RRJ#2

Reference:

Dybas, C. and NSF. Cain, E. (2010, January 28). dinosaur discovery helps solve piece of evolutionary puzzle. National Science Foundation directorate for biological sciences (BIO), George Washington University, retrieved Feb. 1, 2010, from
http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=116291&org=BIO&from=news.

Summary:

This article tells us about the new evidence of a kind of dinosaurs, which looks like bird, but does not belong to birds. This kind of dinosaurs is distinct from the birds. National Science Foundation supposed some scientists’ expeditions. They went to Xinjiang Autonomous Region, a part of northwestern China. This place is famous for Late Jurassic fossils. After through many of expeditions, these scientists found many interesting fossils. Especially, they found the fossil of Haplocheirus, which was their major discovery. Haplocheirus is a transitional fossil; it displays an early evolutionary process, so it reflects the process that the later alvarezsaurs develop and change from earlier predatory dinosaurs. And this kind of fossil also proves the scientists’ predictions-the Alvarezsauridae is used to develop in the Late Jurassic time period. Besides, according this article, the Late Jurassic period is very important in that the birds evolved in this time.

Reaction:

After reading, I feel this expedition was historic. The new fossil can return a real situation of the Late Jurassic period, and let our people find the truth of the dinosaurs’ evolution. Before I held the same view with scientists, that the birds are evolved from the group of Alvarezsauridae. Even though this result is announced to republic but I was so shocked that I could not believe this fact. That is because it is totally different; the knowledge that students learned before was the opposite. In addition, as a Chinese I’m very proud of our country; this most important historic thing was found in China. This new discovery can help us to fix the erroneous theory, and let our students obtain the right knowledge; it is good for our science development. I realize that sometimes the firm knowledge maybe is wrong, even if people believe it for so many years. When we have different views, we should point out our questions, not just follow the rules.