Crazy New Dinosaur Discoveries You Won't Believe Are True

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After 25 years of Jurassic Park movies, you'd probably assumed scientists had learned everything there was to know about dinosaurs, and that the facts about life in the Mesozoic were more or less set in stone or fossilized amber. But that's not the case. Today, we're looking at all the crazy dinosaur facts that have been discovered since you were in school. Paleontologists make new discoveries all the time, including new species of dinosaurs, new insights on dinosaur behavior, and new conclusions about how dinosaurs would have looked and sounded. [SCREAMING] Odds are a lot has changed since the last time you opened a dinosaur book. Before we get started, make sure you subscribe to Weird History and tell us your favorite dinosaur. I've always been partial to Triceratops medium well with a side of asparagus. OK, let's look at some Dino facts. We're all familiar with some of the truly hulking dinosaurs, like the Brachiosaurus whose sneezes Lex Murphy and forever dooms her to a life of playing indoors. But scientists are discovering new species of dinosaurs all the time. While nowhere near as large as its movie star cousin, though Ledumahadi mafube was twice the size of an African bull elephant, making it the largest animal on earth when it lived in the early Jurassic. And we had no idea it even existed until September of 2018. Meaning a giant thunderclap at dawn in the native language of the area of South Africa, in which it was discovered, the Ledumahadi mafube was what researchers refer to as a transitional dinosaur, walking on two legs with crouched, arm-like front limbs, before its sauropod cousins, like Brachiosaurus and Brontosaurus evolved into a four legged huge-asaurus to support their massive weight. The things we know about dinosaurs change as more research is done over the years. So consequently, things that were accepted as scientific fact back in 1993, such as a Tyrannosaurus Rex could outrun Jeff Goldblum in a Jeep, later became contested, if not flat out disproven. At the time, paleontologists believed that T-Rex could possibly run at speeds of up to 33 miles an hour. But now the commonly accepted belief is that the dinosaur maxed out at about 12 miles an hour. That by no means is slow for an eight ton predator. But the tyrant lizard king was definitely more Prefontaine than it was Usain Bolt. Unlike the giant lizards they've been portrayed as for the past 100 years, the vast majority of dinosaurs were probably covered in feathers, meaning they looked more like Big Bird than T-Rex, which is cute and terrifying all at the same time. The great dinosaurs had feathers theory didn't come together all at once. But after years of unearthing plumed specimens, including a well-preserved feather herbivore in 2014, the evidence became impossible to ignore. Maybe that means the Tyrannosaurus Rex's tiny arms were actually wings, which would make the next Jurassic World movie 10 times better. One of the first things any self-respecting dinosaur nerd will tell you is that Brontosaurus didn't actually exist. It was just a case of a scientist misidentifying an Apatosaurus skeleton as a new species and giving the discovery a new name. However, in 2015, a research team reexamined both the Apatosaurus and the original Brontosaurus skeleton, and discovered significant differences. Meaning the Brontosaurus might finally earn its well-deserved spot on the official dinosaur roster, which would be great considering the Brontosaurus is a way cooler name than Apatosaurus But speaking of famous dinosaurs that didn't really exist, back in 2010, scientists discovered that a species of dinosaur known as Triceratops didn't actually exist, putting several Land Before Time sequels in jeopardy of suddenly becoming scientifically inaccurate. How could one of the most well-known, and my favorite, dinosaurs in history not be real? Well, before we all get too upset. It turns out the discovery was more of a technicality. The specimens that had previously been identified as Triceratops were actually younger dinosaurs of a different species, called Torosaurus. But since Triceratops was the first of the two species to be discovered, it remains the official name of the species. We apologize to all you Torosaurus fans out there. Because we view dinosaurs as giant lizards rather than their own distinct classification of animals for decades, the common scientific belief was that they laid eggs in nests and abandoned them, like modern lizards and those people who allow their faces to be unblurred on Cops. However, more recent discoveries have revealed that several species of dinosaurs, including the predatory Troodon, actually guarded their nests and raised their hatchlings. I'm not sure if they got their offspring into swimming or jazz band, but dinosaurs were good parents. One of the most oft-repeated factoids about famous dinosaurs is that the Stegosaurus had a second auxiliary brain in its pelvis, perhaps to help it solve complicated math problems. But the theory that the dinosaur's pelvic cavity held a second brain was never more than that, just a theory. Modern scientists think it might have held a glycogen body, which is a structure found in modern birds that is used to store energy. Pachycephalosaurs, or Friar Tuck as it's called in 1997's The Lost World, Jurassic Park, was long thought to have used its impressive domed skull to head but competing dinosaurs in mating contests or deciding who gets the remote control. But while they may have possessed the ferocious bold demeanor of a Jason Statham-asaurus, modern researchers have concluded the Pachycephalosaurs skull simply couldn't have withstood more than a single headbutt. Those formidable skull bones were merely for show. You may remember Spinosaurus as the pinch-hitting dinosaur nobody asked for that steps in to take T-Rex's place as the chief terrorizor of the human characters in Jurassic Park 3. Despite engaging in a memorable battle to the death with Tyrannosaurus in the