That doesn't leave many images. The current JP image in the pop culture section also has to be replaced, because it does not appear to be an unmodified screen shot (it's chopped). I just added it as a place-holder until we find a more usable JP image. Firsfron of Ronchester 10:02, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Aerodynamic bones?

"Paleontologist John Ostrom's study of Deinonychus in the late 1960s revolutionised the way we think about dinosaurs ... Ostrom noted the aerodyamic bones and and stiffened tendons..." -- I don't think that "aerodyamic" is the word we want here (I could be wrong). "Pneumatized"? (Check the spelling, also.) -- Writtenonsand 07:14, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Or simply lightly built/bird-like, which is less technical. Dinoguy2 07:34, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Illos back to haunt us again

We currently have two life-restoration illos in the article.

1) Conway's is IMHO really Neornithe-oid, but apparently wiser heads here are convinced that it's adequately accurate. I would, however, like the caption to specify more exactly just where Conway did get that plumage from. (Scorpionman's puffin? - Which is, after all, a "related species" ...)

2) We also have a "Velociraptor" built by InGen and featured in Jurassic Park. After the dogfights here defending the accuracy of Conway from its critics, IMHO we should be really embarrassed to include this, unless we include a caption in huge caps: "FICTIONAL INACCURATE DEPICTION OF A 'VELOCIRAPTOR' BEARING ONLY LIMITED RESEMBLANCE TO A DEINONYCHUS."

-- Writtenonsand 07:46, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Aww I think your latter description is a bit unkind, I thought it wasn't too bad really (pre feathers 'n'all....) :) cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 08:19, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what's wrong with the plumage. It has primary feathers on the wings and tail, exactly like all known feather impressions from dromies, troodontids, etc etc etc. It has slightly more primitive feathers on the body, which are even a different color, with rounded contours/breast area feathers that match Microraptor, Jinfengopteryx, Archeopteryx, etc etc. What exactly is Neornithine about it? It's not like it has an extensive beak or a fan tail in place of a frond tail (Chiappe and his useful descriptors!). Seriously. I'm really kind of tired of people criticizing this drawing without presenting any actual arguments, which makes it very frustrating to respond. I agree about the JP image--yes, the raptors in the book were meant to be Deinonychus, but I could swear I read a quote from Speilberg (maybe in the "Making Of..." book?) that, since the synonymy was dead about as soon as it was published, he went with Velociraptor for the film because it had a cooler name. Either way, the innacuracy of the models in JP are described on

Velociraptor, so maybe a quick mention and a pointer to that article would be enough. Dinoguy2 09:02, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry. :-) I can believe that you're tired of this, and I didn't intend my comments as "criticizing without presenting any actual arguments" - as I wrote, "apparently wiser heads here are convinced that it's adequately accurate" - "wiser" intended respectfully and without sarcasm. To rephrase my point:

"Wow! It looks so modern-birdlike! But apparently it did look that "birdlike"! But apparently some other people are skeptical about whether it really did look that birdlike! And the caption says, "Plumage based on related species." So how do we make clear to the skeptics that their skepticism is unwarranted and that this reconstruction really should be accepted as accurate?"

Not only do extraordinary claims require extraordinary proofs, but when presenting apparently extraordinary claims, it's probably a good idea to show why aren't really as extraordinary as they seem. I'm not criticizing the reconstruction, I'm asking that critics be disarmed right from the start with a clear justification of this "surprising" image. Thanks! -- Writtenonsand 14:41, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I got the feathers from the fossils (!), informed by comparison to modern birds, but not one in particular. Again, feathers from the fossils, as dinoguy has pointed out (thanks Matt, I wouldn't have had the patience!). John.Conway 13:14, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks much for your reply! So we can change the current caption, which reads, "Plumage based on related species" - I.e., the plumage is simply what we see in Deinonychus specimens? (And somebody is probably going to ask "Which specimens?"). Thanks again. -- Writtenonsand 14:15, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

