Dinosaurs under the Aurora

Notes

149 NOTES 1. The Arctic Setting 1. The fossil horsetail rush Equisetites is abundantly represented by root casts in what were once sediments depositing in ponds, along river banks, and in floodplain wetlands during the Cretaceous. The modern equivalent of this taxon is Equisetum, popularly known as the scouring or horsetail rush. This plant incorporates abundant amounts of microcrystals of silica in its cell walls, making it highly abrasive on teeth. This and plants such as ferns and cycads also contain silica bodies called phytolithsTrueplant stones.” All of these plants were abundant when hadrosaurs and ceratopsians roamed Alaska’s paleo-Arctic. These highly abrasive plant tissues may have been a key factor in the evolution of the tooth batteries that marked both of these lineages of dinosaurs during the Late Cretaceous. 2. Prasad, Strömberg, Habib, et al. (2005). It shouldn’t surprise anyone working on the paleoecology of the Late Cretaceous that several varieties of grasses had evolved by this time. At present, we have no direct evidence of grasses in the paleo-Arctic record . However, comprehensive phytolith sampling of hadrosaur and ceratopsian teeth has not been conducted as yet, but it is a promising research direction . The first angiosperms date back to the Early Cretaceous (Aptian) and were rapidly evolving by the Campanian. See Fastovsky and Smith (2004), 619, for an excellent graphic summary of the Cretaceous plant record. 3. Totman Parrish and Spicer (1988); Spicer, Totman Parrish, and Grant (1992); Spicer (2003). 4. Nikiforuk (1984); Varricchio, Jackson, Scherzeer, et al. (2005). 5. Velikovsky (1955), 13–15. Also see Goldsmith (1977) for discussions that question Velikovsky’s logic and his grasp of astronomy and planetary dynamics. Although this collection of essays concentrates on Velikovsky’s Worlds in Collision, there are a number of refutations of Velikovsky’s assumptions and basic premises that are pertinent to his Earth in Upheaval. 6. The Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP 1997; 1998) and Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF 2001) are the sources of mapped information used in plate 1. The Arctic is defined by latitude, vegetation, and temperature. 7. Williams (2003); Berton (2001). Also see Roderick (1997), 135. 8. Lopez (2001). 9. The Thing from Another World is a 1951 movie that takes place at a research base in Alaska. An alien “killer vegetable” is found frozen in ice, having crashed there on a journey from outer space. In the 1978 movie, Superman is compelled by the power of kryptonite to fly to the Arctic Circle to discover who he really is and where he came from. 10. Michener (1988); Davis, Liston, and Whitmore (1998). 11. See figure 1.3. 12. Cohen (2002). 13. The Lost World is the title of a book written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame. In The Lost World, Doyle tells the tale of an expedition to a mysterious plateau in the Amazon Basin of South America that has preserved a world of the past with all manner of ancient critters, including dinosaurs. Published in 1912, the book was the basis for a Hollywood movie in 1925 and influenced the plots of several movies and books that followed, including Michael Crichton’s The Lost World, published in 1995. 14. Cohen (2002), 42. 15. Cohen (2002), 61. 16. Norman (1985); Sarjeant (1997). 17. Rudwick (1985). 18. Sagan (1996). 2. Tracks Lead the Way The epigraph is from McPhee (1998), 64. In his Annals of the Former World, McPhee, a journalist, writes a book that celebrates the science of geology in a way that is almost poetic. More importantly, he writes in a way that communicates clearly and excitedly how geologists piece together the fascinating history of the earth. He undertakes a series of journeys across the United States during which he engages with a series of active geologic researchers from various backgrounds and geologic specialties, who he portrays as human beings living out their passion for discovery and understanding. 1. McFarling and Lafferty (2003); Fookes (2008), 150; Berkman and Young (2009). 150 Notes to Pages 11–33 2. Scotese, Gahagan, Ross, et al. (1987); Smith, Hurley, and Briden (1981); Rich , Gangloff, and Hammer (1997), 564. 3. Lapparent (1962). 4. Lapparent (1962), 18. 5. Hurum, Milàn, Hammer, et al. (2006). 6. Edwards, Edwards, and Colbert (1978). 7. Upchurch, Otto-Bliesner, and Scotese (1999). 8. Rich, Gangloff, and Hammer (1997), 563–64. 9. Núñez-Betelu, Hills, and Currie (1995); Chen, Osadetz, Embry, et al. (2000). See also plate 8. 10. Grady (1993...