Welcome to sci.bio.paleontology, Leroy! I'm glad I noticed you before
some other regulars did: I'll explain that below.

I'm almost always glad to see new participants who are interested in paleontology.
But the "Soetoro" part of your moniker gives me pause: are you a regular from talk.origins
posting under a new pseudonym that he hasn't used there?

Be that as it may, let me explain why I like to welcome newcomers.
When I first posted here in the 1990's, it was quite an active group
with a good number of regulars, a few of whom
were professional paleontologists.

But when I returned 11 years ago after almost a decade of absence,
I was shocked to see that the group was on the verge of extinction.
Thanks to some strenuous efforts by myself and a few others,
it has recovered to the extent that I would only call it "vulnerable".
There is even one person, "Pandora," who joined a few years later,
who I'm sure is a professional, but doesn't give out any information about her identity.

On Thursday, December 2, 2021 at 1:58:08 PM UTC-5, Leroy N. Soetoro wrote:
> About 80 million years ago, when dinosaurs walked the Earth, an 18-foot-
> long (5 meters) sea monster called a mosasaur cruised the ancient ocean
> that once covered western Kansas, snagging prey with its slender, tooth-
> lined snout.

This brought back memories of my first experience, earlier this year,
of fossil digs out west. There was a conference in Casper, Wyoming,
at a fine museum, with lots of good speakers, most of them quite young,
about the marine reptiles that swarmed in those seas. It covered both
Jurassic and Cretaceous kinds.

Our first expedition was to a Jurassic site, and I found some nice minerals
but no fossils. Other members were luckier, including one group that found
a long ichtyosaur lower jaw; too long to unearth that day, but marked
for careful removal and taking to the museum to enrich its collection.

> Paleontologists discovered the fossil of this beast in the 1970s, but they
> had difficulty classifying it, so it ended up stored with other mosasaur
> specimens in the Platecarpus genus, at Fort Hays State University's
> Sternberg Museum of Natural History (FHSM) in Kansas.
>
> Recently, researchers revisited the enigmatic fossil — pieces of a skull,
> jaw and a few bones from behind the head — and found that the reptile
> didn't belong in the Platecarpus genus. Rather, it was a close relative of
> a rare mosasaur species known from just one specimen, scientists reported
> in a new study.

Reminds me of the second day, a Cretaceous site where some
members of the group found a mosasaur fossil with most of the same
fragmentary parts that are described above. If memory serves, this was the site that
was very close to the South Dakota border-- so close, that our guides
took us just across the border and past a "Welcome to South Dakota"
sign, then turned the vans back and took us past a "Welcome to Wyoming" sign.

> The newly described species, formerly known as specimen FHSM VP-5515 and
> now named Ectenosaurus everhartorum, is the second known species in the
> Ectenosaurus genus. The only other species is Ectenosaurus clidastoides,
> which was described in 1967, according to the study.
>
> E. everhartorum's head was about 2 feet (0.6 m) long, and like E.
> clidastoides, E. everhartorum had a snout that was narrow and elongated
> compared with those of other mosasaurs, said study co-author Takuya
> Konishi, a vertebrate paleontologist and assistant professor at the
> University of Cincinnati.
>
> "It's a kind of skinny snout for agile, speedy snapping of fish, rather
> than biting into something hard like turtle shells," Konishi told Live
> Science. The narrowness of the jaw and of a bone at the top of the head
> hinted that VP-5515 belonged in the Ectenosaurus genus, even though the
> fossil was about 500,000 to 1 million years younger than the E.
> clidastoides specimen, Konishi said.
>
> But in some ways, the skull wasn't Ectenosaurus-like at all. For example,
> it lacked a bony bump at the end of its snout. The snout on VP-5515 was
> also shorter than the one on E. clidastoides, according to the study.
>
> "We knew it was a new species, but we didn't know if it was an
> Ectenosaurus or not," Konishi said. "To answer that puzzle, we were
> eventually able to find another feature where the jaw joint was, at the
> back end of the lower jaw." There, the researchers detected a small notch
> that didn't appear in any mosasaur species — except one.
>
> "That little depression turned out to be a newly discovered consistent
> feature for the genus Ectenosaurus," Konishi said. "You have this
> Ectenosaurus united by the little notch at the end of the lower jaw, but
> then it's consistently different at the level of the species from the
> generic type — that is to say, the first species assigned to the genus."
>
> One lingering question about Ectenosaurus is why this genus is so poorly
> represented among mosasaur fossils from western Kansas. To date,
> paleontologists have uncovered more than 1,800 mosasaur specimens at the
> site of the former inland sea. But for now, the entire Ectenosaurus genus
> is represented by just two fossils — one for each species.

I wonder whether this genus is different enough for little bits sticking above
the ground not to be noticed by paleontologists used to looking for telltale
signs of other genera. For instance, the only turtle bones found were spotted
by a young woman who specialized in sea turtles of just that family for her Ph.D. dissertation
and her postdoctoral work.

>
> "That's very strange," Konishi told Live Science. "Why is it so rare for a
> mosasaur, where you have hundreds of Platecarpus from the same locality?
> Does that mean they were living near shore, or were they living farther
> south or farther north? We just don't know."
>
> The findings were published Aug. 26 in the Canadian Journal of Earth
> Sciences.
>
> Originally published on Live Science.
>
> https://www.livescience.com/mosasaur-18-foot-monster.html
>
>
> --
> "LOCKDOWN", left-wing COVID fearmongering. 95% of COVID infections
> recover with no after effects.

I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but with special connotations]
dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p. experience, not age],
is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.

"Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.

I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.

>
> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>
> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov

Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov

The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.

You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.

> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
> fiasco, President Trump.

My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...

I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.

> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
> queer liberal democrat donors.

> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.

I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.

