Mesozoic Mind

A couple days ago I went to the Ontario Science Centre, a science museum on Toronto's east side. It's a pretty nice museum if I say so myself; and concerning recent political events caused by Ontario's premeir, deserves to stay where it is  and be spared from conservatives. But mostly I came to visit one temporary exhibit, that's pertinent to my own interests. Dinos(saurs) in Motion is that one a travelling exhibition from the mind of Imagine Exhibitions and late artist John Payne, about kinetic scupltures of dinosaurs, some of which are borderline robots thanks to being interactive via levers and stering wheels attached to pullies. It has been set up in the Science Centre's atrium, with a fairly minimal setup. The species lineup for the exhibit, going clockwise, goes: Ornithomimus and Struthiomimus Plesiosaurus Diplodocus Deinonychus Ouranosaurus Gastornis Parasaurolophus Ankylosaurus Tyrannosaurus Pachycephalosaurs (I think they have no signage and thus don) Who...

Phew, sorry for the hiatus. I didn't go to college after all - yet. I'm back! Got another obscure palaeo -documentary at hand! No, this is not that book I reviewed  despite the prescence of both the American Museum of Natural History and Mark Norrell, nor a documentary calledd The Dinosaur Hunters from 2002 about Gideon Mantell and other 1800's palaeontologists based off a book, nor the utterly terrible Discovery Reality series Dino Hunters . Sheesh, National Geographic's Dinosaur Hunters is such a generic title you need to specify what you mean everytime. Anyway... Rather, it's the National Geographic documentary special from 1996, back before Nat Geo had its own channel and put out specials on other channels and VHS. It was made at the height of the Dinosaur Renaissance as new discoveries of theropods were coming out of Asia to reveal how birdlike and caring the smaller dinosaurs were rather then the lumbering idiots. That's what the doc is about: those very...

  Just like the ROM visit, I got several books for my birthday. One of them is today's subject, The Dinosaur Hunters *, a book about the history of palaeontology and the study dinosaurs, from the origins of the subject to the impact dinosaurs have on pop culture. It is written by Lowell Dingus with help from Mark Norell, both from and book helped by the venerable American Museum of Natural History. * Not to be confused with another non-fiction book of the same name and subject by Deborah Cadbury. The contents of it are fairly broad in scope. It goes chronologically, and a basic list summary is: Origins of Palaeontology, from the Greek Xenophanes observing fossil shells in mountains to Nicolas Steno's work in geology against Church's dogma. England's discoveries, such as William Buckland and Megalosaurus, the Mantells discovering and describing Iguanodon , and Crystal Palace Park. During and beyond the 1870's, Belgium sees the discovery of more Iguanodon that change...