Intelligent Dinosaurs

[Moontanman]

At the end of the Cretaceous period dinosaurs were tending toward larger brains and grasping hands (some of them) In this thread lets discuss the possibility that a civilization of intelligent dinosaurs may have exacerbated the ecological collapse at the end of the Cretaceous and the proposed impactors might have just delivered the straw that broke the planets ecological back. Some say we are in the middle of a vast extinction caused by human activity, could an civilization of intelligent dinosaurs have had a similar effect? Here is a supporting thread to get the debate started.

 

http://web.ukonline.co.uk/michael.magee/awwls/00/wls143.html

[CaptainPanic]

I am a strong supporter of the theory that certain types of animals leave no fossils... either because they're eaten before they get a chance to, or because they disappear for another reason (which I don't know). Therefore, the fossil records will almost certainly be incomplete, even if we were to dig up every individual fossil.

 

The dinosaurs, the intelligent ones, might have burned their dead, so they cannot be discovered by archaeologists.

[Sisyphus]

I don't know enough about paleontology to refute it, but it seems like a species as ubiquitous and environment-changing enough to cause a mass extinction would leave lots of traces behind. Are there fossils that suddenly show up in large numbers all over the world at the time of the mass extinction?

 

Also, if that is the cause, then the dominant theories have to be wrong, and that has to be demonstrated too. Is all the evidence for a major impact event flawed? Or was there a massive impact, but it just happened coincidentally?

[Mokele]

The problem is the word "dinosaurs"

 

That's like saying "Mammals are civilized, intelligent beings which build cities".

 

There *were* dinosaurs with grasping hands and increased brain size, but this was only one lineage out of many dozens. Even if one of the small theropods had become truly intelligent, that still leaves a planet full of hulking brutes with less brains than a pigeon.

 

Also, the whole "raptors were smart" thing - their brains were about the size of an ostrich brain relative to their body size. I don't know if you've ever dealt with rattite birds, but folks I know who have say they're just about the stupidest things short of sheep. Hell, the whole "pack hunting" thing is, IIRC, based on a single fossil which may have just been an assembly of solitary animals around a carcass.

[ydoaPs]

The problem is the word "dinosaurs"

 

That's like saying "Mammals are civilized, intelligent beings which build cities".

 

There *were* dinosaurs with grasping hands and increased brain size, but this was only one lineage out of many dozens. Even if one of the small theropods had become truly intelligent, that still leaves a planet full of hulking brutes with less brains than a pigeon.

 

Also, the whole "raptors were smart" thing - their brains were about the size of an ostrich brain relative to their body size. I don't know if you've ever dealt with rattite birds, but folks I know who have say they're just about the stupidest things short of sheep. Hell, the whole "pack hunting" thing is, IIRC, based on a single fossil which may have just been an assembly of solitary animals around a carcass.

 

And the whole thing about reptiles lacking a neocortex.

[SH3RL0CK]

As Captain Panic pointed out, there are many new species yet to be discovered, and unfortunately many that will never be discovered. Very, very few dead animals become fossils. Very few fossils survive after this very long period of time. Very, very few of the surviving fossils will ever be discovered. If there were an intelligent dinosaur (i.e. something with a large brain and hands capable of building tools living maybe 100 million years ago), it is likely we may never know about it.

 

Its more likely that a dinosaur-built tool would survive than the fossil (like a spearpoint), but the chances of finding these are still extremely small. What else would survive a few million years and still be recognizable as a tool or a sign of intelligence?

[Sisyphus]

As Captain Panic pointed out, there are many new species yet to be discovered, and unfortunately many that will never be discovered. Very, very few dead animals become fossils. Very few fossils survive after this very long period of time. Very, very few of the surviving fossils will ever be discovered. If there were an intelligent dinosaur (i.e. something with a large brain and hands capable of building tools living maybe 100 million years ago), it is likely we may never know about it.

 

Is it unlikely, though? This wouldn't just be any old species, it would be the cause of a mass extinction event. Presumably it would be extremely numerous and spread all over the world. If ~30 tyrannosaurs have been found, then surely we would have found at least one specimen of the extinction causer by now, right? 65 million years from now, there might be no substantial evidence that chimps existed, but how could there not be fossilized humans?

[SH3RL0CK]

Is it unlikely, though? This wouldn't just be any old species, it would be the cause of a mass extinction event. Presumably it would be extremely numerous and spread all over the world. If ~30 tyrannosaurs have been found, then surely we would have found at least one specimen of the extinction causer by now, right? 65 million years from now, there might be no substantial evidence that chimps existed, but how could there not be fossilized humans?

 

The likihood is the question, isn't it? Our species has only been around for about 500,000 years (I'm being generous here) and why couldn't an intelligent dinosaur species have a similar lifespan (unlike most of the known fossils whose species existed for perhaps tens of millions of years thus providing a greater number of existing fossils).

 

There have been perhaps a few hundred Neanderthal and H. Erectus specimens discovered; how many fewer would be discovered after another 65 million years? Certainly many of these samples (if not all) would not have survived this length of time.

