I wonder if the first person who spoke out that dinosaurs might actually resemble birds more than lizards was considered a science denier?

https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33678744 

I wonder if the first person who spoke out that dinosaurs might actually resemble birds more than lizards was considered a science denier?

The word “dinosaur” was first used in 1842 and is a combination of two Greek words, "deinos" which means terrible or fearfully great, and "saur" which means lizard. This word was used by scientists who were studying fossils being pulled out of the ground. The word itself was invented because these researchers believed Dinosaurs to be reptilian like with scales.

All I want to do it allow the conversation to happen. Scientist now agree that dinosaurs most likely resembled birds. Scientist also argued for hours about how an Iguanodon stood or walked. Did it’s legs support it like an elephant off the ground or were they splayed like a crocodile and its belly was closer to the ground. Scientist today agree that both of those theories were wrong and that Iguanodon most likely stood on its hind legs especially when it was running.

We are still learning new things about dinosaurs 173 after the word was invented! What if no one questioned the science about dinosaurs? New discovers would not have been allowed to happen. Please allow individuals to question the beginning of life, coronavirus, variances and global warming. The science is still changing and people are still learning more about dinosaurs 173 years later.

Direct Quotes:

Once thought to be terrifying, scaly lizards, it now seems dinosaurs were actually more like birds. But not everyone's ready to accept their new image, writes Mary Colwell.

The word "dinosaur" is made from the combination of two Greek words, "deinos" which means terrible or fearfully great, and "saur" which means lizard. It was first used in 1842 by the palaeontologist Richard Owen who saw some similarities between huge fossil bones and the skeletons of living reptiles.

As bones were unearthed and assembled dinosaurs emerged from the darkness of the past into the glaring light of the burgeoning science of geology. They presented a world that was extraordinary and terrifying.

Some were so huge they would have towered over buildings. Others had teeth that were larger and more deadly than those of anything alive. These monsters fired the imagination of the fossil hunters.

But there was plenty of controversy, even in the early days. Uncertainty reigned over the posture of the Iguanodon. Did its legs support it like an elephant so that its body was of fthe ground, or were they more splayed like a crocodile? No-one was sure, so they made both models.

Both were wrong. We know today that its hind legs were bigger and stronger than its forelimbs and it often stood upright on two legs, especially when running.

What is more, horn-like structures were often found alongside Iguanodon fossils. These were assumed to be rhinoceros-type horns and were displayed on the animals' noses. More recent fossils show they were thumb spikes that were probably used for fighting.

Much intellectual blood has been shed in the corridors of paleontological research institutes over the years as evidence has been amassed to show that dinosaurs were highly varied in size and behaviour, and more like birds than reptiles.

"All the evidence is that dinosaurs were warm-blooded," says Mike Benton, professor of palaeontology at Bristol University. "When you look at the bone histology [structure] you see they had growth patterns and replacement of bone very like mammals and birds… Many if not most dinosaurs had feathers." Many of those feathers were coloured ginger and white and black.

It may be hard to swallow, but Tyrannosaurus-Rex, the fearsome predator that seems to be all teeth and bad attitude, could have sported a jaunty tuft of plumes. Perhaps also Dippy the Dinosaur, the huge replica skeleton of Diplodocus that has impressed visitors to the Natural History Museum in London for 100 years, was covered in soft down. "The medium-to-small dinosaurs all had feathers - the giant ones had shed feathers by the time they got to adult size," says Benton.

Will Hollywood ever change with the new science and portray dinosaurs as being more like a blue tit than a terrible lizard?

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