It was based largely on Cryptovolans as it was known as at the time I drew the picture (2002 I think), with elements from Sinornithosaurus. It has proven to be pretty accurate in light of more recent discoveries, so I haven't had to revise it since then. I am surprised at the reaction it's had here, but I think it's almost entirely from two people -- Kaz and Scorpionman -- who don't seem to know an awful lot about biology, but have very fixed ideas nonetheless. I don't think the image needs a lot of qualification and defending, but if you'd like to change the caption I have no objections. John.Conway 17:19, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

"I am surprised at the reaction it's had here, but I think it's almost entirely from two people -- Kaz and Scorpionman -- who don't seem to know an awful lot about biology." -- Newsweek / MSNBC March 31, 2007: "Nearly half (48 percent) of the public rejects the scientific theory of evolution; one-third (34 percent) of college graduates say they accept the Biblical account of creation as fact." http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17879317/site/newsweek/ -- You may only have heard from Kaz and Scorpionman on this page, but they sure aren't the only ones out there who are leery about "dinobirds". To repeat: Many people will find this idea controversial or hard to accept. We have to make things clear for them. That's all. -- Writtenonsand 20:51, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

This debate was settled a year ago, by folks who know what they are talking about. I'm not even sure the users who supported a feather-free image are still active, so I don't think it's an issue. If there is new evidence supporting the idea that dromaeosaurs didn't have feathers, that can be presented in the article, with an appropriate picture. Until then, Wikipedia's policy on Original Research applies: "unpublished facts, arguments, concepts, statements, or theories, or any unpublished analysis or synthesis of published material." No reputable source was provided above, a full year ago when it was requested, so there's no need to resurrect this debate. I recently added a JP image to this article, but it had been present in this article previously (a couple of months ago), and was only moved out when the pop culture section was moved to a new article. The Velociraptor in JP, were, as far as I know, based on Deinonychus, so it seems to me a valid usage of the image (though the image itself may be a copyvio because it's been altered from the original). Firsfron of Ronchester 19:30, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Hey no, it wasn't me who didn't like it! (the above entries are close together)...now we've had Prehistoric Park and The Truth About Killer Dinosaurs both....cheers, Casliber | talk | contribs 20:27, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Hope I'm not beating a dead Deinonychus here, but just to be clear, I wasn't supporting any feather-free image (in fact I criticized the Jurassic Park feather-free image). I'm simply saying that we need to make clear that we/dinosaurologists have excellent reason to believe that Deinonychus really did have such a modern-birdlike appearance. That's pretty much it. (Man. Mucho heat to try to get a little light. :-) ) The JP Velociraptor/Deinonychus image belongs in this article only in the way that Waterhouse Hawkins' reconstruction belongs in Iguanodon or Zallinger's would belong in Tyrannosaurus -- "Of historical interest only". Have a good one, all. -- Writtenonsand 20:51, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarifications. The only thing that threw me off was your opinion that it looked neronithine, which struck me as very specific. I guess I've been conditioned to over react to anything involving images like that ;) As for a discussion in the article, the problem is that I don't know of any sources that discuss that sort of thing in relation to Deinonychus specifically, just dromaeosaurs in general. Any write-up on the new (not really, over 10 years old now) feather issue would be exactly the same on each dromaeosaur article, which is a problem. It should (and is, to an extent) discussed at Dromaeosauridae. I wouldn't mind discussing this on Deinonychus, but lets keep it to this, Dromaeosauridae, and maybe Velociraptor (probably the most well-known dromies) and leave it at that. If anybody wants to go ahead and incorporate this, you could probably pick and modify text from Dromaeosauridae and Velociraptor that should cover it. Dinoguy2 01:07, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

No problem -- like I said above, I can empathize! "Any write-up on the ... feather issue would be exactly the same on each dromaeosaur article, which is a problem." Hmm, an article on Feathers in the Dromaeosauridae? Too specific? I dunno. Maybe not. And we already have Feathered dinosaurs and Dinosaur-bird connection. -- Writtenonsand 12:13, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

