If you’re confused: Birds are dinosaurs, crocodiles aren’t; note the “closest living relatives

  • Codex@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 month ago

    It might be easy to brush off my complaint as a case of paleo-pedantry, but word choice matters. “Dinosaur” is a word for a specific group of creatures united by shared characteristics and which had their own evolutionary history—it is not a catch-all term for anything reptilian and prehistoric.

    We have known about this distinction for a long time, and I bet that your average 10-year old paleo fan would know not confuse the groups.

    https://xkcd.com/2501/