I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to talk more about them,
but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 5:25:51 PM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> Welcome to sci.bio.paleontology, Leroy! I'm glad I noticed you before
> some other regulars did: I'll explain that below.
>
> I'm almost always glad to see new participants who are interested in paleontology.
> But the "Soetoro" part of your moniker gives me pause: are you a regular from talk.origins
> posting under a new pseudonym that he hasn't used there?
>
> Be that as it may, let me explain why I like to welcome newcomers.
> When I first posted here in the 1990's, it was quite an active group
> with a good number of regulars, a few of whom
> were professional paleontologists.
>
> But when I returned 11 years ago after almost a decade of absence,
> I was shocked to see that the group was on the verge of extinction.
> Thanks to some strenuous efforts by myself and a few others,
> it has recovered to the extent that I would only call it "vulnerable".
> There is even one person, "Pandora," who joined a few years later,
> who I'm sure is a professional, but doesn't give out any information about her identity.
> On Thursday, December 2, 2021 at 1:58:08 PM UTC-5, Leroy N. Soetoro wrote:
> > About 80 million years ago, when dinosaurs walked the Earth, an 18-foot-
> > long (5 meters) sea monster called a mosasaur cruised the ancient ocean
> > that once covered western Kansas, snagging prey with its slender, tooth-
> > lined snout.
> This brought back memories of my first experience, earlier this year,
> of fossil digs out west. There was a conference in Casper, Wyoming,
> at a fine museum, with lots of good speakers, most of them quite young,
> about the marine reptiles that swarmed in those seas. It covered both
> Jurassic and Cretaceous kinds.
>
> Our first expedition was to a Jurassic site, and I found some nice minerals
> but no fossils. Other members were luckier, including one group that found
> a long ichtyosaur lower jaw; too long to unearth that day, but marked
> for careful removal and taking to the museum to enrich its collection.
> > Paleontologists discovered the fossil of this beast in the 1970s, but they
> > had difficulty classifying it, so it ended up stored with other mosasaur
> > specimens in the Platecarpus genus, at Fort Hays State University's
> > Sternberg Museum of Natural History (FHSM) in Kansas.
> >
> > Recently, researchers revisited the enigmatic fossil — pieces of a skull,
> > jaw and a few bones from behind the head — and found that the reptile
> > didn't belong in the Platecarpus genus. Rather, it was a close relative of
> > a rare mosasaur species known from just one specimen, scientists reported
> > in a new study.
> Reminds me of the second day, a Cretaceous site where some
> members of the group found a mosasaur fossil with most of the same
> fragmentary parts that are described above. If memory serves, this was the site that
> was very close to the South Dakota border-- so close, that our guides
> took us just across the border and past a "Welcome to South Dakota"
> sign, then turned the vans back and took us past a "Welcome to Wyoming" sign.
> > The newly described species, formerly known as specimen FHSM VP-5515 and
> > now named Ectenosaurus everhartorum, is the second known species in the
> > Ectenosaurus genus. The only other species is Ectenosaurus clidastoides,
> > which was described in 1967, according to the study.
> >
> > E. everhartorum's head was about 2 feet (0.6 m) long, and like E.
> > clidastoides, E. everhartorum had a snout that was narrow and elongated
> > compared with those of other mosasaurs, said study co-author Takuya
> > Konishi, a vertebrate paleontologist and assistant professor at the
> > University of Cincinnati.
> >
> > "It's a kind of skinny snout for agile, speedy snapping of fish, rather
> > than biting into something hard like turtle shells," Konishi told Live
> > Science. The narrowness of the jaw and of a bone at the top of the head
> > hinted that VP-5515 belonged in the Ectenosaurus genus, even though the
> > fossil was about 500,000 to 1 million years younger than the E.
> > clidastoides specimen, Konishi said.
> >
> > But in some ways, the skull wasn't Ectenosaurus-like at all. For example,
> > it lacked a bony bump at the end of its snout. The snout on VP-5515 was
> > also shorter than the one on E. clidastoides, according to the study.
> >
> > "We knew it was a new species, but we didn't know if it was an
> > Ectenosaurus or not," Konishi said. "To answer that puzzle, we were
> > eventually able to find another feature where the jaw joint was, at the
> > back end of the lower jaw." There, the researchers detected a small notch
> > that didn't appear in any mosasaur species — except one.
> >
> > "That little depression turned out to be a newly discovered consistent
> > feature for the genus Ectenosaurus," Konishi said. "You have this
> > Ectenosaurus united by the little notch at the end of the lower jaw, but
> > then it's consistently different at the level of the species from the
> > generic type — that is to say, the first species assigned to the genus."
> >
> > One lingering question about Ectenosaurus is why this genus is so poorly
> > represented among mosasaur fossils from western Kansas. To date,
> > paleontologists have uncovered more than 1,800 mosasaur specimens at the
> > site of the former inland sea. But for now, the entire Ectenosaurus genus
> > is represented by just two fossils — one for each species.
> I wonder whether this genus is different enough for little bits sticking above
> the ground not to be noticed by paleontologists used to looking for telltale
> signs of other genera. For instance, the only turtle bones found were spotted
> by a young woman who specialized in sea turtles of just that family for her Ph.D. dissertation
> and her postdoctoral work.
> >
> > "That's very strange," Konishi told Live Science. "Why is it so rare for a
> > mosasaur, where you have hundreds of Platecarpus from the same locality?
> > Does that mean they were living near shore, or were they living farther
> > south or farther north? We just don't know."
> >
> > The findings were published Aug. 26 in the Canadian Journal of Earth
> > Sciences.
> >
> > Originally published on Live Science.
> >
> > https://www.livescience.com/mosasaur-18-foot-monster.html
> >
> >
> > --
> > "LOCKDOWN", left-wing COVID fearmongering. 95% of COVID infections
> > recover with no after effects.
> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but with special connotations]
> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p. experience, not age],
> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>
> "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
> had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
> decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.
>
> I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
> where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
> wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
> >
> > No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
> > Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
> >
> > Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
> > ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>
> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>
> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
> > Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
> > fiasco, President Trump.
> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>
> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
> > Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
> > The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
> > queer liberal democrat donors.
>
> > President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
> > dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>
> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to talk more about them,
> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.
>
>
> Peter Nyikos
> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> University of South Carolina
> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

On 12/3/21 5:25 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> Welcome to sci.bio.paleontology, Leroy! I'm glad I noticed you before
> some other regulars did: I'll explain that below.

You should understand that this guy is clearly a spammer who wrote none
of what he posted and whose main purpose was likely to impress his
Trumpist sigs onto you.

> This brought back memories of my first experience, earlier this year,
> of fossil digs out west. There was a conference in Casper, Wyoming,
> at a fine museum, with lots of good speakers, most of them quite young,
> about the marine reptiles that swarmed in those seas. It covered both
> Jurassic and Cretaceous kinds.
>
> Our first expedition was to a Jurassic site, and I found some nice minerals
> but no fossils. Other members were luckier, including one group that found
> a long ichtyosaur lower jaw; too long to unearth that day, but marked
> for careful removal and taking to the museum to enrich its collection.

I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
expedition. Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.

>> "LOCKDOWN", left-wing COVID fearmongering. 95% of COVID infections
>> recover with no after effects.
>
> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but with special connotations]
> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p. experience, not age],
> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.

Your obsession is both childish and tiresome.

>> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
>> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>>
>> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
>> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>
> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
>
> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.

What do you mean by "for this"? Are you agreeing with the claim that the
election was stolen, that the Mueller report found no collusion, that
Covid-19 is no big deal, just fearmongering?

> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.

What is "this"?

>> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
>> fiasco, President Trump.
>
> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...

What sympathies with radical Islam?

> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
>
>
>> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
>> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
>> queer liberal democrat donors.
>
>> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
>> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
>
> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.

What's your attitude?

> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to talk more about them,
> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.

You mean his attempts to dismantle all our alliances, his sucking up to
dictators, or his general ignorance of foreign countries (Nambia?)?

But this was just a drive-by. I doubt you'll hear from him again. Did
you notice that he had spammed several groups with that post?

On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:

> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> expedition. Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.

Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates. The older the rock, the more competent, since
if it weren't competent it's gone. Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.

On 12/4/21 10:09 AM, erik simpson wrote:
> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>
>
>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>> expedition. Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>
> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates. The older the rock, the more competent, since
> if it weren't competent it's gone. Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>
Been to the Mt. Stephens trilobite bed, where it's all just splitting
shale to find what's inside. Anomalocaris claws are common. And I've
been to the Avalon peninsula, more shale, where you're still allowed to
collect. Didn't find much. I'd love to try the Green River or Hell Creek
some time, given the opportunity.

On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 11:22:34 AM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
> On 12/4/21 10:09 AM, erik simpson wrote:
> > On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
> >
> >
> >> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> >> expedition. Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> >> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
> >
> > Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> > particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates. The older the rock, the more competent, since
> > if it weren't competent it's gone. Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
> >
> Been to the Mt. Stephens trilobite bed, where it's all just splitting
> shale to find what's inside. Anomalocaris claws are common. And I've
> been to the Avalon peninsula, more shale, where you're still allowed to
> collect. Didn't find much. I'd love to try the Green River or Hell Creek
> some time, given the opportunity.

