New Page--Dinosaur-Age Fossil Leaves In California

[Inyo]

Not long ago, I uploaded my latest fossils-related page: "Dinosaur-Age
Fossil Leaves At Del Puerto Canyon, California" over at
http://inyo4.coffeecup.com/morenofossils/morenofossils.html . It's a
field trip--with detailed text, on-site images, and photographs of
fossil specimens--to a fossil leaf locality in the upper Cretaceous
portion of the upper Cretaceous to Paleocene Moreno Formation near the
western edge of California's Great Central Valley.

Of course, the world-famous Moreno Formation produces California's
recently established State Dinosaur (formally recognized in September,
2017), a hadrosaur duckbill herbivore called Augustynolophus morrisi.

A fascinating paleontological side-story here is that sophisticated high
resolution stratigraphic sampling of Moreno Formation foraminfera (tiny
shells secreted by a microscopic single-celled organism)--exquisitely
sensitive time indicators that lived and died during specific,
restricted moments in geologic time--proves that during deposition of
the Moreno Formation, the hadrosaur dinosaurs went extinct a full 1.23
million years before the infamous meteorite impact of 66 million years
ago that many investigators identify as the kill-shot which ended the
dinosaurian dynasty on Earth.

[erik simpson]

Thanks for this! I worked at an experimental radar facility run by SRI near Los
Banos for many years, and when I had the time I rode my bike up Del Puerto
Canyon many times, but I never stopped to look at the rocks. I assumed (wrong!)
that it was "Franciscan trash" never examined it closely. I'll check it out.

[Inyo]

On 1/13/2018 10:34 AM, Inyo wrote:

> A fascinating paleontological side-story here is that sophisticated high
> resolution stratigraphic sampling of Moreno Formation foraminfera (tiny
> shells secreted by a microscopic single-celled organism)--exquisitely
> sensitive time indicators that lived and died during specific,
> restricted moments in geologic time--proves that during deposition of
> the Moreno Formation, the hadrosaur dinosaurs went extinct a full 1.23
> million years before the infamous meteorite impact of 66 million years
> ago that many investigators identify as the kill-shot which ended the
> dinosaurian dynasty on Earth.

Forgot to mention that that same foraminifer study demonstrated that the
Moreno Formation mosasaurs went extinct 158,000 years before that big
space chunk bolide struck Earth some 66 million years ago.

[erik simpson]

Having found no Mosasaur remains in the last 158000 years prior to Chixilub
isn't proof that they went extinct at the date of the last known fossil. That would be very unlikely, requiring the identification of the fossil as the last.
Some analysis is needed to establish when the line went extinct. Do you have a
relevant reference?

[Peter Nyikos]

For that matter, the statement about hadrosaur dinosaurs would seem only to apply to their absence in the Moreno formation. I don't know how widespread hadrosaurs were, but there seems even to be some confusion about their classification. See:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadrosauroidea

and also:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadrosauromorpha

for various rival classifications.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina

[Peter Nyikos]

On Saturday, January 13, 2018 at 1:34:12 PM UTC-5, Inyo wrote:

> Not long ago, I uploaded my latest fossils-related page: "Dinosaur-Age
> Fossil Leaves At Del Puerto Canyon, California" over at
> http://inyo4.coffeecup.com/morenofossils/morenofossils.html . It's a
> field trip--with detailed text, on-site images, and photographs of
> fossil specimens--to a fossil leaf locality in the upper Cretaceous
> portion of the upper Cretaceous to Paleocene Moreno Formation near the
> western edge of California's Great Central Valley.
>

Great pictures, and lots of fascinating information, Inyo! Any chance of you
being able to identify those fossil leaves?

> Of course, the world-famous Moreno Formation produces California's
> recently established State Dinosaur (formally recognized in September,
> 2017), a hadrosaur duckbill herbivore called Augustynolophus morrisi.

The Aussies are similarly proud of their own *Muttaburrasaurus*, an
ornithopod closely related to the hadrosaurs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muttaburrasaurus

Its holotype is an almost complete skeleton, which was actually found
in marine deposits, but the consensus is that the carcass was washed
out to sea.
[source: _In Search of Ancient Queensland_, published in 2015 by the
Queensland Museum. page 157]

You seem to be describing a similar situation in your linked webpage:

