Deviation Actions
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The Italian paleontologist Andrea Cau, known for his blog Theropoda.blogspot lately has focused on the megalosauroid Spinosaurus in a series of articles designed to discredit or just explore the myths concerning the biology and morphology of the extinct animal. Although it might seem too long, the latest in this parade of posts embodies everything that the author has written about the mysterious theropod (if you want to read : theropoda.blogspot.it/2014/01/…) . The result ? An accurate representation like no other.
The portrait of Spinosaurus provided by Cau is not an emphatic poem, but the feeling of reading a file fact on the beast in the flesh is palpable. Not only the exposure is realistic, but it is absolutely real. By the term "real" I mean that is perfectly in line with the studies and discoveries made so far. The animal described seems to come out from a zoological guide, yet nothing of what has been written is fictitious or exaggerated.
And then I think of all those pages (on the web, but also on paper, not to mention movies and 'documentaries') where they have to inflate the prehistoric beast as they could, until you get a creature that collapses under its own, emphatic weight. Think about the articles you can find on Wikipedia (mainly the Italian version, loaded with such abominations you can't tell) or on other 'sources' where the animals presented seem to come out from epic tales of other times and that, thanks to the suspension of disbelief, you believe that they actually existed. Instead they are nothing more than mental artifacts, whose scientific evidence in favor of their existence are just preconceptions of little value. Dinosaurs, since they do not currently exist (Aves excluded, of course) enjoy the same credibility as a fantastic monster, lying in a limbo between the 'tangible' and the 'indefinable': for this reason, you feel fully entitled to ecstasize all that you can think about them, even at the expense of the real data in our possession. Yet what we know about them is much more appealing than any aggravation that you can hear or read about and despite flaws and errors are present in scientific research, the results make up for all the faults and inaccuracies.
Among the dinosaur-themed books that I'm still reading with great pleasure, In The Presence of Dinosaurs must be quoted, written by John Colagrande, accompanied by superb illustrations of Larry Felder and with the foreword by Jack Horner. The authors engulf the reader in worlds long gone, yet those worlds are as real as today's Serengeti. It is not just a list of what we know from fossils: it is the reconstruction of real extinct ecosystems, and the fact of being able to do it without frills is what makes all of this wonderful Sure, the book has its flaws due to its age but the perceived intent within its pages is to praise. It's surprising what you can decant from a handful of specimens, and it's sad to think that no one does that how it should be done. No fantasy or coolness are needed to describe vanished animals: just stick to the actual data, and the picture obtained will be exciting in itself.
If only people could linger on everything we already know instead of exalting the unknown, one would realize the magnificence that every creature encloses, large or small.</span>