[Sisyphus]

I don't doubt that an intelligent species could vanish without a trace, I doubt an intelligent species that would cause a mass extinction would. Neanderthals were intelligent, but it's humans that would be the analog.

[john5746]

a civilization of intelligent dinosaurs may have exacerbated the ecological collapse at the end of the Cretaceous and the proposed impactors might have just delivered the straw that broke the planets ecological back.

 

I think it is more plausible that excessive gas expelled by the dinosaurs made the atmosphere much easier to ignite when the meteor hit.

[SH3RL0CK]

What traces would you expect to remain after 65 million years?

 

To enact climate change would require an industrial civilization to be sure, but 65 million years is a very long time for traces of said civilization to be erased. Other than our space probes and landing craft on the moon, what have we built that would survive this length of time?

 

Now, I am actually of the opinion that there were NOT intelligent dinosaurs (at least to the level of an industrial civilization) because we have (and are using) the coal and oil that existed prior to this timeframe. Had a prior industrial civilization existed, this coal and oil would have already been consumed. But if they used solar and wind only, what would survive?

[Sisyphus]

I expect there's plenty we've made that once buried would remain recognizable indefinitely, in fossilized form or otherwise, barring geological events (which wouldn't be everywhere). You mentioned spearpoints above. Well, there's a whole lot more than spearpoints around. And a peak population of at least 7 billion, and you're not expecting any fossilized remains?

[SH3RL0CK]

I expect there's plenty we've made that once buried would remain recognizable indefinitely, in fossilized form or otherwise, barring geological events (which wouldn't be everywhere). You mentioned spearpoints above. Well, there's a whole lot more than spearpoints around. And a peak population of at least 7 billion, and you're not expecting any fossilized remains?

 

The time of existence of the species matters. In the case of T-rex, I beleive they existed for about 3 million years and we have about 30 fossil specimens. That means that only one of these is preserved and recovered today for every 100,000 years said species existed. That is in the approximate ballpark for the lifespan of our species of homosapiens. I have no idea of the population of T-Rex, it couldn't have been very high as these were probably an apex predator. Today there are more people alive than the T-Rex dinosaurs back then, but this is probably not the case for most of the existence of humanity when there were a few thousand homo sapiens living in Africa. Also I note that a T-rex fossil is larger and therefore easier to find and less likely to misidentify or simply disregard (as seems plausible in the late 1800's and early 1900's) than would be a human fossil. In fact, we have many dinosaur bones (maybe a tooth for example) that we know nothing else about the species, if one of these were intelligent, how would we know this?

 

So, in my wild guesstimation here, I think that 65 million years from now the odds would be less than 50/50 we would be able to find a human fossil and be able to identify it as a potentially intelligent species. Really I am pulling these numbers out of the air as I don't know how to quantify these odds in a more realistic way, but I just think its unlikely that very much would survive.

 

In the case of tools, most items (wood, plastic, iron, copper) would not survive millions of years. Stone (as in spearpoints), glass, gold jewlery, and maybe stainless steel items (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gateway_Arch) would be what I would expect could survive on earth in a recognizable form this long. Again, however, how easy would it be to find these items? Not much at all would really last tens of millions of years.

 

I do agree there has not been an industrialized species on earth before. The strongest case for the lack of a prior industrialized species on earth, IMHO, is that we still have ample coal and oil.

[Mokele]

Another point to consider: humans have only been around 500k years, but our ancestors were around for MUCH longer, and showing large brains since well before we showed up.

 

Primates diverged very early in the fossil record (just after the KT event), and it wasn't long before brains got bigger. Monkeys (which have noticeably big brains) are known from 40 million years of fossils, apes from almost 20 million years.

 

Now, of course, it's possible that things just didn't fossilize, but all things considered, you'd expect there to be more "intermediates" in the record.

[Sisyphus]

I still think you're underestimating the sheer number of durable artifacts currently around on a planet of 7 billion people, and just how many 7 billion actually is. If you estimate ::reaches in the air:: and average of 10,000 t-rex's alive at a time, or even just per generation, there are still 700,000 times that many humans alive right now. That means every generation of humans has the same order of magnitude of number of individuals as the entire 3 million year history of the t-rex species history. Even if we go extinct extremely quickly (geologically speaking), we can surely expect a whole lot of fossilized remains.

Edited October 20, 2009 by Sisyphus

[SH3RL0CK]

I am now becoming more convinced that there would indeed be a more reasonable chance that the presence of an industrialized civilization 65 million years ago would be known today for the following reasons:

 

1) as I stated, there would be very little fossil fuel left dating from before this time...we know this isn't the case as we are currently in the process of burning it all up.

 

2) Mokele makes a great point about intermediates in the fossil record. AFAIK, other than primates, there isn't a divergence showing a marked increase in intelligence. Granted there is a big time difference between 20 m.y.o. and say 80 m.y.o., but still.

 

3) Sisyphus's point that seven billion is a large number is worthy of reconsideration. I'm still not convinced that in this number all that many fossils would be around and be discovered (10,000 T-rexs seems low, but even allowing a few orders of magnitude more doesn't change the picture much). But I am more convinced that at least one set of remains might be found.

