Archaeopteryx Identity Crisis: Some Broad Connections in Secular Literature

The idea that Archaeopteryx was a dinosaur, rather than a bird, is not a new one. The growing majority of paleontologists do not accept Archaeopteryx’s old status as the earliest bird. This has not so much been due to the new emerging picture of Archaeopteryx (though that has played a part), but rather the discovery of certain dinosaurs, which share features with Archaeopteryx.

Keep in mind that the following research and opinions is based largely on the science of cladistics, which is grounded in the belief in the functionality of macroevolution. For example, many of the authors looked at in the following paragraphs hold to a Deinonychosauria clade. To an evolutionist, a clade is a distinct branch of the evolutionary tree of life. While the presupposition that all animals are descended from the same ancestor is inherently flawed, there is a lot to be gleaned in a baraminological perspective.

Looking at the reasons paleontologists determine the members of a clade helps us translate the data into a form useful to creationists. Archaeopteryx, as an example, might be considered very close on the evolution tree to Velociraptor. They are considered related to each other, not as some random interpretation of the evolutionist, but because they do bear many similarities. In effect, cladistics is a great way to get a preliminary perspective on exactly how alike the various genera are. Whether truly related or not, cladistics shows in a visual format the physical similarity of the organisms.

The discovery of the Chinese fossil species Xiaotingia zhengi has provided a link among deinonychosaurs (Xu et al., 2011). Xiaotingia was most similar to Archaeopteryx and Anchiornis huxleyi (a small carnivore bearing many similarities to troodont dinosaurs and often considered more bird-like than Archaeopteryx in some respects). Actually, Xiaotingia was nearly identical to Anchiornis, especially in the structure of the skull, and both animals were placed in the Deinonychosauria with Archaeopteryx. Interestingly, Archaeopteryx was considered to be slightly more similar to other deinonychosaurs and less similar to birds, when compared to the other two genera. Bringing the data closer to home, if Xiaotingia and Anchiornis are considered deinonychosaurs, then the less bird-like Archaeopteryx has an even higher chance of belonging to the same monobaramin as the less bird-like Deinonychosaurs, such as Velociraptor, than these two species.

And yet, Xiaotingia and Anchiornis are more like troodont dinosaurs than Archaeopteryx. So, if Anchiornis/Xiaotingia and Archaeopteryx are most like each other, but Archaeopteryx is very like the dromaeosaurids (such as Velociraptor), and Xiaotingia/Anchiornis are very like troodonts, what is the creationist interpretation? Well, given that information, there are a couple of possibilities. First, it could be that the extreme similarities to each other is merely coincidental, and the alternate likeness of the Anchiornis/Xiaotingia and Archaeopteryx groups to the Troodontidae and Dromaeosauridae prospectively is evidence that the two groups are not the same created kind. The second perspective would take the evidence in an opposite direction. While the Troodontidae and the Dromaeosauridae represent two different subgroups within the Deinonychosauria, the traits each group shares with Anchiornis/Xiaotingia and Archaeopteryx groups is evidence that they all belong to the same super monobaramin. There is no clear line that can be drawn between the various groups; they all seem to have significant similarities with one another discontinuously. Thus, the two views are, either all are the same created kind, or there are many very similar monobaramins.

Further evidence for the single monobaramin theory has ben uncovered with the new discovery of the troodontid-like Aurornis xui. Seemingly, it has crumbled the barrier between the Archaeopteryx, Anchiornis, and Xiaotingia clade (Godefroit et al., 2013). It is undeniable that the new dinosaur Aurornis xui was extremely similar to the Troodontidae, more so than even Anchiornis, but it was also much more birdlike than the previous finds in many of its features. It appears that Aurornis was a more perfect combination of dinosaur and bird features than even Archaeopteryx. Thus, Aurornis joins the growing number of genera in the Archaeopteryx holobaramin as possibly the most bird-like of the deinonychosaurs, but not the most non-dinosaurian.

Since a lot of this post has dealt with the views and observations of evolutionists on the Deinonychosauria, some explanation is needed. It should be noted that evolutionists do not see birds and dinosaurs as two distinct groups. When an evolutionist says an animal is a bird, in most cases, it in no way detracts from the animal’s status as a dinosaur. All birds are dinosaurs to most evolutionists. However, not all dinosaurs are birds in that perspective, because it is the birds that evolved from the dinosaurs, not vice versa. Keep in mind that these views are present when evolutionists classify dinosaurs, as is discussed throughout this text.

Archaeopteryx has been compared to other dinosaur families in a broader sense. It was illustrated that Archaeopteryx is distinct from the Tyrannosauroidea (including Tyrannosaurus) and Alverezsauroidea, such as Mononykus, which has been believed to be a bird rather than a dinosaur (Xu et al., 2010). It is interesting that the authors of that paper noticed such stark differences between the Deinonychosauria and the Alverezsauroidea, since members of the later group have also been considered birds in the past. However, Archaeopteryx was considered similar to other groups like the Oviraptorosauria, Scansorioperygidae, and especially (but not surprisingly) the Dromaeosauridae and Troodontidae, which are fellow deinonychosaurs. All four groups were considered birds by those authors. Of course, that thinking would also include the iconic Velociraptor as a bird, which will be explored a little later on.

Not all feathered dinosaurs were so bird-like. This is a heterodontosaur, a
kind of herbivorous ornithopod dinosaur. Although they did have
feathers, they are never included as a possible dino-bird candidate
because other feathers of their anatomy clearly differentiate them from the
Deinonychosauria, Oviraptorosauria, and other very bird-like dinosaurs.

Once again, let me remind readers that this is an overview of secular literature and, while much good data has been gleaned, we always need to keep in mind the ultimate goals of this research, one of which is to determine which monobaramin Archaeopteryx belongs to. However, this overview of the literature has brought up an interesting side note and, as was addressed in the first part of this series, if the Deinonychosauria like Velociraptor should be considered dinosaurs, then it would mean that some dinosaurs were feathered. I think this is a notion that creationists need to become comfortable with.


References:

Goedfroit, Pascal, Andrea Cau, Hu Dong-Yu, Francois Escuillie, Wu Wenhao, et Gareth Dyke. June 2013. “A Jurassic Avialan Dinosaur from China Resolves the Early Phylogenetic History of Birds”. Nature. Vol. 498, No. 7454, pp. 359-362.

Xu, Xing, Hailu You, Kai Du, et Fenglu Han. July 2011. “An Archaeopteryx-like Theropod from China and the Origin of the Avialae”. Nature. Vol. 475, No. 7357, pp. 465-470.

Xu, Xing, Qing Yu Ma, et Dong Yu Hu. December 2010. “Pre-Archaeopteryx Coelurosaurian Dinosaurs and Their Implications for Understanding Avian Origins”. Chinese Science Bulletin. Vol. 55, No. 35.