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Watery secret of the dinosaur death pose (Simplest explanation of Dino extinction: They drowned)
New Scientist ^ | 11/23/2011 | by Brian Switek

Posted on 11/26/2011 6:26:37 PM PST by SeekAndFind

Recreating the spectacular pose many dinosaurs adopted in death might involve following the simplest of instructions: just add water.

When palaeontologists are lucky enough to find a complete dinosaur skeleton – whether it be a tiny Sinosauropteryx or an enormous Apatosaurus – there's a good chance it will be found with its head thrown backwards and its tail arched upwards – technically known as the opisthotonic death pose. No one is entirely sure why this posture is so common, but Alicia Cutler and colleagues from Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, think it all comes down to a dip in the wet stuff.

Cutler placed plucked chickens – both fresh and frozen – on a bed of sand for three months to see if desiccation would lead to muscle contractions that pulled the neck upwards – a previously suggested explanation for the death pose. The chickens decayed without contorting. When seven other chickens were placed into cool, fresh water, however, their necks arched and their heads were thrown back within seconds. Sustained immersion of the birds for up to a month slightly increased the severity of the pose, but the major movement of the head occurred almost immediately.

The result contrasts with a study carried out in 2007 by Cynthia Marshall Faux at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Montana, and Kevin Padian at the University of California in Berkeley. The pair found that salty water did not alter the pose of dead quails. They concluded that the arched back seen in so many fossils was instead the result of the expiring dinosaur's final death throes (Paleobiology, DOI: 10.1666/06015.1) – an idea that was first suggested by pathologist Roy Moodie in 1918.

Why dunking dead birds in water produced different results in the two studies is not clear.

(Excerpt) Read more at newscientist.com ...


TOPICS: History; Science
KEYWORDS: apatosaurus; catastrophism; dinosaur; dinosaurs; extinction; godsgravesglyphs; greatflood; paleontology; sinosauropteryx; theory
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To: PapaNew

Read D R Humphreys’ Starlight and Time.


121 posted on 11/27/2011 5:03:27 PM PST by editor-surveyor (No Federal Sales Tax - No Way!)
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To: PapaNew

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJfBSc6e7QQ

...there were no oceans, just shallow seas...


122 posted on 11/27/2011 5:04:00 PM PST by Fred Nerks (FAIR DINKUM!)
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To: editor-surveyor

No matter how you cut it, the earth in Genesis 1:2 was covered with water and darkness. Afterwards in Genesis 1:9, dry land appeared. In Genesis Chapter 7, about 1000 years later in Noah’s time, water once again covered the whole earth.


123 posted on 11/27/2011 5:12:33 PM PST by PapaNew
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To: Fred Nerks

Interesting but the narrator seems to be angry about something.


124 posted on 11/27/2011 5:27:00 PM PST by PapaNew
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To: SeekAndFind

I merely indicated that I could; NOT that I would.


125 posted on 11/27/2011 7:33:54 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: editor-surveyor
It was a sphere of water about two light years in diameter, that was expanded (Raqia) into the entire universe.

HUH?

126 posted on 11/27/2011 7:36:01 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: Elsie

Read Starlight and Time.


127 posted on 11/27/2011 8:00:43 PM PST by editor-surveyor (No Federal Sales Tax - No Way!)
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To: editor-surveyor

Huh; again...


128 posted on 11/27/2011 8:10:34 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: SunkenCiv

So, how do you drown a fish?


129 posted on 11/27/2011 8:13:30 PM PST by tacticalogic
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To: Elsie

Go back to sleep doofus!


130 posted on 11/27/2011 8:30:26 PM PST by editor-surveyor (No Federal Sales Tax - No Way!)
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To: tacticalogic

They were buried alive, which is why they wound up fossils.


131 posted on 11/27/2011 8:30:26 PM PST by SunkenCiv (It's never a bad time to FReep this link -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: MD Expat in PA

Just to jump in here, the only things I’m aware of from the Middle Ages are the “great worms” (a.k.a. dragons, worm was another name for them) IOW giant eels (they are extinct now, apart from the occasional “horse eel” in Ireland, and of course the Loch Ness monster) the slaying of which critters in a nearby river would sometimes enter local folklore.


132 posted on 11/27/2011 8:35:41 PM PST by SunkenCiv (It's never a bad time to FReep this link -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: Elsie

RE: I merely indicated that I could; NOT that I would.

If you could, would you? If not, why not?


133 posted on 11/28/2011 4:22:56 AM PST by SeekAndFind (u)
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To: SeekAndFind
If you could, would you? If not, why not?

Not germaine to discussion; I think.


WOOF!

134 posted on 11/28/2011 5:15:23 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: SunkenCiv

There is a book called “The Biblical Flood and the Ice Epoch” that explains the salt in the ocean. Also, some of the hypotheses presented by Immanuel Velikovski would explain it as well.


135 posted on 11/28/2011 5:24:51 AM PST by cuban leaf (Were doomed! Details at eleven.)
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To: editor-surveyor

Right. Excellent answer though.


136 posted on 11/28/2011 5:51:32 AM PST by stuartcr ("Everything happens as God wants it to...otherwise, things would be different.")
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To: Elsie

RE: Not germaine to discussion; I think.

But surely it is germane. If the explanation that a watery death is stupid (your words, not mine), it would be interesting to know WHY it meets the adjective and what is the explanation that best fits the evidecne.


137 posted on 11/28/2011 6:33:33 AM PST by SeekAndFind (u)
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To: SatinDoll
Did you know there are over 65,000 errors of translation and transliteration in the King James version of the Bible?

Got your magic undies on too tight? Name some of those errors........ Now lets compare that to the book of Mormon, which scientists are having a very difficult time trying to find any evidence of the Nephite people.

138 posted on 11/28/2011 7:44:26 AM PST by dragonblustar (Allah Ain't So Akbar!)
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To: SeekAndFind
If the explanation that a watery death is stupid (your words, not mine), it would be interesting to know WHY it meets the adjective and what is the explanation that best fits the evidecne.

Perhaps I should have said simplistic.

I can give all KINDs of 'alternatives' that can be neither proven or disproven; but why waste my time?

139 posted on 11/28/2011 9:00:14 AM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going)
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To: dragonblustar

“...translation and transliteration errors...”

Do you people even understand what that means?

It means that the men who translated Greek and Latin ms. into English made errors.

It means that during the 1300 years prior to the printing press’s invention, when the books which make up the Holy Bible were being hand scribed, errors occurred.

It means that if you are serious about bible studies, you’ll seek the truth of the original texts of the Holy Bible, and stop sniping at me.

As for my undies, that is none of your damn business.


140 posted on 11/28/2011 11:13:18 AM PST by SatinDoll (NO FOREIGN NATIONALS AS U.S.A. PRESIDENT)
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