What is the answer to the Fermi Paradox?

[Razgovory]

One of the interesting things is that Pterosaurs had a fairly large brain in ratio to it's body compared to birds.  I suspect that's because birds more efficient structure then pterosaurs did and pterosaurs had to increase the sheer mass of the brain just so they could fly.

[Queequeg]

These were foxes, not komodo dragons or monitor lizards. Relatively clever, capable of complex social behaviors and aggressive. They wouldn't wait around for prey and ambush them. The word reptile has no helpful meaning here.

[Queequeg]

One of the interesting things is that Pterosaurs had a fairly large brain in ratio to it's body compared to birds.  I suspect that's because birds more efficient structure then pterosaurs did and pterosaurs had to increase the sheer mass of the brain just so they could fly.

......and we're back to where we started.

[Razgovory]

They still aren't birds.

[Queequeg]

This started with me telling Timmy that his teleological view of increasing neurological complexity was complicated by birds triumphing over pterosaurs, though tbh just because pterosaur wings made massively complex, huge flocculi possible doesn't mean they were as smart as a New Caledonian crow or Alex the Parrot.

[Queequeg]

Also IDK if them surviving KPG extinction event was cause of "superior" build. Could have been Pterosaur eggs were less able to deal with pollution. They were amazing animals and we don't understand them that well.

[Razgovory]

Weren't they already in decline before the KT?

[Queequeg]

Most evidence these days paints a mixed picture, and even then there was a lot of weird climactic stuff going on, and the mammals were stealing eggs like crazy. Also, I don't believe birds are superior at all things cause in 100,000,000 years of birds there's nothing like the massive pterosaurs.

[Queequeg]

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/aug/11/pterosaurs-fossils-research-mark-witton
Naish

[jimmy olsen]

Most evidence these days paints a mixed picture, and even then there was a lot of weird climactic stuff going on, and the mammals were stealing eggs like crazy. Also, I don't believe birds are superior at all things cause in 100,000,000 years of birds there's nothing like the massive pterosaurs.

There's no evidence of that.

[Queequeg]

 

Okay.  Egg-thieving by various animals substantially complicated the reproductive strategies of just about every large archosaur, especially when due to ecological factors their eggs weren't forming correctly anyway meaning every egg one of our ancestors caught meant one fewer egg that didn't even have the chance to fuck up during development. 

[Viking]

A gorgonopsid is a good example. It just doesn't look like a dinosaur. At all. There's maybe some vague resemblance to later pre-Dinosaur Triassic Crocodilomorph predators but one look at it's teeth and you know you're dealing with something different. By comparison the first pterosaurs and dinosaurs probably looked like shrews and bats. Obvious relationship.

Just so this is clear,spellus, you are right. They are not dinosaurs and I do correct people to because, I too, am a pedant. It's just that the ignorant masses classify all large non-hairy non-scaly animals of more than 65 million years ago as dinosaurs... except, apparently, the crocodiles.

[The Brain]

This fucking frog debate makes me sick inside.

[Siege]

This have to be one of the most successful highjacks I've seen in a while.
Who gets the credit for highjacking this thread with dinosaurs?

[Eddie Teach]

Hijacking a thread about evolution with dinosaurs? The nerve!