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Anonymous
I was reading a biology text book. It classified birds as reptiles. Did something happen recently? I was always under the impression that birds were their own "order"
>> Anonymous
Outdated knowledge is outdated.

The old classification system was based largely on a complete ignorance of how groups of animals came to be. The current cladistic taxonomy is based on knowledge on how these groups have evolved and which groups share common ancestors (and how recently). Since the group that includes chelonians, tuataras, lizards, snakes and crocodiles also includes birds, either we call them all reptiles or we call none of them reptiles. Scientifically speaking, Reptilia doesn't even exist anymore, so it's mainly a question of preference whether you want your birds to be reptiles or your no-longer-reptiles to be sauropsids.
>> Anonymous
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Reptiles isn't a thing anymore, OP.

And the dinosaurs never went extinct.
>> Anonymous
Huh, thanks for clearing that up.
So
Birds = surviving set of Dinosaurs = Reptiles?
>> Anonymous
>>315217
Essentially, yes.

It turns out that crocodiles are more closely related to birds than they are to turtles. Knowing this, it's kindof stupid to call them both reptiles and separate them from birds. Nowadays, people still use the word Reptile, but its scientific value is negligible.

I love whenever a paleontologist talks about the extinction of "non-avian dinosaurs". Science is fun.
>> Anonymous
did you know

Hyenas are more closely related to cats than dogs (their closest relation being mongooses and meerkats)

Hippos and Dolphins share a direct common ancestor
>> Anonymous
>>315246
Yes. I knew all those things.

Did you know that the megachiroptera (large diurnal bats) probably evolved from ancestors similar to microchiroptera (small echolocating bats). Rather than being a more primative clade that had not ever evolved echolocation, the megabats probably had echolocation and lost it as they adapted to an environment with an abundance of light.

Similarly, the megabats have a visual pathway that is superficially similar to those of primates, which evolved seperately (but for the same purpose of identifying fruit).

This wasn't interesting to anyone, was it?
>> Anonymous
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Oh hai. Can I be a bird nao?
>> Anonymous
>>315251
Yeah, as if you weren't fucking terrifying enough already, now you can fucking FLY?!