I think a new article would be too specific. You know what I think was really problem with the image (given that the extent of the feathers is no different to a lot of other images out there these days): it doesn't look scary enough. That doesn't warrant a new article or a significant defence in my opinion, but as I said, I have no objections to someone(else) being more explicit. John.Conway 13:14, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Pronunciation again

I'm afraid the pronunciation given for this dinosaur is a little out of whack. What is presented as a phonetic transcription (of an unspecified English dialect) appears to be a phonemic transcription of a general American pronunciation. I checked that dinosaur pronunciation guide website again, to confirm this (their transcription - unfortunately in a non-intuitive non-IPA format - is "die-NON-i-kus"). The main problem here is with the vowel in the second syllable: the above website shows it as "O", which, if you look up their explanation here, represents the vowel in American English "tot" (which they refer to as "short o"). This is realised phonetically in modern General American as [ɑ], and not as [a], as you can see at IPA chart for English, which furthermore reveals that GA has actually merged two phonemes - the /a:/ phoneme of "father" and the /o/ phoneme of "not" - whence an explanation for the misleading transcription given in this article (which results in a completely ridiculous pronunciation if attempted by a British or Australian speaker). About the best solution I can think of here is to recast the pronunciation to a phonetic representation that avoids the American vowel merger while still remaining comprehensible to those speaking the major dialects of English, which would make it [daɪ.ˈnɒn.ɪ.kəs] (this is actually an RP transcription, which is not my native dialect, but has the virtue of being used as a default quasi-phonemic transcription by several dictionaries; note also the shift to correct syllable structure and the change to the unstressed [ɪ] in the third syllable).

On a broader note, is there someone active in the dinosaur wikiproject who knows IPA and can interpret these pronunciations? I'm willing to assist in future if there is a need for this, but can't guarantee timeliness, I'm afraid. Thylacoleo 02:00, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

We certainly should have somebody on board who can understand IPA... it might as well be a different language. I can't make heads or tails of it. Also, remember that there are no standard pronunciations for dinosaur names. remember hearing that Ostrom, who named it, had some odd way of pronouncing the name different from the usual standard listed on the DOL site. Dinoguy2 06:23, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

IPA is not that difficult in principle, as it involves a strict one sound:one symbol correspondence (although I'll admit the phonetic/phonemic distinction sometimes muddies the waters here); the major stumbling block for most people seems to be the need to learn a number of new symbols (and perhaps a fear that this means it's more complicated than it actually is?). Of course, I could be biased in that respect... And there are indeed "standard" pronunciations of dinosaur names - they are precisely those pronunciations that most native English speakers use when talking about them. (How else could the DOL site come up with its pronunciation guide?) That the original namer of a genus had some strange ideas about how ancient Greek/Latin morphemes should be rendered into modern English is, happily, entirely irrelevant. Thylacoleo 06:48, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

"And there are indeed "standard" pronunciations of dinosaur names - they are precisely those pronunciations that most native English speakers use when talking about them." --- I disagree, I've come across an awful lot of variation in the way people pronounce dinosaur names, and not just relatively obscure ones. Old standards like Diplodocus are pronounced in wildly different ways: DIP-lo-DOH-kus, DIE-PLOH-dih-kus, DIE-PLOD-ih-KUS, etc. Seems to me that with some dinosaurs, there are as many pronunciations as there are people.John.Conway 10:55, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

The problem is, as has been pointed out on the DML a few times, the "standard" English pronunciations don't always match the real pronunciation in Greek/Latin. For example, most English speakers say -saurus as SORE-us, rather than the more correct SAUR-oos. Most people say Centrosaurus as sent-ro-SORE-us, rather than the more correct kent-ro-SAUR-oos (which is actually why Kentrosaurus got its name). It's funny, but after anyone goes to a conference or SVP or something, there are always stories about how everyone has different ways of pronouncing the names. Oh, and I apologize, I must have been thinking of a different case, because Ostrom apparently said it the way I do -- die-NON-i-kus. Here's a thread with some IPA, which is good overall since it's about varying pronunciation [12] Dinoguy2 11:02, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