And despite the undeniable fact that the rocks overwhelmingly
represent marine-originated horizons--a lithologically monotonous
interbedding of alternating shales, siltstone and sandstones--
several sections nevertheless reveal near-shore paleoenvironments
where the abundant remains of terrestrial plants and occasional
hadrosaur duckbilled dinosaurs can be found in strata
whose normally diagnostic fossils include ammonites, pelecypods,
gastropods, foraminifers (microscopic shells secreted by a
single-celled animal), tube worms, corals, giant sea turtles,
and marine reptiles--plesiosaurs and mosasaurs.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina

http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

[John Harshman]

Signor-Lipps effect:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signor–Lipps_effect

Signor, P. W., III and Lipps, J. H. (1982) Sampling bias, gradual
extinction patterns, and catastrophes in the fossil record, in
Geological implications of impacts of large asteroids and comets on the
Earth (ed. L. T. Silver and P. H. Schultz), Geological Society of
America Special Publication, vol. 190, pp. 291-296.

[erik simpson]

Ah, thanks. I knew I'd seen this, but I'd forgotten where and who.

[Peter Nyikos]

Common sense stuff; I'm surprised they bothered to name it after anyone.

Also the Wiki entry is all too brief and makes such comments as
this one-liner natural.

The debate as to how slow or how fast dinosaurs, etc. became extinct
still goes on, and the fossil evidence keeps coming in, just as
common sense would dictate. But we shouldn't forget that it wasn't
just dinosaurs that met their demise: there were also mosasaurs and
plesiosaurs and pterosaurs and enantiornithine birds.

There is also a big disconnect: the great extinctions are professionally
described and measured using mostly marine and mostly invertebrate fossils,
whereas in the public mind they are tied to the disappearance of big
vertebrates, both on land and sea. The latest great extinction, still
ongoing, is not yet recognized professionally as such because it mainly
involves birds and mammals, many if not most of them made extinct by humans.

And I know of only one sea animal made extinct by humans: Stellar's sea cow
-- a tragic extinction, to be sure -- unless one counts the Biscay right
whale as a separate species.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--

U. of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

[John Harshman]

Was there really any need to belittle Signor and Lipps that way?

> Also the Wiki entry is all too brief and makes such comments as
> this one-liner natural.

I would suggest reading the actual paper before judging.

> The debate as to how slow or how fast dinosaurs, etc. became extinct
> still goes on, and the fossil evidence keeps coming in, just as
> common sense would dictate. But we shouldn't forget that it wasn't
> just dinosaurs that met their demise: there were also mosasaurs and
> plesiosaurs and pterosaurs and enantiornithine birds.

And ammonites, and many groups of forams, etc. But what is the relevance
here?

> There is also a big disconnect: the great extinctions are professionally
> described and measured using mostly marine and mostly invertebrate fossils,
> whereas in the public mind they are tied to the disappearance of big
> vertebrates, both on land and sea. The latest great extinction, still
> ongoing, is not yet recognized professionally as such because it mainly
> involves birds and mammals, many if not most of them made extinct by humans.
>
> And I know of only one sea animal made extinct by humans: Stellar's sea cow
> -- a tragic extinction, to be sure -- unless one counts the Biscay right
> whale as a separate species.

Spelling flame: "Steller's". I'm not sure I'm on board with this
free-association. If you have nothing to say, I would not complain if
you said nothing. Don't feel forced to make conversation.

[Peter Nyikos]

Don't be silly: I was belittling the write-up of the effect on Wikipedia.
If there's a lot more to it, why didn't you tell us what it was,
so we could arrive at a better appreciation of Signor and Lipps?

And if there isn't much more to it, how about telling us more about
these two scientists, so that we could ...[continue as above]?

>
> > Also the Wiki entry is all too brief and makes such comments as
> > this one-liner natural.

> I would suggest reading the actual paper before judging.

That's exactly my course of action. But...have YOU seen the paper?
Unless you can tell me something that goes well beyond what Wiki says
about the effect, I see no reason to give high priority to reading it,
let alone judging it.

> > The debate as to how slow or how fast dinosaurs, etc. became extinct
> > still goes on, and the fossil evidence keeps coming in, just as
> > common sense would dictate. But we shouldn't forget that it wasn't
> > just dinosaurs that met their demise: there were also mosasaurs and
> > plesiosaurs and pterosaurs and enantiornithine birds.
>
> And ammonites, and many groups of forams, etc. But what is the relevance
> here?

The relevance is that the Wiki entry spoke only of dinosaur extinctions.
I see I should have made it clearer that I was still criticizing the
skimpy information there. See quote near the end.


To save you a bit of trouble in case you have not seen the article...