I was at Mt Stephens many years ago, and an Anomalocaris claw was uncovered by a guy
next to me. The ranger guide kept it (Anomalocaris was still exotic then). Green River is exposed
over quite an area in Wyoming and Utah, and has fish (LOTS), great leaf fossils and assorted vertebrates
from Crocs to bats (very few). Good commercial quarries with very high density of fish near Kemmerer,
and lots of BLM land around Vernal where leaves can be collected. I'd love to visit the Avalon peninsula,
but it's all the way across the continent. I wasn't aware that there's collectable areas there.

On 12/4/21 1:58 PM, erik simpson wrote:
> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 11:22:34 AM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>> On 12/4/21 10:09 AM, erik simpson wrote:
>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>>>> expedition. Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>>>
>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates. The older the rock, the more competent, since
>>> if it weren't competent it's gone. Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>>>
>> Been to the Mt. Stephens trilobite bed, where it's all just splitting
>> shale to find what's inside. Anomalocaris claws are common. And I've
>> been to the Avalon peninsula, more shale, where you're still allowed to
>> collect. Didn't find much. I'd love to try the Green River or Hell Creek
>> some time, given the opportunity.
>
> I was at Mt Stephens many years ago, and an Anomalocaris claw was uncovered by a guy
> next to me. The ranger guide kept it (Anomalocaris was still exotic then). Green River is exposed
> over quite an area in Wyoming and Utah, and has fish (LOTS), great leaf fossils and assorted vertebrates
> from Crocs to bats (very few). Good commercial quarries with very high density of fish near Kemmerer,
> and lots of BLM land around Vernal where leaves can be collected. I'd love to visit the Avalon peninsula,
> but it's all the way across the continent. I wasn't aware that there's collectable areas there.
>
There's a spot very close to St. John's, with a name I don't recollect.
Mind you, this was close to 20 years ago, and I don't know if collection
is still allowed. But people used to find nice trilobites there.

John Harshman <jharshman@pacbell.net> wrote:
> On 12/3/21 5:25 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
>> Welcome to sci.bio.paleontology, Leroy! I'm glad I noticed you before
>> some other regulars did: I'll explain that below.
>
> You should understand that this guy is clearly a spammer who wrote none
> of what he posted and whose main purpose was likely to impress his
> Trumpist sigs onto you.
>
>> This brought back memories of my first experience, earlier this year,
>> of fossil digs out west. There was a conference in Casper, Wyoming,
>> at a fine museum, with lots of good speakers, most of them quite young,
>> about the marine reptiles that swarmed in those seas. It covered both
>> Jurassic and Cretaceous kinds.
>>
>> Our first expedition was to a Jurassic site, and I found some nice minerals
>> but no fossils. Other members were luckier, including one group that found
>> a long ichtyosaur lower jaw; too long to unearth that day, but marked
>> for careful removal and taking to the museum to enrich its collection.
>
> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> expedition. Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>
>>> "LOCKDOWN", left-wing COVID fearmongering. 95% of COVID infections
>>> recover with no after effects.
>>
>> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio"
>> but with special connotations]
>> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p.
>> experience, not age],
>> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>
> Your obsession is both childish and tiresome.
>
>>> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
>>> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>>>
>>> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
>>> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>>
>> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
>> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
>> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
>>
>> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
>> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>
> What do you mean by "for this"? Are you agreeing with the claim that the
> election was stolen, that the Mueller report found no collusion, that
> Covid-19 is no big deal, just fearmongering?
>
>> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
>> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
>
> What is "this"?
>
>>> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
>>> fiasco, President Trump.
>>
>> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
>> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
>> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>
> What sympathies with radical Islam?
>
>> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
>>
>>
>>> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
>>> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
>>> queer liberal democrat donors.
>>
>>> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
>>> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
>>
>> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>
> What's your attitude?
>
>> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to
>> talk more about them,
>> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of
>> paleontology, like this one.
>
> You mean his attempts to dismantle all our alliances, his sucking up to
> dictators, or his general ignorance of foreign countries (Nambia?)?
>
> But this was just a drive-by. I doubt you'll hear from him again. Did
> you notice that he had spammed several groups with that post?
>

https://groups.google.com/g/misc.phone.mobile.iphone/c/oH_WH6aol5s/m/zBZjvE8XAQAJ

https://groups.google.com/g/misc.phone.mobile.iphone/c/m8D3C9WwCeo/m/G0SgQTjDAgAJ

I leave it an exercise for someone else to determine if this critter ever
replies after an OP, but I think this is priceless top shelf stuff right
here (BTW I am becoming more convinced Obama was a Wall Street corporate
shill = neoliberal as is Biden but enjoy):

https://groups.google.com/g/misc.phone.mobile.iphone/c/gUYTVh5DisY/m/4oxwxjFMBwAJ

“Barack Obama, reelected by the dumbest voters in the history of the United

States of America. The only American president to deliberately import a
lethal infectious disease from Africa, Ebola.

Loretta Fuddy, killed after she "verified" Obama's phony birth
certificate.

Nancy Pelosi, Democrat criminal, accessory before and after the fact to
improper vetting of Barry Soetoro aka Barack Hussein Obama, a confirmed
felon using SSAN 042-68-4425, belonging to a dead man.”

Peter should have stuck to the “But the "Soetoro" part of your moniker
gives me pause” part and let the rest go. Nothing good comes from such
peculiar starting points.

Peter Nyikos <peter2nyikos@gmail.com> wrote:
>
[snip good on topic stuff by Peter where he rolls out the red carpet for
someone who may never reply to his efforts]
>
> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but
> with special connotations]
> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p.
> experience, not age],
> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>
Must you engage in this compulsion?
>
> "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
> had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
> decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.
>
> I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
> where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
> wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
>
Peter, this is hurtful stuff. You and Oxy have a contentious history and I
cannot say I am closely familiar with how it has gone over the years, but
please stop with such deeply personal biting animosity. You did this with
the imprimatur of your university below. Not a good optic. Can you stick to
stuff about the subject matter of the group without entertaining whatever
personal misgivings you have with Oxy in such an ugly manner? Can you try a
moratorium on talking about people for say a month of active participation
(I know you usually take a winter hiatus so specified that)?
>
>>
>> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
>> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>>
>> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
>> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>
> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
>
> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>
> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
>
>
>> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
>> fiasco, President Trump.
>
> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>
Finding bin Laden…
>
> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
>
I doubt that a reply will come. You got sucked into an agenda— hook, line,
and sinker.
>
>> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
>> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
>> queer liberal democrat donors.
>
>> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
>> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
>
> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>
> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to
> talk more about them,
> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.
>
Can you stick to paleontology then? You suck at the welcoming wagon,
especially given the actual OP intent which should have been obvious. This
critter has polluted the iPhone group for years.
>
> Peter Nyikos
> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> University of South Carolina
> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>

*Hemidactylus* <ecphoric@allspamis.invalid> wrote:
> Peter Nyikos <peter2nyikos@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
> [snip good on topic stuff by Peter where he rolls out the red carpet for
> someone who may never reply to his efforts]
>>
>> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but
>> with special connotations]
>> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p.
>> experience, not age],
>> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>>
> Must you engage in this compulsion?
>>
>> "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
>> had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
>> decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.
>>
>> I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
>> where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
>> wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
>>
> Peter, this is hurtful stuff. You and Oxy have a contentious history and I
> cannot say I am closely familiar with how it has gone over the years, but
> please stop with such deeply personal biting animosity. You did this with
> the imprimatur

Sorry I meant imprint or sig line. Imprimatur implies endorsement. Not what
I intended to mean.

