Scientists in agreement: Asteroid killed The Dinosaurs.

[Martok]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... tists.html

I thought I heard Richard Dawkins say a couple years ago the asteroid theory of dinosaur extinction was already accepted as true.

I guess its official now for sure.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The first part of the subject line is really funny.

[Elessarina]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... tists.html

I thought I heard Richard Dawkins say a couple years ago the asteroid theory of dinosaur extinction was already accepted as true.

I guess its official now for sure.

And I just want to growl everytime I see your avatar

[Nautilidae]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... tists.html

I thought I heard Richard Dawkins say a couple years ago the asteroid theory of dinosaur extinction was already accepted as true.

I guess its official now for sure.

Blast, you beat me to it.

[susu.exp]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... tists.html

I thought I heard Richard Dawkins say a couple years ago the asteroid theory of dinosaur extinction was already accepted as true.

I guess its official now for sure.

It´s a review article summing up the science done on this in the last 3 decades. In 1980 Alvarez et al. published their findings of iridium anomalies at the KT boundary first proposing an impact scenario in science. This new paper pretty much right on the 30th Aniversary doesn´t tell us anything new - that´s not what review papers are about anyway. It mainly synthesizes the work of many, including the authors, which all have done work either on impacts on earth or local KT boundary sections. The impact hypothesis is very well accepted these days, the link to the extinction is strong and there aren´t any good contenders. Now, some dinosaur paleontologists with bad grasps on statistics like to talk about a decline prior to that (likely backsmearing - discussed here by me) and a few people who insist the deccan traps had something to do with it - with neither a plausible mechanism at hand, nor any explanation for some temporal mismatchs.

The news article you linked to seriously misrepresents this. It also gets the name of the researcher wrong - it´s Jay Melosh, not Jim Melosh...

[klr]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... tists.html

I thought I heard Richard Dawkins say a couple years ago the asteroid theory of dinosaur extinction was already accepted as true.

I guess its official now for sure.

It´s a review article summing up the science done on this in the last 3 decades. In 1980 Alvarez et al. published their findings of iridium anomalies at the KT boundary first proposing an impact scenario in science. This new paper pretty much right on the 30th Aniversary doesn´t tell us anything new - that´s not what review papers are about anyway. It mainly synthesizes the work of many, including the authors, which all have done work either on impacts on earth or local KT boundary sections. The impact hypothesis is very well accepted these days, the link to the extinction is strong and there aren´t any good contenders. Now, some dinosaur paleontologists with bad grasps on statistics like to talk about a decline prior to that (likely backsmearing - discussed here by me) and a few people who insist the deccan traps had something to do with it - with neither a plausible mechanism at hand, nor any explanation for some temporal mismatchs.

The news article you linked to seriously misrepresents this. It also gets the name of the researcher wrong - it´s Jay Melosh, not Jim Melosh...

A link back to an RD.net science thread. That's another hypothesis proven I guess.

Now, if we could only get the cause(s) of the end-Permian mass extinction finally pinned down.