who coined the term thagomizer?lllllllllllllllll
The tail arrangement is believed to have been a defensive weapon against predators. The term thagomizer was coined by Gary Larson in a 1982 Far Side comic strip, in which a group of cavemen in a faux-modern lecture hall are taught by their caveman professor that the spikes were named for the late Thag Simmons.
Stegosaurus had a formidable tail. Studded with four long spikes, this dinosaur's business end would have given Allosaurus and other Jurassic predators plenty of incentive to keep moving. But do we have any evidence that Stegosaurus really used its tail this way? Among paleontologists, the four-spiked tail of Stegosaurus is called a  thagomizer.. It is one of a few terms inspired by one of Gary Larson's beloved  Far Side cartoons: a caveman points to a slide of a Stegosaurus tail and names the nasty-looking structure in honor of the late Thag Simmons..