My two-year old has a toy alligator, and one of his favorite games is to sneak up to me and shout “roar”. I, of course, dramatically react to the surprise attack as he fervently giggles and squeals. Then the surprise attack ensues once again.
Any true Southeast Texan knows that alligators don’t roar, they make an eerie hissing sound. So I began to wonder why my boy assumed alligators roar. Then I remembered the dinosaur book. We have a book with brightly colored illustrations of different kinds of dinosaurs with big sharp teeth and scaly skin. He likes to look at the pictures, and every time we turn the page we let loose with a terrifying dinosaur roar. So I figured he assumed that the alligator is the same as the dinosaurs from the book.
I must admit that is not a bad assumption for a two year old. After all alligators are reptiles that have big sharp teeth. They even look similar to dinosaurs. But they don’t roar.
In fact, I can’t seem to think of any large reptiles that roar. Iguanas, Kimodo dragons, Galapagos tortoises, snakes, alligators, and crocodiles – none of them roar. They can hiss, howl, squeak and grunt, but not roar.
So why on earth do we assume that dinosaurs, which ranged from the size of a chicken to the size of a 3-story building, made loud, terrorizing, deep throated, roaring noises?
-Because they said so. On TV, in movies, at museums, and in our science books dinosaurs are portrayed as massive, savage, roaring beasts. So it must be true, right?
It seems to me that evolutionary scientists and archeologists base their “facts” on some shaky assumptions. I am by no means an expert on the subject, I don’t see any evidence that supports the assumption that dinosaurs roared. I bet that dinosaurs no more roared than alligators do.
But I’m not going to break this news to my son yet, I’m just gunna let the gators roar.
No comments:
Post a Comment