Dinosaurs
Dinosaurs inhabited the Earth, taking up the lands, the seas and the skies. They thrived, filling up the Earth with life, love and nature. But one fateful day, a massive meteoroid came down crashing into the Earth, killing our dinosaurs and burying them deep into the earth Billions of years went by, and not a single soul had known about the mere existence of ‘terrible lizards’. However, one day a man named William Buckland went deep into research for nine years before bestowing it the name of the order: “Dinosaur” Years later, more and more fossils were found, and new species are still being discovered to this day.
Have you ever watched “Jurassic Park” or any of the “Jurassic World” films? Well, I, for one, surely have! I really like this film series because it is one of the few sci-fi films I have actually watched in my life, and it is pretty interesting in its entirety. Now, let us step away from handsome actors and incredibly realistic CGI and head to the topic at hand: Dinosaurs.
There is quite a lot to cover when it comes to this topic, so I’m just breaking it down into three categories I would like to highlight for you: The first discovery of dinosaurs, their eras, and for a little pizzazz, going into Micheal Criton’s films and look at some of the things the filmmakers and directors portrayed wrong.
Firstly, we are going to step into the discovery of dinosaurs. In the 18th century- 1824 to be precise- an English geologist named Rev William Buckland announced the discovery of a new species, which he named the Megalosaurus. This species was the first-ever dinosaur to be given. This gave a new insight into the world of the past, shocking millions with this discovery.
Another man named Richard Owen came up with the name from the Greek word ‘deinos’, meaning terrible and ‘sauros’, meaning lizard. Later on, the human race finds more species of dinosaurs, and they are still looking. One of the most recent fossils to be found of a new dinosaur was Guemesia ochoai found this year.
Secondly, we are going to look at the prehistoric periods. Now, these periods aren’t just a hop, skip and jump away. They were millions of years ago before humans were alive.
There are three main periods, the Paleozoic, Mesozoic and the Cenozoic. The Paleozoic has seven eras. They are the Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Mississippian, Pennsylvanian and Permian. The Mesozoic is made up of 3 eras; the Triassic, Jurassic and the Cretaceous. And the Cenozoic is made up of 7, which are the paleocene, eocene, oligocene, miocene, pliocene, pleistocene and holocene.
And finally, the topic you have all been waiting for.... What did the people at Jurassic Park/World do wrong?! One of the things they got wrong was the dilophosaurus. It was supposedly about a meter tall in the films, but in reality, dilophosauruses average height was around 20 feet!
They also portrayed this dinosaur to have a frilled neck and that it could spit poison, but really it doesn’t have a glamorous accessory on its head and is completely clear of toxic saliva. A different dinosaur they got wrong was the raptor. Raptors actually have feathers, so they aren’t stark naked like they were seen in the films.
References
https://www.amnh.org/dinosaurs/dinosaur-facts
https://www.livescience.com/3945-history-dinosaurs.html
Author biography
Aishath Aan Abdullah Rafeeu is a 13 year old from the capital city of Malé. She has been a participant in theCircle by Ugail Foundation Coding and Critical Thinking Programme of 2021 and is now a young leader of the 2022 Leaders of Tomorrow programme. She has a perky, bold and bubbly personality. Her favourite genre is fantasy, murder mystery and information. A fun fact about Aan is that she loves Marvel! She aims to be a travel blogger in the future as she loves to travel! She is now in Jamaluddin school and is a member of the first batch in her school's Sign Language Club. She likes watching 'Forensic Files', making origami, roleplaying, and making her own characters.
Cite this article as:
Aishath Aan Abdullah Rafeeu, Dinosaurs, theCircle Composition, Volume 2, (2022). https://thecirclecomposition.org/dinosaurs-2/