Clicking on the Wikipedia reference to the article only takes me here:

https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/books/book/350/chapter/3796467/sampling-bias-gradual-extinction-patterns-and?redirectedFrom=PDF

It gives me a DOI, but that's the only information not available on
the Wiki webpage itself:

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1130/SPE190-p291

It's clickable, but it just takes me right back to the same page!
Copying and pasting it into my browser has the same effect.

>
> > There is also a big disconnect: the great extinctions are professionally
> > described and measured using mostly marine and mostly invertebrate fossils,
> > whereas in the public mind they are tied to the disappearance of big
> > vertebrates, both on land and sea. The latest great extinction, still
> > ongoing, is not yet recognized professionally as such because it mainly
> > involves birds and mammals, many if not most of them made extinct by humans.
> >
> > And I know of only one sea animal made extinct by humans: Stellar's sea cow
> > -- a tragic extinction, to be sure -- unless one counts the Biscay right
> > whale as a separate species.
>
> Spelling flame: "Steller's". I'm not sure I'm on board with this
> free-association.

It isn't free-association. Didn't you read the Wiki entry? Here
is what I was reacting to:

But the Signor–Lipps effect is more important for the difficulties
it raises in paleontology:

It makes it very difficult to be confident about the timing and
speed of mass extinctions, and this makes it difficult to test
theories about the causes of mass extinctions. For example, the
extinction of the dinosaurs was long thought to be a gradual process,
but evidence collected since the late 1980s suggests it was abrupt,
which is consistent with the idea that an asteroid impact caused it.

Why would it have been thought to be a gradual process, with all
that corroborative evidence of so many species (and families,
and orders) going extinct so close to the demise of the (non-avian)
dinosaurs?

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--

U. of So. Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

[John Harshman]

All you have to do is read the paper. And you might google Phil Signor
and Jere Lipps.

>>> Also the Wiki entry is all too brief and makes such comments as
>>> this one-liner natural.
>
>> I would suggest reading the actual paper before judging.
>
> That's exactly my course of action. But...have YOU seen the paper?

Yes, though not recently.

> Unless you can tell me something that goes well beyond what Wiki says
> about the effect, I see no reason to give high priority to reading it,
> let alone judging it.

No problem. I was complaining about you judging it. If you want to
retract the judgment, pending further investigation, fine.

>>> The debate as to how slow or how fast dinosaurs, etc. became extinct
>>> still goes on, and the fossil evidence keeps coming in, just as
>>> common sense would dictate. But we shouldn't forget that it wasn't
>>> just dinosaurs that met their demise: there were also mosasaurs and
>>> plesiosaurs and pterosaurs and enantiornithine birds.
>>
>> And ammonites, and many groups of forams, etc. But what is the relevance
>> here?
>
> The relevance is that the Wiki entry spoke only of dinosaur extinctions.
> I see I should have made it clearer that I was still criticizing the
> skimpy information there. See quote near the end.

You were unclear. It sounded as if you were criticizing Signor and Lipps.

> To save you a bit of trouble in case you have not seen the article...
>
> Clicking on the Wikipedia reference to the article only takes me here:
>
> https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/books/book/350/chapter/3796467/sampling-bias-gradual-extinction-patterns-and?redirectedFrom=PDF
>
> It gives me a DOI, but that's the only information not available on
> the Wiki webpage itself:
>
> DOI: https://doi.org/10.1130/SPE190-p291
>
> It's clickable, but it just takes me right back to the same page!
> Copying and pasting it into my browser has the same effect.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279419960_Sampling_bias_gradual_extinction_patterns_and_catastrophes_in_the_fossil_record

I'm not really interested in discussing the wikipedia entry. Just
because they're apparently obsessed with dinosaurs to the exclusion of
all else is no reason to harp on it. I'm not sure why a mass extinction
being spread across multiple taxa makes is less likely to be gradual,
though.

[Peter Nyikos]

On Thursday, January 18, 2018 at 10:47:49 PM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
> On 1/18/18 7:10 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> > On Wednesday, January 17, 2018 at 10:51:07 PM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
> >> On 1/17/18 6:57 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> >>> On Monday, January 15, 2018 at 10:06:27 PM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
> >>>> On 1/14/18 8:09 PM, erik simpson wrote:
> >>>>> On Sunday, January 14, 2018 at 6:13:37 PM UTC-8, Inyo wrote:

> >>>>>> Forgot to mention that that same foraminifer study demonstrated that the
> >>>>>> Moreno Formation mosasaurs went extinct 158,000 years before that big
> >>>>>> space chunk bolide struck Earth some 66 million years ago.