Though 1 b covers imprint, I think the latter has less baggage.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/imprimatur

> of your university below. Not a good optic. Can you stick to
> stuff about the subject matter of the group without entertaining whatever
> personal misgivings you have with Oxy in such an ugly manner? Can you try a
> moratorium on talking about people for say a month of active participation
> (I know you usually take a winter hiatus so specified that)?
>>
>>>
>>> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
>>> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>>>
>>> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
>>> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>>
>> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
>> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
>> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
>>
>> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
>> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>>
>> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
>> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
>>
>>
>>> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
>>> fiasco, President Trump.
>>
>> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
>> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
>> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>>
> Finding bin Laden…
>>
>> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
>>
> I doubt that a reply will come. You got sucked into an agenda— hook, line,
> and sinker.
>>
>>> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
>>> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
>>> queer liberal democrat donors.
>>
>>> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
>>> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
>>
>> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>>
>> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to
>> talk more about them,
>> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of
>> paleontology, like this one.
>>
> Can you stick to paleontology then? You suck at the welcoming wagon,
> especially given the actual OP intent which should have been obvious. This
> critter has polluted the iPhone group for years.
>>
>> Peter Nyikos
>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>> University of South Carolina
>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>>
>
>
>
>

On 12/3/2021 8:25 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> Welcome to sci.bio.paleontology, Leroy! I'm glad I noticed you before
> some other regulars did: I'll explain that below.
>
> I'm almost always glad to see new participants who are interested in paleontology.
> But the "Soetoro" part of your moniker gives me pause: are you a regular from talk.origins
> posting under a new pseudonym that he hasn't used there?
>
> Be that as it may, let me explain why I like to welcome newcomers.
> When I first posted here in the 1990's, it was quite an active group
> with a good number of regulars, a few of whom
> were professional paleontologists.
>
> But when I returned 11 years ago after almost a decade of absence,
> I was shocked to see that the group was on the verge of extinction.
> Thanks to some strenuous efforts by myself and a few others,
> it has recovered to the extent that I would only call it "vulnerable".
> There is even one person, "Pandora," who joined a few years later,
> who I'm sure is a professional, but doesn't give out any information about her identity.
>
>
> On Thursday, December 2, 2021 at 1:58:08 PM UTC-5, Leroy N. Soetoro wrote:
>> About 80 million years ago, when dinosaurs walked the Earth, an 18-foot-
>> long (5 meters) sea monster called a mosasaur cruised the ancient ocean
>> that once covered western Kansas, snagging prey with its slender, tooth-
>> lined snout.
>
> This brought back memories of my first experience, earlier this year,
> of fossil digs out west. There was a conference in Casper, Wyoming,
> at a fine museum, with lots of good speakers, most of them quite young,
> about the marine reptiles that swarmed in those seas. It covered both
> Jurassic and Cretaceous kinds.
>
> Our first expedition was to a Jurassic site, and I found some nice minerals
> but no fossils. Other members were luckier, including one group that found
> a long ichtyosaur lower jaw; too long to unearth that day, but marked
> for careful removal and taking to the museum to enrich its collection.
>
>
>> Paleontologists discovered the fossil of this beast in the 1970s, but they
>> had difficulty classifying it, so it ended up stored with other mosasaur
>> specimens in the Platecarpus genus, at Fort Hays State University's
>> Sternberg Museum of Natural History (FHSM) in Kansas.
>>
>> Recently, researchers revisited the enigmatic fossil — pieces of a skull,
>> jaw and a few bones from behind the head — and found that the reptile
>> didn't belong in the Platecarpus genus. Rather, it was a close relative of
>> a rare mosasaur species known from just one specimen, scientists reported
>> in a new study.
>
> Reminds me of the second day, a Cretaceous site where some
> members of the group found a mosasaur fossil with most of the same
> fragmentary parts that are described above. If memory serves, this was the site that
> was very close to the South Dakota border-- so close, that our guides
> took us just across the border and past a "Welcome to South Dakota"
> sign, then turned the vans back and took us past a "Welcome to Wyoming" sign.
>
>
>> The newly described species, formerly known as specimen FHSM VP-5515 and
>> now named Ectenosaurus everhartorum, is the second known species in the
>> Ectenosaurus genus. The only other species is Ectenosaurus clidastoides,
>> which was described in 1967, according to the study.
>>
>> E. everhartorum's head was about 2 feet (0.6 m) long, and like E.
>> clidastoides, E. everhartorum had a snout that was narrow and elongated
>> compared with those of other mosasaurs, said study co-author Takuya
>> Konishi, a vertebrate paleontologist and assistant professor at the
>> University of Cincinnati.
>>
>> "It's a kind of skinny snout for agile, speedy snapping of fish, rather
>> than biting into something hard like turtle shells," Konishi told Live
>> Science. The narrowness of the jaw and of a bone at the top of the head
>> hinted that VP-5515 belonged in the Ectenosaurus genus, even though the
>> fossil was about 500,000 to 1 million years younger than the E.
>> clidastoides specimen, Konishi said.
>>
>> But in some ways, the skull wasn't Ectenosaurus-like at all. For example,
>> it lacked a bony bump at the end of its snout. The snout on VP-5515 was
>> also shorter than the one on E. clidastoides, according to the study.
>>
>> "We knew it was a new species, but we didn't know if it was an
>> Ectenosaurus or not," Konishi said. "To answer that puzzle, we were
>> eventually able to find another feature where the jaw joint was, at the
>> back end of the lower jaw." There, the researchers detected a small notch
>> that didn't appear in any mosasaur species — except one.
>>
>> "That little depression turned out to be a newly discovered consistent
>> feature for the genus Ectenosaurus," Konishi said. "You have this
>> Ectenosaurus united by the little notch at the end of the lower jaw, but
>> then it's consistently different at the level of the species from the
>> generic type — that is to say, the first species assigned to the genus."
>>
>> One lingering question about Ectenosaurus is why this genus is so poorly
>> represented among mosasaur fossils from western Kansas. To date,
>> paleontologists have uncovered more than 1,800 mosasaur specimens at the
>> site of the former inland sea. But for now, the entire Ectenosaurus genus
>> is represented by just two fossils — one for each species.
>
> I wonder whether this genus is different enough for little bits sticking above
> the ground not to be noticed by paleontologists used to looking for telltale
> signs of other genera. For instance, the only turtle bones found were spotted
> by a young woman who specialized in sea turtles of just that family for her Ph.D. dissertation
> and her postdoctoral work.
>
>>
>> "That's very strange," Konishi told Live Science. "Why is it so rare for a
>> mosasaur, where you have hundreds of Platecarpus from the same locality?
>> Does that mean they were living near shore, or were they living farther
>> south or farther north? We just don't know."
>>
>> The findings were published Aug. 26 in the Canadian Journal of Earth
>> Sciences.
>>
>> Originally published on Live Science.
>>
>> https://www.livescience.com/mosasaur-18-foot-monster.html
>>
>>
>> --
>> "LOCKDOWN", left-wing COVID fearmongering. 95% of COVID infections
>> recover with no after effects.
>
> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but with special connotations]
> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p. experience, not age],
> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>
> "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
> had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
> decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.

Fine, I have hormonal abnormalities. I'm intersex. Go fuck yourself, bigot.

