Talk:Origin of birds

message: The article states "Paul also proposed that the bird ancestor of these groups was more advanced in its flight adaptations than Archaeopteryx. This would mean that Archaeopteryx is thus less closely related to extant birds than these dinosaurs are.[126]" The author may have indeed mentioned that he thought so, I don't know, but the first statement doesn't imply the latter. As far as I understand it, it could be that the cladistic branching was in the sequence of coelurosaur → ancestor branch of living birds → archaeopteryx → dromaeosaurs. That is, Archaeopteryx itself being an intermediate in the direction of flightlessness, thus less advanced in its flight adaptations than the ancestors of them both, but still closer to living birds, as it's not yet 100% flightless. Dromaeosaurs, being flightless, "unavoidably" would have had also ancestors with flight adaptations passing through "Archaeopteryx-like" levels, that is, if we're not positing saltationism or near-saltationism, a "blazing fast" loss of flight from a highly-advanced flight, without an intermediate state. And perhaps they could have retained different sets of derived advanced flight adaptation vestiges. If Archaeopteryx has traits that strongly hint its flight adaptations are necessarily ancestral, predictably distinct from what one would expect from having evolved slightly inferior flight adaptation from a "better", unknown, bird ancestor (like chickens did from possibly better known ancestors), it would be "extremely interesting" to have it mentioned. At least for nerds who have a weird extreme interest in this sort of thing.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.18.92.181 (talk) 19:24, 25 June 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: You are of course right that there is a non sequitur and I'll adapt the text. The tree you give is indeed found by some modern analyses but Paul's hypothesis is much older. He in 1988 proposed that "dinobirds", with which he meant more or less the entire Maniraptora, were more derived than Archaeopteryx. So Archaeopteryx would then not be a basal member of the branch towards the Dromaeosauridae, but the Dromaeosauridae would be a basal group of the branch towards modern birds. This would explain why, despite being flightless (Microraptor had not been found yet in 1988), dromaeosaurids showed flight adaptations that were more advanced than those of Archaeopteryx, such as a keeled and ossified sternum, uncinate processes on the ribs, stiffer tail, a bowed ulna and a bowed third metacarpal. And according to Paul, oviraptorosaurs were even more advanced birds, what with their short toothless skulls, short tails and pygostyles. Paul also suggested that Archaeopteryx had lost some flight capability but this in his view would be related to it being an insular species, not as a forerunner of dromaeosaurids.--MWAK (talk) 05:33, 26 June 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Secondary fligthlessness in dromaeosaurs and the like, relationship of later birds with them versus Archaeopteryx 

message: This article discusses the dissent known as BAND or Birds Are NOt Diosaurs, but does not mention its name. As far as I knw, there is nowhere in Wikipedia which explains this name. If the hypothesis is worthy of discussion, isn't it worthy of mentioning it by name? If not here, then where? (And that is not a rhetorical question.) Let me make it clear that I am not an advocate of BAND. I just think that Wikipedia should explain what BAND means, and this paragraph in this article gives the fullest descripton.   TomS TDotO (talk) 13:52, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I fear that you misunderstood the terminology. "BAND" is not the name of the hypothesis, but of the group propagating it. They form the BAND and are themselves the BANDits. The implicit informality of this parlance has always led to objections when mentioning it on Wikipedia. Maybe one day a scholarly work will be written on the entire phenomenon and a well-sourced lemma can be created...--MWAK (talk) 21:09, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: All the more reason to mention the "correct" meaning of "BAND". How many people are left in the dark, as I was,  about BAND because of Wikipedia's neglect? Do yuu have a reference that I can cite?   TomS TDotO (talk) 23:38, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I feel that the situation is not quite so dramatic. The terms are used by insiders to the discussion. If you belong to the "inner circle", you know what these names mean. If you are not one of the initiated, you have no need of knowing them... Therefore the experts avoid the use of such terms in publications, which makes it difficult to source them properly. However, recently this paper has appeared: https://academic.oup.com/sysbio/advance-article/doi/10.1093/sysbio/syz010/5315532 --MWAK (talk) 07:50, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

text: And we now also have Darren Naish. 2021. "Birds Are Not Dinosaurs (or BAND)" p 23-27 in Dinopedia — A Brief Compendium of Dinosaur Lore. Princeton University Press. A book highly recommended to those desirous to be "in the know" :o).--MWAK (talk) 09:00, 14 June 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  BAND 

message: "Computed tomography (CT) scans conducted in 2000 of the chest cavity of a specimen of the ornithopod Thescelosaurus found the apparent remnants of complex four-chambered hearts, much like those found in today's mammals and birds."  Did this one specimen really have more than one, or should the sentence read "remnants of a complex four-chambered heart"?  71.235.184.247 (talk) 20:56, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: The wording is indeed awkward. Worse, today the consensus is that the fossil does not preserve a heart. I'll remove the mention of it.--MWAK (talk) 07:57, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hearts?