The DOL site is nice because all the pronunciations are collected together, and are actually published (so no Original Research). Unfortunately, as both John and Dinoguy state, there is no "standard" pronunciation, and we don't pronounce things the correct Greek/Latin way anyway. Many people seem to pronounce Deinonychus Die-NON-ee-kus, but how many people pronounce Mononychus similarly? The only reason Kentrosaurus and Centrosaurus are both valid names is because they aren't pronounced the same, when "classical" pronunciation would make them homophones. Also: I'm clueless when it comes to IPA, and we still have hundreds of dinosaur articles which don't have any pronunciation scheme at all, so you've got your work cut out for you. :) Firsfron of Ronchester 17:15, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

I think you're (plural) getting confused between linguistic description and prescription (try reading linguistic prescription for a quick run-down on the difference). While the spelling of a word is a suitable case for prescriptivism (as written language is an artificial entity), when it comes to pronunciation, the only workable course of action is description. A "standard" pronunciation is indeed what most native English speakers use or find acceptable, and more than one pronunciation may be considered "standard" - think of the two ways of pronouncing "either". This works for dinosaur names too, as they are regular words like any other. If Diplodocus is indeed pronounced in multiple ways, then it's okay to list those alternative pronunciations, provided that we follow the general Wikipedia principle of having those pronunciations properly sourced, and not giving undue weight to pronunciations used by a small minority. The DOL site seems a reasonable source for dinosaur name pronunciations, although I would temper it where possible with other sources (such as the OED). The Greek/Latin matter is a red herring in all of this - we no more are required to give the "correct" Latin pronunciation than we are to give the French pronunciation or Swahili pronunciation. Thylacoleo 23:54, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

"provided that we follow the general Wikipedia principle of having those pronunciations properly sourced," This is the problem. Other than the DOL, I don't know of any sources for dinosaur pronunciation, aside from a few children's books. One or two papers do provide a preferred pronunciation (e.g. Suuwassea, for which the authors provide "SOO-oo-WAH-see-uh", but no IPA). Most (all?) published pronunciations are in this non-IPA format, so I think following the DOL would be our best bet, but any conversion to IPA would then be original research, wouldn't it? Dinoguy2 00:11, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

But DOL is an acceptable source for this, so I don't see the problem (now if there were no DOL site, then things would be difficult). There are other sources, which do give IPA pronunciations, the only problem with them is that they tend to be selective and only have the more well known genera. The OED online, for instance, has both "iguanodon" and "diplodocus" (it gives - in IPA - two different pronunciations for each), but not "deinonychus", a gap which is filled by the Oxford Dictionary of Pronunciation (which, however, doesn't have "mononychus"). Conversion of ad hoc pronunciation guides into IPA can only be considered original research if the guide didn't give a key to explain what their symbols mean. Fortunately the DOL does have such a key, so the task is as trivial as would be converting Russian from Cyrillic into the Latin alphabet using the standard transcription scheme. In contrast I can't reliably convert your "SOO-oo-WAH-see-uh" into IPA (although I could make an educated guess), because you haven't told me what sounds you mean by "WAH", and so on. The real problem is in ensuring the phonetic transcription is broad enough that it adequately covers the various major dialects of English without going into too much phonetic detail. The OED does a reasonable job of this (and it would appear the DOL makes enough distinctions to also work well - for instance, despite being based on an "American" pronunciation, they've avoided the GA /a:/~/o/ merger), while the Oxford Dictionary of Pronunciation errs on the side of phonetic detail. Thylacoleo 05:18, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Feathers