>
> I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
> where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
> wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
>
>
>>
>> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
>> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>>
>> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
>> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>
> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
>
> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>
> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
>
>
>> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
>> fiasco, President Trump.
>
> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>
> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
>
>
>> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
>> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
>> queer liberal democrat donors.
>
>> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
>> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
>
> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>
> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to talk more about them,
> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.
>
>
> Peter Nyikos
> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> University of South Carolina
> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>

On 12/4/2021 11:13 PM, *Hemidactylus* wrote:
> Peter Nyikos <peter2nyikos@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
> [snip good on topic stuff by Peter where he rolls out the red carpet for
> someone who may never reply to his efforts]
>>
>> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but
>> with special connotations]
>> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p.
>> experience, not age],
>> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>>
> Must you engage in this compulsion?

I don't think he can help himself.

>>
>> "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
>> had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
>> decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.
>>
>> I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
>> where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
>> wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
>>
> Peter, this is hurtful stuff. You and Oxy have a contentious history and I
> cannot say I am closely familiar with how it has gone over the years, but
> please stop with such deeply personal biting animosity. You did this with
> the imprimatur of your university below. Not a good optic. Can you stick to
> stuff about the subject matter of the group without entertaining whatever
> personal misgivings you have with Oxy in such an ugly manner? Can you try a
> moratorium on talking about people for say a month of active participation
> (I know you usually take a winter hiatus so specified that)?

Thank you for this, Hemi. I appreciate it.

>>
>>>
>>> No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
>>> Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
>>>
>>> Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
>>> ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>>
>> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
>> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
>> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.nancy@mail.house.gov
>>
>> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
>> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>>
>> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
>> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
>>
>>
>>> Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
>>> fiasco, President Trump.
>>
>> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
>> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
>> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>>
> Finding bin Laden…
>>
>> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
>>
> I doubt that a reply will come. You got sucked into an agenda— hook, line,
> and sinker.
>>
>>> Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
>>> The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
>>> queer liberal democrat donors.
>>
>>> President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
>>> dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
>>
>> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>>
>> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to
>> talk more about them,
>> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.
>>
> Can you stick to paleontology then? You suck at the welcoming wagon,
> especially given the actual OP intent which should have been obvious. This
> critter has polluted the iPhone group for years.
>>
>> Peter Nyikos
>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>> University of South Carolina
>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>>
>
>
>

On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>
>
> > I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> > expedition.

I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
being served.

I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.

> > Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> > nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.

If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.

> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.

How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?

>The older the rock, the more competent, since
> if it weren't competent it's gone.

It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.

I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.

> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.

Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
go miles into the un-worn underground.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

On 12/6/21 4:45 AM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>>
>>
>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>>> expedition.
>
> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
> being served.
>
> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.

I count that as volunteer. There's an organization around somewhere that
connects amateurs with professionals.

>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>
> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.

No, chert is sedimentary. It's a deep ocean sediment composed of
radiolarian and other siliceous protist skeletons. I'm moderately
surprised that you were looking for macrofossils in it. It's so hard
that preparation would be difficult.

>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
>
> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
>
>
>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
>
> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>
> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
>
>
>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>
> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
> go miles into the un-worn underground.

"Competent" is a geological term, referring to rock that doesn't come
apart easily.

On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
> > On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
> >
> >
> > > I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> > > expedition.
> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
> being served.
>
> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
> > > Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> > > nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
> > Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> > particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
> >The older the rock, the more competent, since
> > if it weren't competent it's gone.
> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>
> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
> > Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
> go miles into the un-worn underground.
> Peter Nyikos
> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
kinds of environments.

Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.

"Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.

On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 08:40:01 -0800 (PST), erik simpson
<eastside.erik@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
>> > On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> > > I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>> > > expedition.
>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
>> being served.
>>
>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
>> > > Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>> > > nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
>> > Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>> > particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
>> >The older the rock, the more competent, since
>> > if it weren't competent it's gone.
>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>>
>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
>> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
>> > Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
>> Peter Nyikos
>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>
>What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
>kinds of environments.
>
>Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.
>
>"Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.

Not only is chert not igneous, but is typically composed of the
petrified remains of siliceous ooze, and so is expected to contain
fossils.

Also, even igneous layers can have embedded sedimentary inclusions:

<https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/chemical-fossils-preserved-in-lava/>

Finally, even though igneous layers almost never contain fossils, they
provide the means for absolute dating of fossils which lie adjacent
and/or between them.

On 12/6/21 11:21 AM, jillery wrote:
> On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 08:40:01 -0800 (PST), erik simpson
> <eastside.erik@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
>>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
>>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>>>>> expedition.
>>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
>>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
>>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
>>> being served.
>>>
>>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
>>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
>>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
>>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
>>>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
>>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
>>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
>>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
>>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
>>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
>>>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
>>>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
>>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
>>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
>>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
>>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>>>
>>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
>>> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
>>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
>>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
>>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
>>>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
>>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
>>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
>>> Peter Nyikos
>>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>>> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
>>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>>
>> What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
>> kinds of environments.
>>
>> Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.
>>
>> "Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.
>
>
> Not only is chert not igneous, but is typically composed of the
> petrified remains of siliceous ooze, and so is expected to contain
> fossils.
>
> Also, even igneous layers can have embedded sedimentary inclusions:

Also, volcanoclastics like ash-flow tuffs can contain lots of fossils.

> <https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/chemical-fossils-preserved-in-lava/>
>
> Finally, even though igneous layers almost never contain fossils, they
> provide the means for absolute dating of fossils which lie adjacent
> and/or between them.
>
>

On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 2:27:23 PM UTC-7, John Harshman wrote:
> On 12/6/21 11:21 AM, jillery wrote:
> > On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 08:40:01 -0800 (PST), erik simpson
> > <eastsi...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> >>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
> >>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> >>>>> expedition.
> >>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
> >>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
> >>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
> >>> being served.
> >>>
> >>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
> >>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
> >>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
> >>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
> >>>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> >>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
> >>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
> >>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
> >>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
> >>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
> >>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> >>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
> >>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
> >>>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
> >>>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
> >>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
> >>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
> >>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
> >>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
> >>>
> >>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
> >>> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
> >>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
> >>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
> >>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
> >>>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
> >>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
> >>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
> >>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
> >>> Peter Nyikos
> >>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> >>> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
> >>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
> >>
> >> What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
> >> kinds of environments.
> >>
> >> Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.
> >>
> >> "Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.
> >
> >
> > Not only is chert not igneous, but is typically composed of the
> > petrified remains of siliceous ooze, and so is expected to contain
> > fossils.
> >
> > Also, even igneous layers can have embedded sedimentary inclusions:
> Also, volcanoclastics like ash-flow tuffs can contain lots of fossils.

'Tuff can be classified as either igneous or sedimentary rock. It is usually studied in the context of igneous petrology, although it is sometimes described using sedimentological terms. "

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

"Chert".

On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 2:27:23 PM UTC-7, John Harshman wrote:
> On 12/6/21 11:21 AM, jillery wrote:
> > On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 08:40:01 -0800 (PST), erik simpson
> > <eastsi...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> >>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
> >>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> >>>>> expedition.
> >>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
> >>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
> >>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
> >>> being served.
> >>>
> >>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
> >>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
> >>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
> >>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
> >>>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> >>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
> >>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
> >>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
> >>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
> >>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
> >>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> >>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
> >>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
> >>>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
> >>>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
> >>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
> >>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
> >>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
> >>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
> >>>
> >>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
> >>> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
> >>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
> >>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
> >>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
> >>>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
> >>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
> >>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
> >>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
> >>> Peter Nyikos
> >>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> >>> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
> >>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
> >>
> >> What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
> >> kinds of environments.
> >>
> >> Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.
> >>
> >> "Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.
> >
> >
> > Not only is chert not igneous, but is typically composed of the
> > petrified remains of siliceous ooze, and so is expected to contain
> > fossils.
> >
> > Also, even igneous layers can have embedded sedimentary inclusions:
> Also, volcanoclastics like ash-flow tuffs can contain lots of fossils.