 

4) But more so, seven billion peoples discarded beer bottles and other durable trash is going to be a rather large amount of garbage that could be found in the future. We do generate a vast amount of trash, even disregarding what winds up in the landfills.

[foodchain]

I don't know enough about paleontology to refute it, but it seems like a species as ubiquitous and environment-changing enough to cause a mass extinction would leave lots of traces behind. Are there fossils that suddenly show up in large numbers all over the world at the time of the mass extinction?

 

Also, if that is the cause, then the dominant theories have to be wrong, and that has to be demonstrated too. Is all the evidence for a major impact event flawed? Or was there a massive impact, but it just happened coincidentally?

 

Also one might expect lots of fossils indicative of some kind of food stock.

[D H]

What traces would you expect to remain after 65 million years?

That is still the wrong question, but is getting close.

 

The right question: Why do we still have deposits of coal, oil, and iron?

[granpa]

What traces would you expect to remain after 65 million years?

 

To enact climate change would require an industrial civilization to be sure,

 

uh...I dont think so. even the aborigines used slash and burn.

[Mr Skeptic]

Well here's a thought: where would we be without agriculture? Agriculture was almost a prerequisite to our industrial society, as it allowed us to live in one place and in great numbers. And if the intelligent dino's were carnivores, they would have an even harder time than us intelligent humans to advance technologically, since they wouldn't be able to settle down. This leads me to conclude that technologically advanced species are likely to start as omnivores: the intelligence hunters need but the ability to settle down.

[SH3RL0CK]

uh...I dont think so. even the aborigines used slash and burn.

 

I strongly doubt slash and burn can be a sufficient modification to enact a global change of climate.

[iNow]

I strongly doubt slash and burn can be a sufficient modification to enact a global change of climate.

 

Obviously, it depends on scale. Burning adds CO2 and other elements to the atmosphere, and killing that plant life decreases the base of organisms which would re-absorb that CO2 as part of the respiratory process.

 

However, I tend to agree that it's a stretch.

[Moontanman]

So far this has been a great thread, many of the points made are addressed in the link I put in the first post. What amazed me was the number of places this idea was taken at least semi seriously.

 

All sorts of caveats can be made to explain lack of evidence, like maybe they cremated their dead or the population was less dense than our or they lived clustered around geologically unstable areas.

 

The idea of Gas and oil is I think a good point except that new gas and oil deposits are being created all the time and destroyed all the time by nature. Even if you don't believe the abiogenic oil you have to admit that oil is refilling old fields (at a rate far too slow to affect the oil crisis) at a slow rate and even though we might very well have sucked the planet dry, in several millions of years new oil fields may very well come into being near the surface again. Iron deposits are another matter and may very well be a deal breaker.

 

For me the only way it could be true is if the population was small, not world wide, and their impact on the Earth was minimal, but of course this negates the basic premise of them having some thing to do with the demise of the dinosaurs to begin with.

 

This is an interesting idea:

 

Caches of bones of a single species are regarded by paleoanthropologists as suggesting husbandry. In the development of man, various cultures seemed to concentrate on ibex, horses, reindeer and so on. Could it be that ceratopsians and hadrosaurs were actually domestic animals like cows and sheep kept for food?

 

 

All in all the idea makes for some good Science Fiction ideas but even if intelligent dinosaurs happened I have to agree with the consensus that they did not cause the extinction of the dinosaurs.

 

Thanks for the great discussion dudes and dudettes, here are some more links to this idea

 

http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2008/03/dinosauroids_2008.php

 

http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/D/dinosaurintell.html

 

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/features/print/1444/smartasaurus

[D H]

The idea of Gas and oil is I think a good point except that new gas and oil deposits are being created all the time and destroyed all the time by nature.

Most of the coal we mine now was formed during the Carboniferous, 300 to 360 million years ago. Oil's origins are a bit more widespread in time, but most of our oil is from well before the Cretaceous. That coal and oil would have been around for those intelligent dinosaurs to extract -- except the didn't. Proof: It's still here.

 

The world's iron deposits are even older, dating back to the development of photosynthesis.

 

BTW, abiogenic oil is a crock.

[Moontanman]

BTW, abiogenic oil is a crock.

 

No, the way the hypothesis of abiotic oil became totally distorted by the people who wanted desperately to prove that there was no way we could run out of oil is a crock. Thomas Gold came out with a book suggesting that hydrocarbon deposits are geology reworked by biology instead of biology reworked by geology and the crazies went nuts. People who wanted to prove oil was an unlimited resource hijacked the idea so thoroughly every one assumed it meant oil was being created at a pace we could never use up. Nothing could be further from the truth but as in most displays of emotion the truth has little place among the fantasies. So much ideology, emotion, and money rode on an idea that did not support the idea of unlimited oil to begin it was never really investigated properly. Any attempt to investigate the idea of geology reworked by biology is met with such venom that no one wants to risk even suggesting it might have some merit.