film, the real-life Spinosaurus actually lived in water. According to a 2014 discovery, Spinosaurus had several structures similar to modern crocodiles, making them excellent water hunters, as depicted in that climactic scene where it tries like hell to eat William H. Macy. Mmm, braised William H. Macy. When we were kids, picking a dinosaur out of a lineup seemed pretty easy. If Jurassic Park made a toy out of it, it was a dinosaur. But as the fossil record has continued to grow over the years with more and more discoveries, scientists are finding it increasingly difficult to classify exactly what traits define a dinosaur. In fact, according to paleontologist Randall Hermes, there's only one distinguishing feature that is completely unique to all dinosaurs-- having a complete hole in the hip socket. Anything else is just a weird old animal. And scientists are finding it harder to classify different species of dinosaurs within their own evolutionary tree. For instance, Tyrannosaurus and other theropdos were once assumed to be closer to sauropods, like Apatosaurus, than to be beaked Ornithischian, like Triceratops. But a study in 2017 suggests that the opposite is true, which is fine with us. Because that's one more checkmark in the T-Rex might have had wings column. Because they were long assumed to be giant reptiles, it was similarly assumed that dinosaurs were cold-blooded. But recent discoveries over the past few decades have determined that this likely wasn't the case. Since cold-blooded animals like lizards can't regulate their body temperature, their skeletal structure keep them low to the ground. Dinosaurs were massive upright creatures, which cast serious doubt on that cold-blooded theory. Additionally the discovery that many dinosaurs had feathers, and that these feathers were not used for flight, suggests that they were used for insulation, much in the same way that mammals use fur or puffy winter jackets. Dinosaurs have been roaring for as long as we've been putting them into films. Because humans, as a species, collectively decided that something that huge would shake the Earth with it's powerful prehistoric bellow. As it turns out, dinosaurs would've been physically incapable of roaring. I know, so disappointing. Instead of a larynx, which is what mammals like bears and lions have, dinosaurs would have had syrinx's, which are essentially the vocal tubes of birds. Scientists discovered a preserved voice box from a prehistoric duck-like bird in 2016, which provided them with a good idea of the kinds of sounds a dinosaur would have made. Although, if you ask us, the ending of Jurassic Park would have been no less memorable if after killing those Raptors T-Rex let out a triumphant honk, and pretty handy to have a T-Rex for your morning commute as well. Everyone thinks they have a pretty good idea of what dinosaurs looked like. But the truth is all of our images of dinosaurs are based on speculation and guesswork. For example, there's a world of difference between an elephant skeleton and when an elephant actually looks like. The skeleton leaves out the elephants most defining characteristic, the trunk, if you didn't know what that characteristic was. To illustrate this point, paleo artists CM Kosemen and John Conway published a book called, All Yesterdays, that features alternate artistic renderings of what dinosaurs could have looked like based on the fossil record. They also include a few interpretations of modern animals drawn in the paleontological style of stretching leathery skin tightly over the bones, including this truly nightmarish drawing of a baboon. We're currently living in what many consider to be the golden age of dinosaur discovery, with scientists discovering new species on the regular. We're now just being able to uncover fossils in places like the Arctic, where we recently found Nanuqsaurus, an ice-bound Tyrannosaur. Included in this hit parade of recent discoveries is the Patagotitan. No, not a new outdoor clothing brand, but the largest land animal yet known to have ever existed, which was found in 2013. But even at around 35 meters long and 10 meters tall, it might only be a matter of time before the new biggest dinosaur ever is crowned over the Patagotitan. Because of the reconstructive nature of paleontology, and an ever-growing fossil record that's currently increasing at a blazing rate, scientists have accepted that everything we know about dinosaurs today might completely change within a decade or two. According to paleontologist Jonathan P. Tenant-- There are still huge gaps in our knowledge of the fossil records. And the rapid pace of discovery is changing much of what we thought we knew about dinosaurs. There are still conclusions to be drawn from the fossils discovered within the past few years, let alone all the discoveries waiting to be made from the bones that haven't been uncovered yet. We're still keeping our fingers crossed for some T-Rex wings. Paleontology is a unique form of science that attempts to reconstruct the past based on limited evidence, which means our knowledge of dinosaurs and dinosaur behavior is constantly evolving, much like the dinos themselves. What do you think dinosaurs look like? Let us know in the comments below. And while you're at it, check out some of these other videos of our Weird History.
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Channel: Weird History
Views: 332,229
Rating: 4.7443285 out of 5
Keywords: dinosaurs, dinosaur facts, latest dino facts, palentology, palentologist, weird history, history, weirdhistory.com, triceratops, brontosaurus, torosaurus, south africa, thunderclap, Brachiosaurus, Ledumahadi mafube, Tyrannosaurus, Stegosaurus, Spinosaurus, Patagotitan, Pachycephalosaurus, friar tuck dinosaur, jurassic park movie, jurassic era, jurassic world, jurassic park, william h macy, armchair historian, drunk history, history channel, ranker
Id: UjWdFmyh2mE
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Length: 10min 16sec (616 seconds)
Published: Thu Jan 31 2019
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