tgamble

This may seem like a silly question but here goes anyway. In this article.
<a href="http://www.atheists.org/bone.pit/halfawing.html" target="_blank">http://www.atheists.org/bone.pit/halfawing.html</a>

Frank Zindler states:

"Although some very famous ornithologists have thought otherwise, I am convinced that the majority opinion is correct: bird flight began in the trees, not on the ground."

However, my understanding from this article and elsewhere
<a href="http://www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/Leads97/Feduccia97-03.html" target="_blank">http://www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/Leads97/Feduccia97-03.html</a>
is that the trees down theory is a minority view.

Maybe I'm missing something here? Thanks.

Hallucigenia

Depends on who the "majority" is. Among dinosaurian paleontologists, the "ground up" model seems to be most prevalent; however, from what I have seen from ornithologists (many of whom, interestingly, claim that birds evolved not from dinosaurs, but from a basal archosauromorph), the "trees down" model seems to be preferred.

Gieven that there are probably more ornithologists than dinosaur paleontologists, it may well be, therefore, that the "trees down" model is the more prevalent.

Nic Tamzek

This is wrapped up in the whole dinobirds vs. BANDits (Birds Are Not Dinosaurs) controversy.

I think this is about right, although it may just be that a few prominent ornithologists are BANDits, rather than all of them. IMHO it appears that the BANDits have lost the argument.

However, this does not IMO resolve the ground-up, tree-down controversy. Assuming that birds are descended from small bipedal dinosaurs, IMO there is no particular reason that some of these couldn't have become arboreal, and then developed flying via the normal path of gliding.

There may even be some paleontological evidence for this at this point; there are some very detailed webpages out there I know, e.g. a technical dinosaur discussion group archives, but I can't remember the links...

nic

Hallucigenia

There is evidence to support both models, really. Much depends on which version one finds more reasonable. Myself, I cast my vote for the "ground up" model (for both birds and pterosaurs).

tgamble

Thanks for the responses. I'm sure most have read it already but in AIG's response to SA Sarfati claims that the debate proves that birds didn't evolve at all.

Both sides produce "devestating arguments" against the other.