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Rat-Squirrel Not Extinct After All (Scientists off 11 Million years)
The AP via Yahoo! News ^ | March 9, 2006 | Lauran Neergaard

Posted on 03/09/2006 2:46:21 PM PST by new yorker 77

It has the face of a rat and the tail of a skinny squirrel — and scientists say this creature discovered living in central Laos is pretty special: It's a species believed to have been extinct for 11 million years.

The long-whiskered rodent made international headlines last spring when biologists declared they'd discovered a brand new species, nicknamed the Laotian rock rat.

It turns out the little guy isn't new after all, but a rare kind of survivor: a member of a family until now known only from fossils.

Nor is it a rat. This species, called Diatomyidae, looks more like small squirrels or tree shrews, said paleontologist Mary Dawson of Pittsburgh's Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

Dawson, with colleagues in France and China, report the creature's new identity in Friday's edition of the journal Science.

The resemblance is "absolutely striking," Dawson said. As soon as her team spotted reports about the rodent's discovery, "we thought, 'My goodness, this is not a new family. We've known it from the fossil record.'"

They set out to prove that through meticulous comparisons between the bones of today's specimens and fossils found in China and elsewhere in Asia.

To reappear after 11 million years is more exciting than if the rodent really had been a new species, said George Schaller, a naturalist with the Wildlife Conservation Society, which unveiled the creature's existence last year. Indeed, such reappearances are so rare that paleontologists dub them "the Lazarus effect."

"It shows you it's well worth looking around in this world, still, to see what's out there," Schaller said.

The nocturnal rodent lives in Laotian forests largely unexplored by outsiders, because of the geographic remoteness and history of political turmoil.

Schaller calls the area "an absolute wonderland," because biologists who have ventured in have found unique animals, like a type of wild ox called the saola, barking deer, and never-before-seen bats. Dawson describes it as a prehistoric zoo, teeming with information about past and present biodiversity.

All the attention to the ancient rodent will be "wonderful for conservation," Schaller said. "This way, Laos will be proud of that region for all these new animals, which will help conservation in that some of the forests, I hope, will be preserved."

Locals call the rodent kha-nyou. Scientists haven't yet a bagged a breathing one, only the bodies of those recently caught by hunters or for sale at meat markets, where researchers with the New York-based conservation society first spotted the creature.

Now the challenge is to trap some live ones, and calculate how many still exist to tell whether the species is endangered, Dawson said.

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

Copyright © 2006 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: allsquirrelsarerats; bloodbath; squirrelarmy; squirrels
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To: ml1954

Nahh, I already knew you make no sense.



Sorry buddy but That's my line.


161 posted on 03/10/2006 7:48:26 AM PST by WKB
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To: DaveLoneRanger
Scientists haven't yet a bagged a breathing one, only the bodies of those recently caught by hunters or for sale at meat markets

Taste just like chicken!

162 posted on 03/10/2006 7:59:34 AM PST by phil1750 (Love like you've never been hurt;Dance like nobody's watching;PRAY like it's your last prayer)
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To: Defiant
It's sad however all politicians have their staff doing work for them outside of the office.

I was once getting ready to go clubing with a friend and she called my cell.... I answered and she said that she had a quick errand to run and that she wanted me to join her.

She picks me up, I jump in the SUV and ask where are we going? She said her boss needed her to deliver mail to her residence and to turn on some lights to deter theft. The following day this poor girl had to go do yard work, feed the cats and take out the trash.

Poor Trafficant... why did he have to do it?

163 posted on 03/10/2006 9:26:54 AM PST by Idisarthur
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To: WKB

Maybe if you actually posted something of substance, instead of idiotic jibes at people's FReeper names, you wouldn't have this problem. You do almost nothing but troll, and then whine when you become the trollee rather than the troller.



164 posted on 03/10/2006 9:32:24 AM PST by Right Wing Professor
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To: new yorker 77

Is this the Scrat from "Ice Age"?


165 posted on 03/10/2006 9:34:25 AM PST by Little Ray (I'm a reactionary, hirsute, gun-owning, knuckle dragging, Christian Neanderthal and proud of it!)
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To: Right Wing Professor
People with no brains(according to the evilones) can't be anything but idiotic.
166 posted on 03/10/2006 9:36:11 AM PST by WKB
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To: Right Wing Professor
With all due respect perfesser
there is no need in posting anything of substance
because as metmom said:

"No matter what happens, it always *supports* evolution. If they evolve, it does; if they don't evolve, it does. How convenient. There's never any contradiction because EVERYTHING supports evolution. Heads I win, tails you lose."