Cherty tuff.

On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 6:25:51 PM UTC-7, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> Welcome to sci.bio.paleontology, Leroy! I'm glad I noticed you before
> some other regulars did: I'll explain that below.

https://groups.google.com/g/alt.atheism/search?q=author%3ALeroy%20author%3AN.%20author%3ASoetoro
>
> I'm almost always glad to see new participants who are interested in paleontology.
> But the "Soetoro" part of your moniker gives me pause: are you a regular from talk.origins
> posting under a new pseudonym that he hasn't used there?
>
> Be that as it may, let me explain why I like to welcome newcomers.
> When I first posted here in the 1990's, it was quite an active group
> with a good number of regulars, a few of whom
> were professional paleontologists.
>
> But when I returned 11 years ago after almost a decade of absence,
> I was shocked to see that the group was on the verge of extinction.
> Thanks to some strenuous efforts by myself and a few others,
> it has recovered to the extent that I would only call it "vulnerable".
> There is even one person, "Pandora," who joined a few years later,
> who I'm sure is a professional, but doesn't give out any information about her identity.
> On Thursday, December 2, 2021 at 1:58:08 PM UTC-5, Leroy N. Soetoro wrote:
> > About 80 million years ago, when dinosaurs walked the Earth, an 18-foot-
> > long (5 meters) sea monster called a mosasaur cruised the ancient ocean
> > that once covered western Kansas, snagging prey with its slender, tooth-
> > lined snout.
> This brought back memories of my first experience, earlier this year,
> of fossil digs out west. There was a conference in Casper, Wyoming,
> at a fine museum, with lots of good speakers, most of them quite young,
> about the marine reptiles that swarmed in those seas. It covered both
> Jurassic and Cretaceous kinds.
>
> Our first expedition was to a Jurassic site, and I found some nice minerals
> but no fossils. Other members were luckier, including one group that found
> a long ichtyosaur lower jaw; too long to unearth that day, but marked
> for careful removal and taking to the museum to enrich its collection.
> > Paleontologists discovered the fossil of this beast in the 1970s, but they
> > had difficulty classifying it, so it ended up stored with other mosasaur
> > specimens in the Platecarpus genus, at Fort Hays State University's
> > Sternberg Museum of Natural History (FHSM) in Kansas.
> >
> > Recently, researchers revisited the enigmatic fossil — pieces of a skull,
> > jaw and a few bones from behind the head — and found that the reptile
> > didn't belong in the Platecarpus genus. Rather, it was a close relative of
> > a rare mosasaur species known from just one specimen, scientists reported
> > in a new study.
> Reminds me of the second day, a Cretaceous site where some
> members of the group found a mosasaur fossil with most of the same
> fragmentary parts that are described above. If memory serves, this was the site that
> was very close to the South Dakota border-- so close, that our guides
> took us just across the border and past a "Welcome to South Dakota"
> sign, then turned the vans back and took us past a "Welcome to Wyoming" sign.
> > The newly described species, formerly known as specimen FHSM VP-5515 and
> > now named Ectenosaurus everhartorum, is the second known species in the
> > Ectenosaurus genus. The only other species is Ectenosaurus clidastoides,
> > which was described in 1967, according to the study.
> >
> > E. everhartorum's head was about 2 feet (0.6 m) long, and like E.
> > clidastoides, E. everhartorum had a snout that was narrow and elongated
> > compared with those of other mosasaurs, said study co-author Takuya
> > Konishi, a vertebrate paleontologist and assistant professor at the
> > University of Cincinnati.
> >
> > "It's a kind of skinny snout for agile, speedy snapping of fish, rather
> > than biting into something hard like turtle shells," Konishi told Live
> > Science. The narrowness of the jaw and of a bone at the top of the head
> > hinted that VP-5515 belonged in the Ectenosaurus genus, even though the
> > fossil was about 500,000 to 1 million years younger than the E.
> > clidastoides specimen, Konishi said.
> >
> > But in some ways, the skull wasn't Ectenosaurus-like at all. For example,
> > it lacked a bony bump at the end of its snout. The snout on VP-5515 was
> > also shorter than the one on E. clidastoides, according to the study.
> >
> > "We knew it was a new species, but we didn't know if it was an
> > Ectenosaurus or not," Konishi said. "To answer that puzzle, we were
> > eventually able to find another feature where the jaw joint was, at the
> > back end of the lower jaw." There, the researchers detected a small notch
> > that didn't appear in any mosasaur species — except one.
> >
> > "That little depression turned out to be a newly discovered consistent
> > feature for the genus Ectenosaurus," Konishi said. "You have this
> > Ectenosaurus united by the little notch at the end of the lower jaw, but
> > then it's consistently different at the level of the species from the
> > generic type — that is to say, the first species assigned to the genus."
> >
> > One lingering question about Ectenosaurus is why this genus is so poorly
> > represented among mosasaur fossils from western Kansas. To date,
> > paleontologists have uncovered more than 1,800 mosasaur specimens at the
> > site of the former inland sea. But for now, the entire Ectenosaurus genus
> > is represented by just two fossils — one for each species.
> I wonder whether this genus is different enough for little bits sticking above
> the ground not to be noticed by paleontologists used to looking for telltale
> signs of other genera. For instance, the only turtle bones found were spotted
> by a young woman who specialized in sea turtles of just that family for her Ph.D. dissertation
> and her postdoctoral work.
> >
> > "That's very strange," Konishi told Live Science. "Why is it so rare for a
> > mosasaur, where you have hundreds of Platecarpus from the same locality?
> > Does that mean they were living near shore, or were they living farther
> > south or farther north? We just don't know."
> >
> > The findings were published Aug. 26 in the Canadian Journal of Earth
> > Sciences.
> >
> > Originally published on Live Science.
> >
> > https://www.livescience.com/mosasaur-18-foot-monster.html
> >
> >
> > --
> > "LOCKDOWN", left-wing COVID fearmongering. 95% of COVID infections
> > recover with no after effects.
> I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but with special connotations]
> dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p. experience, not age],
> is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
>
> "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
> had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
> decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.
>
> I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
> where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
> wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
> >
> > No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
> > Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
> >
> > Donald J. Trump, cheated out of a second term by fraudulent "mail-in"
> > ballots. Report voter fraud: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
> Did you know that Google masked the email address you put above?
> It's done automatically to all such addresses, but I was able to remove
> the masking and see it unmasked: sf.n...@mail.house.gov
>
> The troika can be expected to rip into you for this, but
> I don't expect to come in on either side unless I see good evidence one way or another.
>
> You see, there has been such a smokescreen by the mainstream
> media about this, that I'm not sure whom to believe.
> > Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
> > fiasco, President Trump.
> My biggest beef with Obama is that his sympathies with radical Islam
> caused all kinds of disruption in the near east: the overthrow and
> cold-blooded murder of Ghadaffi in Libya, the Benghazi murders, ...
>
> I'd say more, and probably will if you reply favorably to what I'm saying here.
> > Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
> > The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
> > queer liberal democrat donors.
>
> > President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
> > dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
> I can just imagine the attitude of the troika to the choice of justices.
>
> I'm impressed by Trump's international accomplishments, and I'd like to talk more about them,
> but much prefer to do it in posts where there is a good bit of paleontology, like this one.
>
>
> Peter Nyikos
> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> University of South Carolina
> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

I administered my calculus final today and need to start correcting it,
as well as preparing a vector analysis final for Wednesday.
This is probably the only post I do today to either s.b.p. or t.o.