> >>>>> Having found no Mosasaur remains in the last 158000 years prior to Chixilub
> >>>>> isn't proof that they went extinct at the date of the last known fossil. That would be very unlikely, requiring the identification of the fossil as the last.
> >>>>> Some analysis is needed to establish when the line went extinct. Do you have a
> >>>>> relevant reference?


> >>>> Signor-Lipps effect:
> >>>>
> >>>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signor–Lipps_effect
> >>>>
> >>>> Signor, P. W., III and Lipps, J. H. (1982) Sampling bias, gradual
> >>>> extinction patterns, and catastrophes in the fossil record, in
> >>>> Geological implications of impacts of large asteroids and comets on the
> >>>> Earth (ed. L. T. Silver and P. H. Schultz), Geological Society of
> >>>> America Special Publication, vol. 190, pp. 291-296.
> >>>
> >>> Common sense stuff; I'm surprised they bothered to name it after anyone.
> >>
> >> Was there really any need to belittle Signor and Lipps that way?
> >
> > Don't be silly: I was belittling the write-up of the effect on Wikipedia.

Your comments below suggest that you skimmed over this last sentence
without it sticking in your memory.

> > If there's a lot more to it, why didn't you tell us what it was,
> > so we could arrive at a better appreciation of Signor and Lipps?
> >
> > And if there isn't much more to it, how about telling us more about
> > these two scientists, so that we could ...[continue as above]?
>
> All you have to do is read the paper. And you might google Phil Signor
> and Jere Lipps.
>
> >>> Also the Wiki entry is all too brief and makes such comments as
> >>> this one-liner natural.
> >
> >> I would suggest reading the actual paper before judging.
> >
> > That's exactly my course of action. But...have YOU seen the paper?
>
> Yes, though not recently.
>
> > Unless you can tell me something that goes well beyond what Wiki says
> > about the effect, I see no reason to give high priority to reading it,
> > let alone judging it.
>
> No problem. I was complaining about you judging it. If you want to
> retract the judgment, pending further investigation, fine.

There was no judgment, except of what Wikipedia has on the topic.

You are pushing the envelope of our agreement.

> >>> The debate as to how slow or how fast dinosaurs, etc. became extinct
> >>> still goes on, and the fossil evidence keeps coming in, just as
> >>> common sense would dictate. But we shouldn't forget that it wasn't
> >>> just dinosaurs that met their demise: there were also mosasaurs and
> >>> plesiosaurs and pterosaurs and enantiornithine birds.
> >>
> >> And ammonites, and many groups of forams, etc. But what is the relevance
> >> here?
> >
> > The relevance is that the Wiki entry spoke only of dinosaur extinctions.
> > I see I should have made it clearer that I was still criticizing the
> > skimpy information there. See quote near the end.
>
> You were unclear. It sounded as if you were criticizing Signor and Lipps.

I have no idea what gave you the idea. If something came to be known as
"the Harshman Phenomenon" if it just gives the ratio between the longer
and shorter toes of a sample of 1000 ostriches, in an article of yours,
wouldn't you feel a little insulted if your name were forever after
associated with this ratio by future generations?

<snip>

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279419960_Sampling_bias_gradual_extinction_patterns_and_catastrophes_in_the_fossil_record

Thanks for the link to the article. I can already see from the abstract
that there is a lot more to it than what has been referred to in this
thread and in Wikipedia as "the Signor-Lipps effect".

So, my interest in the article has been stimulated, and I intend to
get around to reading it in February. My projects at work give me
very limited time for posting this month.

I did begin an on-topic thread in talk.origins today, and Erik has
made a very helpful correction of a typo of mine there:

Subject: Re: Predictions: Carlip on Theoretical Physics, Nyikos on Evolutionary Theory
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/talk.origins/ffonUPN_ISQ/Ois9W3dXBAAJ

But I don't intend to start any more threads this month.


Remainder deleted, to be replied to later.

Peter Nyikos
Professor of Mathematics
University of South Carolina --standard disclaimer--

[erik simpson]

In the amount of time you've spent crabbing about it, you could have read the
article itself. For what it's worth (very little), I also read your initial
reaction as belittling Signor and Lipps. Belittling comes easily to you.

[ruben safir]

On 01/18/2018 10:10 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> Don't be silly: I was belittling the write-up of the effect on Wikipedia.

wikipedea is not in any way reliable and is run but a bunch of nutcases.

[erik simpson]

That's a pretty hard assessment. I'd be more inclined to say that Wiki's coverage
is uneven. Some of their accounts are excellent, some are rudimetary. The one
being criticized here is not one of the excellent.