So why not just be an antagonizing troll
167 posted on 03/10/2006 9:41:58 AM PST by WKB
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To: WKB
So why not just be an antagonizing troll

Well, because if you dish it out, you need to be able to take it. I've been inhabiting the flamiest of on-line forums for well over a decade, back before the web even, and I have a lot of practice with both. Of course, if you troll, you're diminishing the forum for people who are here for serious discussion, and some of those people happen to be on your side.

The frustration you express - that you can't find anything that refutes evolution - is inevitable when you challenge a well-established scientific theory. No established theory is going to be thrown out for a few anomalous results, because we know from experience that 99% of apparently anomalous results are not really anomalous, once you've investigate them. If and when evolution is overthrown - and I'd bet the farm against a cup of coffee it won't ever be - it will be a result of an accumulation of a large amount of contrary evidence, comparable in weight to the literally millions of pieces of data supporting evolution. There are no short cuts.

168 posted on 03/10/2006 9:51:39 AM PST by Right Wing Professor
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To: Right Wing Professor

That you can't find anything that refutes evolution - is inevitable when you challenge a well-established scientific theory



I have ONE thing that totally refutes evolution.
It's called the "born again experience"
You should try it you would like it forever and ever.


169 posted on 03/10/2006 9:58:52 AM PST by WKB
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To: Right Wing Professor
and I'd bet the farm against a cup of coffee it won't ever be




Apparently you are willing to bet your eternal soul
as well.
170 posted on 03/10/2006 10:06:34 AM PST by WKB
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To: WKB

I love ideas whose primary evidence is a gun at your head.


171 posted on 03/10/2006 10:12:19 AM PST by js1138
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To: WKB
Apparently you are willing to bet your eternal soul as well.

You too, if the Muslims are right. And If I'm right, both you and they are wasting a great deal of time on a myth.

172 posted on 03/10/2006 10:12:36 AM PST by Right Wing Professor
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To: Right Wing Professor
You too, if the Muslims are right.


You are comparing apples and oranges.
Find me a Muslim they claims he is going to
Heaven because he has been "born again"
Then we can talk.

John 3:3 In reply Jesus declared, I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.£”
John 3:7 You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You£ must be born again.
173 posted on 03/10/2006 10:50:41 AM PST by WKB
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To: WKB

Based on the levels of anger you display I would say you haven't passed the first trimester, much less been born again.

I can always count on people clanging cymbals and sounding trumpets, claiming they have been born again, all the while rubbing their hands in glee at the prospects of their enemies roasting.


174 posted on 03/10/2006 10:58:23 AM PST by js1138
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To: js1138

Based on the levels of anger you display



Please link me to the posts where I appear to be angry.


175 posted on 03/10/2006 11:05:37 AM PST by WKB
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To: WKB
I've taken a look at your recent posts...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/user-posts?id=15958

and find them relatively free of name calling, so I apologize if my post suggests that.

My comment was based on two things: your posting on these threads without bringing any actual arguments, and your invocation of Pascal's wager. I can think of nothing I despise more that arguments based on threats. I don't care who makes them or what the circumstances.
176 posted on 03/10/2006 11:18:10 AM PST by js1138
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To: js1138

I can think of nothing I despise more that arguments based on threats.




Who have I threaten with what?


177 posted on 03/10/2006 11:22:04 AM PST by WKB
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To: WKB

You invoked Pascal's wager -- a tactic used when you have no actual argument. Believe what I believe or fry in hell.


178 posted on 03/10/2006 11:24:49 AM PST by js1138
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To: js1138

You invoked Pascal's wager -- a tactic used when you have no actual argument. Believe what I believe or fry in hell.



I quoted the Bible
You'll have to take that up with God.


179 posted on 03/10/2006 11:26:11 AM PST by WKB
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To: WKB

Anyone can quote the Bible to prove anything. The Bible has passages that approve of slavery and passages that assert God ordered genocides.

It's interesting that Jesus was asked a couple of times exactly what is required to get to heaven, and rather than saying you must believe the earth is 6000 years old, He wasted the opportunity by saying you must obey the commandments and love your neighbors, including your enemies.


180 posted on 03/10/2006 11:32:23 AM PST by js1138
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