In the last few years, the media have run headlines about alleged ‘feathered dinosaurs’ proving that dinosaurs evolved into birds. These alleged ancestors are types of
theropods, the group of carnivorous dinosaurs that includes
Tyrannosaurus rex.
We should remember that the media often sensationalize ‘proofs’ of evolution, but the later disproofs, even by other evolutionists, hardly rate a mention. For example, in 1996 there were headlines like ‘Feathered Fossil Proves Some Dinosaurs Evolved into Birds.’5 This was about a fossil called
Sinosauropteryx prima.6 Creationist publications advised readers to be skeptical and keep an open mind.7 They were vindicated when four leading paleontologists, including Yale University's John Ostrom, later found that the ‘feathers’ were just a parallel array of fibres,8 probably collagen.
[
Update: see Dr Feduccia’s recent research supporting the identification as collagen, ‘Do Featured Dinosaurs Exist?: Testing the Hypothesis on Neontological and Paleontological Evidence’, by Alan Feduccia, Theagarten Lingham-Soliar, and J. Richard Hinchliffe,
Journal of Morphology 266:125–166, 2005;
Published Online: 10 October 2005 (DOI: 10.1002/jmor.10382).]
Another famous alleged dino-bird link was
Mononykus, claimed to be a ‘flightless bird.’9 The cover of
Time magazine even illustrated it with feathers, although not the slightest trace of feathers had been found.10 Later evidence indicated that ‘
Mononykus was clearly not a bird … it clearly was a fleet-footed fossorial [digging] theropod.’11
Many news agencies have reported (June 1998) on two fossils found in Northern China that are claimed to be feathered theropods (meat-eating dinosaurs). The fossils,
Protarchaeopteryx robusta and
Caudipteryx zoui, are claimed to be ‘the immediate ancestors of the first birds.’12
The two latest discoveries are ‘dated’ at 120 to 136 million years while
Archaeopteryx, a true bird, is ‘dated’ at 140 to 150 million years, making these ‘bird ancestors’ far younger than their descendants!
Feduccia is not convinced, and neither is his colleague, University of Kansas paleontologist Larry Martin. Martin says: ‘You have to put this into perspective. To the people who wrote the paper, the chicken would be a feathered dinosaur.’13 Feduccia and Martin believe that
Protarchaeopteryx and
Caudipteryx are more likely to be flightless birds similar to ostriches. They have bird-like teeth and lack the long tail seen in theropods.
Caudipteryx even used gizzard stones like modern plant-eating birds, but unlike theropods.14
There are many problems with the dinosaur-to-bird dogma. Feduccia points out:
‘It's biophysically impossible to evolve flight from such large bipeds with foreshortened forelimbs and heavy, balancing tails,’ exactly the wrong anatomy for flight.15
There is also very strong evidence from the forelimb structures that dinosaurs could not have been the ancestors of birds. A team led by Feduccia studied bird embryos under a microscope, and published their study in the journal
Science.16 Their findings were reported as follows: New research shows that birds lack the embryonic thumb that dinosaurs had, suggesting that it is ‘almost impossible’ for the species to be closely related.17