[ruben safir]

On 01/28/2018 04:44 PM, erik simpson wrote:
> That's a pretty hard assessment.

no it is soft. The reality is much worst.

[Peter Nyikos]

On Friday, January 19, 2018 at 10:52:25 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
> On Friday, January 19, 2018 at 7:34:57 PM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> > On Thursday, January 18, 2018 at 10:47:49 PM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
> > > On 1/18/18 7:10 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> > > > On Wednesday, January 17, 2018 at 10:51:07 PM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
> > > >> On 1/17/18 6:57 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> > > >>> On Monday, January 15, 2018 at 10:06:27 PM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:

> > > >>>> Signor-Lipps effect:
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signor–Lipps_effect
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> Signor, P. W., III and Lipps, J. H. (1982) Sampling bias, gradual
> > > >>>> extinction patterns, and catastrophes in the fossil record, in
> > > >>>> Geological implications of impacts of large asteroids and comets on the
> > > >>>> Earth (ed. L. T. Silver and P. H. Schultz), Geological Society of
> > > >>>> America Special Publication, vol. 190, pp. 291-296.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> Common sense stuff; I'm surprised they bothered to name it after anyone.
> > > >>
> > > >> Was there really any need to belittle Signor and Lipps that way?
> > > >
> > > > Don't be silly: I was belittling the write-up of the effect on Wikipedia.

<snip for focus>

> > > > I see I should have made it clearer that I was still criticizing the
> > > > skimpy information there. See quote near the end.
> > >
> > > You were unclear. It sounded as if you were criticizing Signor and Lipps.
> >
> > I have no idea what gave you the idea. If something came to be known as
> > "the Harshman Phenomenon" if it just gives the ratio between the longer
> > and shorter toes of a sample of 1000 ostriches, in an article of yours,
> > wouldn't you feel a little insulted if your name were forever after
> > associated with this ratio by future generations?
> >
> > <snip>
> >
> > https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279419960_Sampling_bias_gradual_extinction_patterns_and_catastrophes_in_the_fossil_record
> >
> > Thanks for the link to the article. I can already see from the abstract
> > that there is a lot more to it than what has been referred to in this
> > thread and in Wikipedia as "the Signor-Lipps effect".
> >
> > So, my interest in the article has been stimulated, and I intend to
> > get around to reading it in February. My projects at work give me
> > very limited time for posting this month.
> >
> > I did begin an on-topic thread in talk.origins today, and Erik has
> > made a very helpful correction of a typo of mine there:
> >
> > Subject: Re: Predictions: Carlip on Theoretical Physics, Nyikos on Evolutionary Theory
> > https://groups.google.com/d/msg/talk.origins/ffonUPN_ISQ/Ois9W3dXBAAJ

> In the amount of time you've spent crabbing about it, you could have read the
> article itself.

Wrong. I didn't get to see any of it until most of the crabbing
was done.

Besides, two of us were crabbing. And you are crabbing now too.

And neither you nor Harshman said anything
about my analogy. Is it not apt?

> For what it's worth (very little), I also read your initial
> reaction as belittling Signor and Lipps.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt, I assume you had thought
I had read one or both of the articles rather than just the
Wiki entry.

But I hadn't. I even had trouble accessing an abstract with the
substandard link in Wikipedia, as I described to Harshman.

> Belittling comes easily to you.

You are in violation of our agreement. There is no way you
could justify this statement by what has happened in s.b.e.
since we made that agreement.

Hence, you could only justify it (if at all) by some events that took
place in talk.origins. And our agreement specifically said we would
lay aside our differences in t.o. when posting here.


To give credit where credit is due: you have done a good job of
holding to our agreement before you made this accusation. So I
don't think it will be hard to you to stick to it from now on.

Peter Nyikos

[Peter Nyikos]

You mean "worse". However, Wikipedia is a valuable tool for those
who know how to use it. Often the references and footnotes make
or break an entry. The good ones take you to more authoritative
webpages where you can get the real lowdown and also see how close
the entry got to satisfying them.

Sometimes a footnoted reference shows that the person who made the
footnote completely misread the information in the reference.
I could tell you about a real doozy if you are interested.

My one complaint about Wikipedia is that it is putting the legitimate
encyclopedias like Britannica in the "endangered list" of books.
Britannica's attempts to compete somehow on the internet are
very unimpressive. One of the very few quizzes I took on line was
one of theirs, and I found a wrong answer to the question.

I called it to their attention in an e-mail, and they wrote back
thanking me and telling me they would fix it.

Peter Nyikos