On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 9:09:26 AM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
> On 12/6/21 4:45 AM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> > On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
> >> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
> >>> expedition.
> >
> > I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
> > field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
> > listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
> > being served.
> >
> > I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
> > expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
> > far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
> > but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.

> I count that as volunteer.

I count it as customer.

I associate "volunteer" with "helping out, no charge for doing it but
no pay either, maybe some tokens of appreciation."

Back when the general misconception was that members of Christian denominations
that are liberal contribute more money to charity than members of conservative denominations,
and someone on a mail listserv made that claim, all I could say given my knowledge was,

"Monetary donations are just one yardstick. Another is hours of volunteer work put in by members.
I believe the Salvation Army is theologically conservative -- correct me if I'm wrong."

Nobody could argue that the Salvation Army was not doing great volunteer work.

> There's an organization around somewhere that
> connects amateurs with professionals.

Amateur fossil hunters with professional fossil hunters looking
for vertebrate fossils? Mineral companies might encourage searching
for invertebrate fossils, but vertebrate ones?

> >>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
> >>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
> >
> > If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
> > anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
> > and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
> > find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.

> No, chert is sedimentary. It's a deep ocean sediment composed of
> radiolarian and other siliceous protist skeletons.

Thanks. I may have been confused by the resemblance of the pebble to jasper.

> I'm moderately
> surprised that you were looking for macrofossils in it.

I wasn't. I spotted the pebble lying on the ground, picked it up because it was
different from the minerals I'd collected up to then, and so small that I could easily
take home a hundred of that size, then saw the fossil right on the surface of it.

>It's so hard
> that preparation would be difficult.

> >> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
> >> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
> >
> > How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
> >
> >> The older the rock, the more competent, since
> >> if it weren't competent it's gone.
> >
> > It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
> > vertebrate fossils. I talked about [how] the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
> > was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
> > on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
> >
> > I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
> > of them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
> > Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
> > I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
> > a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
> >
> >
> >> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
> >
> > Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
> > were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
> > go miles into the un-worn underground.

> "Competent" is a geological term, referring to rock that doesn't come
> apart easily.

Got it. I've spent many hours splitting shale in search of fossils, and it's fun to do it by hand,
but almost always got only imprints of plant leaves.

Peter Nyikos

On 12/6/21 6:27 PM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
> I administered my calculus final today and need to start correcting it,
> as well as preparing a vector analysis final for Wednesday.
> This is probably the only post I do today to either s.b.p. or t.o.
>
> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 9:09:26 AM UTC-5, John Harshman wrote:
>> On 12/6/21 4:45 AM, Peter Nyikos wrote:
>>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
>>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>>>>> expedition.
>>>
>>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
>>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
>>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
>>> being served.
>>>
>>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
>>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
>>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
>>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
>
>> I count that as volunteer.
>
> I count it as customer.
>
> I associate "volunteer" with "helping out, no charge for doing it but
> no pay either, maybe some tokens of appreciation."
>
> Back when the general misconception was that members of Christian denominations
> that are liberal contribute more money to charity than members of conservative denominations,
> and someone on a mail listserv made that claim, all I could say given my knowledge was,
>
> "Monetary donations are just one yardstick. Another is hours of volunteer work put in by members.
> I believe the Salvation Army is theologically conservative -- correct me if I'm wrong."
>
> Nobody could argue that the Salvation Army was not doing great volunteer work.
>
>
>> There's an organization around somewhere that
>> connects amateurs with professionals.
>
> Amateur fossil hunters with professional fossil hunters looking
> for vertebrate fossils? Mineral companies might encourage searching
> for invertebrate fossils, but vertebrate ones?

No, sorry if that was unclear. I mean connecting people who want to help
with fossil finding and professional academic paleontologists doing
field work.

>>>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>>>
>>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
>>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
>>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
>>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
>
>> No, chert is sedimentary. It's a deep ocean sediment composed of
>> radiolarian and other siliceous protist skeletons.
>
> Thanks. I may have been confused by the resemblance of the pebble to jasper.

I forget what jasper is. Excuse me whilst I consult Wikipedia. Ah, I see
it's a term for many sorts of silica rocks formed in various ways. Some
of them are chert. Some are not. I also see that some parts of the
banded iron formations are jasper. How about that?

>> I'm moderately
>> surprised that you were looking for macrofossils in it.
>
> I wasn't. I spotted the pebble lying on the ground, picked it up because it was
> different from the minerals I'd collected up to then, and so small that I could easily
> take home a hundred of that size, then saw the fossil right on the surface of it.
>
>
>> It's so hard
>> that preparation would be difficult.
>
>>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
>>>
>>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
>>>
>>>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
>>>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
>>>
>>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
>>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about [how] the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
>>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
>>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>>>
>>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
>>> of them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
>>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
>>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
>>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
>>>
>>>
>>>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>>>
>>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
>>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
>>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
>
>> "Competent" is a geological term, referring to rock that doesn't come
>> apart easily.
>
> Got it. I've spent many hours splitting shale in search of fossils, and it's fun to do it by hand,
> but almost always got only imprints of plant leaves.

You should look for a marine shale.

On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 13:53:26 -0800 (PST), Glenn <GlennSheldon@msn.com>
wrote:

>On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 2:27:23 PM UTC-7, John Harshman wrote:
>> On 12/6/21 11:21 AM, jillery wrote:
>> > On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 08:40:01 -0800 (PST), erik simpson
>> > <eastsi...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
>> >>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
>> >>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>> >>>>> expedition.
>> >>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
>> >>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
>> >>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
>> >>> being served.
>> >>>
>> >>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
>> >>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
>> >>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
>> >>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
>> >>>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>> >>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>> >>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
>> >>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
>> >>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
>> >>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
>> >>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>> >>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
>> >>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
>> >>>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
>> >>>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
>> >>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
>> >>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
>> >>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
>> >>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>> >>>
>> >>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
>> >>> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
>> >>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
>> >>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
>> >>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
>> >>>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>> >>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
>> >>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
>> >>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
>> >>> Peter Nyikos
>> >>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>> >>> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
>> >>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>> >>
>> >> What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
>> >> kinds of environments.
>> >>
>> >> Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.
>> >>
>> >> "Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.
>> >
>> >
>> > Not only is chert not igneous, but is typically composed of the
>> > petrified remains of siliceous ooze, and so is expected to contain
>> > fossils.
>> >
>> > Also, even igneous layers can have embedded sedimentary inclusions:
>> Also, volcanoclastics like ash-flow tuffs can contain lots of fossils.
>
>
>Cherty tuff.

"Cherty tuff" would be a great name for a rock band.