Am I the only one getting a bit tired of seeing every, single therapod depicted with big plumes of feathers now? While I'm willing to accept that some of them had feathers, I think it's a bit much to assume they all looked like brightly-colored birds with teeth and claws. It strikes me as oddly bandwagon-like that as soon as the possibility of any dinosaurs having had feathers arose, ALL the therapods did because of their relation to birds. That's just my take on it, though. Magicflyinlemur 08:01, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

It's called "phylogenetic bracketing" - it's 100% reasonable to assume that if birds have feathers, and primitive coelurosaurs like Sinosauropteryx had feathers, then their common ancestor and everything descended from it would also have feathers -- unless they were lost at some point. This may have been the case with very large coelurosaurs such as Tyrannosaurus, but for most other theropods in that group it is rather unlikely, especially in something as modestly-sized as Deinonychus. In other words it's not a "bandwagon", it's just knowing a thing or two about how evolution works. Kotengu 小天狗 08:24, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a religious man, but just let me say: OH PLEASE GOD NOT AGAIN! John.Conway 08:33, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Really. I think people should really check out the previous discussions here before making the same arguments ad naseum. Dinoguy2 11:34, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Not to mention that it's a bit hyperbolic to say "every single theropod" is depicted with feathers, since I reckon around half our theropod images on Wikipedia are featherless. Firsfron of Ronchester 00:09, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Grellet-Tinner and Makovicky, 2006

I have a PDF of this article, discussing an egg found with AMNH 3015. Since odds are I'm not going to get to work much on it, if someone would like to write it up, just ask me for the article. J. Spencer 02:54, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Ooh, I'd love a copy. I have a paper to finish for tomorrow but I'll be free for a while afterwards, so I'll be able to work on the article a bit. Dinoguy2 03:19, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Sure thing! We were having trouble with your email and my email last time, though, so maybe we'll need a middleman. J. Spencer 04:01, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I'd give it a try and see what happens--last time I had severe problems with my net connection which have since been fixed. The javasript Gmail stuff didn't seem to like that very much ;) Dinoguy2 07:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

You could throw it my way too, if it isn't too troublesome. I'm on Dracontes[AT]gmail[DOT]com.

Thanks in advance, Dracontes 07:55, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Sure, I'll get to it when I get back from work. J. Spencer 13:17, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I just sent it to Dracontes. Dinoguy, when you get a chance, send me an email so I'll have your address. J. Spencer 21:14, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Roach and Brinkman, 2007

Hot off the presses, this paper claims that Deinonychus was not a cooperative hunter, and did not play well in groups. It gets into the phylogenetic bracket, which finds that cooperative hunting is very rare in diapsids (including crocs and birds), and bone markings, which suggest that the Deinonychus remains at the classic tenontosaur hunting localities were actually losers in intraspecific fights over carcasses, which were then cannibalized as fresher meat. Whosoever would like a pdf, you know what to do. :)

Roach, Brian T., and Brinkman, Daniel L. 2007. A reevaluation of cooperative pack hunting and gregariousness in Deinonychus antirrhopus and other nonavian theropod dinosaurs. Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History 48(1):103-138. J. Spencer 16:42, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

As an aside (I haven't read the paper yet), it seems to me that using a phylogenetic bracket in this case is going to be near useless, as no modern diapsids have anything like the morphology or ecological niche of flightless dromaeosaurs. It think this is a case of bracketing gone mad -- the other evidence may be more compelling though. -- John.Conway 17:09, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

That was an incomplete summary, too - only the first half is Deinonychus, and the rest discusses various sites where multiple theropods of the same species have been found, trackways, and so on. J. Spencer 19:21, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Speaking of hunting...

Here's a link to a 1999 Natural History Magazine article on Deinonychus and group hunting (couldn't go directly to it; go to the first article). J. Spencer 21:54, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Citation needed

Can we get a citation for the maximum height/length and weight estimates in this article? It seems to me that area is the only thing that desperately still needs a citation. Firsfron of Ronchester 07:14, 20 May 2007 (UTC)