On 12/6/21 7:35 PM, jillery wrote:
> On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 13:53:26 -0800 (PST), Glenn <GlennSheldon@msn.com>
> wrote:
>
>> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 2:27:23 PM UTC-7, John Harshman wrote:
>>> On 12/6/21 11:21 AM, jillery wrote:
>>>> On Mon, 6 Dec 2021 08:40:01 -0800 (PST), erik simpson
>>>> <eastsi...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Monday, December 6, 2021 at 4:45:37 AM UTC-8, Peter Nyikos wrote:
>>>>>> On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 1:09:26 PM UTC-5, erik simpson wrote:
>>>>>>> On Friday, December 3, 2021 at 9:41:35 PM UTC-8, John Harshman wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I've always thought it would be fun to volunteer on a vertebrate fossil
>>>>>>>> expedition.
>>>>>> I wasn't a volunteer: I paid for the privilege of taking part. Especially since these
>>>>>> field trips were part of a conference where we spent a good part of our time
>>>>>> listening to stimulating lectures and discussing them over the meals we were
>>>>>> being served.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I don't know how much it would have cost if I tried to join in the usual
>>>>>> expeditions by professionals. I'll ask them about this eventually, but by
>>>>>> far my biggest expense is airfare to Casper and back. I'd have to check,
>>>>>> but the hotel bill might also have come to more than conference participation.
>>>>>>>> Never managed to follow through so far, though. Been to some
>>>>>>>> nice marine invertebrate sites, but that's all.
>>>>>> If it hadn't been for the minerals and invertebrates, I would not have collected
>>>>>> anything to bring home. Lots of belemnites, lots of oyster shells and imprints,
>>>>>> and even a snail shell imprint on a chert pebble. I never dreamed that I could
>>>>>> find such thing: chert is igneous, isn't it? You aren't supposed to find fossils in igneous rock.
>>>>>>> Vertebrate fossil hunting is often lots dirtier than nice paleolithic invertebrate hunting,
>>>>>>> particularly if it's mesozoic vertebrates.
>>>>>> How do you know this, if you never had personal experience?
>>>>>>> The older the rock, the more competent, since
>>>>>>> if it weren't competent it's gone.
>>>>>> It takes a trained eye to make out what little sticks out of the ground among
>>>>>> vertebrate fossils. I talked about the only person finding turtle bones (pretty big ones, at that)
>>>>>> was someone who specialized in them. There was no lack of experienced fossil hunters
>>>>>> on the two expeditions, yet the others had missed them.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I've gone panning for shark teeth in a stream that seems to have a never ending supply
>>>>>> on them, and our experienced guide kept identifying porous "rocks" as chunks of whale bone.
>>>>>> Dark gray amorphous chunks the size but not shape of baseballs and somewhat bigger.
>>>>>> I never would have suspected that they were fossils, and might have missed many
>>>>>> a fossil of a weather-worn bone in our Wyoming outings through not knowing what to look for.
>>>>>>> Cambrian and earlier is good, clean rocks.
>>>>>> Dunno about that, nor can I figure out what you mean by "competent". These fossils
>>>>>> were on the slopes of big hills which are slowly worn away, but the strata they expose
>>>>>> go miles into the un-worn underground.
>>>>>> Peter Nyikos
>>>>>> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
>>>>>> Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
>>>>>> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos
>>>>>
>>>>> What makes you I haven't had personal experience? I've worn out many boots, in all
>>>>> kinds of environments.
>>>>>
>>>>> Chert is not igneous. You sometimes find chert secondarily deposited in pockets in igneous rock.
>>>>>
>>>>> "Competent", geologist-speak hard rock, resistent deformation. In other works, being a good rock.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Not only is chert not igneous, but is typically composed of the
>>>> petrified remains of siliceous ooze, and so is expected to contain
>>>> fossils.
>>>>
>>>> Also, even igneous layers can have embedded sedimentary inclusions:
>>> Also, volcanoclastics like ash-flow tuffs can contain lots of fossils.
>>
>>
>> Cherty tuff.
>
>
> "Cherty tuff" would be a great name for a rock band.
>
Sounds like an anagram of something. Fry the cuff?

On Saturday, December 4, 2021 at 11:13:30 PM UTC-5, *Hemidactylus* wrote:
> Peter Nyikos <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> [snip good on topic stuff by Peter where he rolls out the red carpet for
> someone who may never reply to his efforts]
> >
> > I'm a bit surprised that none of the left-wing troika [meaning "trio" but
> > with special connotations]
> > dominating s.b.p. has sussed you out yet. The senior member [in s.b.p.
> > experience, not age],
> > is John Harshman, and the other two are "Oxyaena" and Erik Simpson.
> >
> Must you engage in this compulsion?

It's a sad necessity. Mostly because of shenanigans in talk.origins by
them and yourself and others, I don't get a chance to post to s.b.p.
for weeks at a time, and they can be almost as brutal to newcomers to s.b.p.
as you have been to Glenn for years now.

You never showed interest in sci.bio.paleontology until last year, when
I was, as usual, hospitable to people from talk.origins here as long as
the talk.origins robo-moderator was down. Did you witness how Erik Simpson
ripped into me for being so hospitable as to temporarily treat s.b.p.
as a "talk.origins in exile," tolerating posts that were off-topic for s.b.p.?

Erik had been perfectly OK with that on all previous occasions -- quite a number
over the years -- but that one was different: Glenn showed up that time,
and Erik has been part of a massive character assassination campaign
against Glenn in talk.origins encompassing the other two troika members, as well as yourself.

> > "Oxyaena" is a trans "woman" who has ducked questions as to whether he
> > had any hormonal abnormalities or unusual genetics (XXY, etc.); hence I
> > decline to use feminine pronouns for him, and that infuriates him.
> >
> > I think he would also be infuriated if he saw the rest rooms in one small restaurant
> > where we stopped on one of our expeditions. The women's room had a big
> > wooden sign on the door with XX on it, and the men's room had a similar sign but with XY.
> >
> Peter, this is hurtful stuff.

Don't talk to me about "hurtful" until you drop your character assassination
campaign against Glenn. At one point you even libeled me like a radical
French Revolution Jacobin for declining to denounce Glenn for a hurtful
thing he said about you, by claiming that I had endorsed what he wrote.
Later you tried to make light of the whole thing by saying the libel was a "misunderstanding"
by "both" of us. The misunderstanding was exclusively on your side,
in every respect.

>You and Oxy have a contentious history and I
> cannot say I am closely familiar with how it has gone over the years,

Then butt out and let someone who is even moderately familiar
with what has gone on ["closely" is flattering yourself beyond reason]
do the talking. Do you know that "Oxyaena" is the "Thrinaxodon"
whose name lived in infamy for years to the extent that any post
that so much as mentioned the name was automatically rejected by the talk.origins robo-moderator?

One reason is that Oxyaena, then posting as "Thrinaxodon," attempted to destroy
sci.bio.paleontology in 2013 and 2014 by massively posting truly insane spam.
Whether it was he or some accomplice who posted very similar insanity
under the false name of "Ed Conrad" is purely academic.

> please stop with such deeply personal biting animosity.

You are as hypocritical with "please" as John Harshman was with it
when he wrote last week, on the sci.bio.paleontology thread "Vaccination,"

"Please do not post off-topic threads to sci.bio.paleontology."

This was a thread on which he, himself, had posted off-topic, copiously, and I nailed him on
his hypocrisy re off-topic posting [a hypocrisy that you are guilty of too] here:

https://groups.google.com/g/sci.bio.paleontology/c/H-SFHyhHp8w/m/ixp2wNr6CgAJ
Re: Vaccination
Dec 3, 2021, 3:03:19 PM

> You did this with
> the imprimatur of your university below.

Stop pretending that you are ignorant of what the part "-- standard disclaimer --"
of my four line virtual .sigs in which I give my university affiliation is all about.

Remainder deleted. I can only stand so much hypocrisy and mendacity in one post.

Peter Nyikos