The Dinosaur Heresies: New Theories Unlocking the Mystery of the Dinosaurs… (1986)

This book opened my eyes to a new way of thinking about dinosaurs. Highly recommended even now that Bakker's theories have gained more traction and no longer seem as radical as when he wrote this book. ( )

Interesting, though somewhat oddly structured - partly due to his arguments becoming less heretical since this book was written, though. 95% of the book is spent declaring that dinosaurs were warmblooded (now considered a reasonable possibility, at least), with evidence of dozens of types to support the assertion. It becomes quite annoying, actually - footprints prove it! Bone structures prove it! Predator/prey ratios prove it! Chapter after chapter after chapter thumping on the same drum. It seems reasonable, and, as I said, is now largely accepted as a possibility - part of my problem may be that he was arguing with a different audience. Then at the very end - the last half of the last chapter - he gets on to a different subject; _since_ dinosaurs were warmblooded, the entire classification system for them is wrong. Among other things, modern birds are part of the same class - and therefore Dinosauria are not extinct! He's definitely a lumper - this and that and the other group should all be subsumed under Dinosauria. Interesting but not convincing to me - I'd like to see a paleontologist's opinion of his argument. And he mentions multiple times, but never goes into detail on, the oddest and most interesting (to me) aspect of this - according to him, the earliest paleontologists generally shared his views, on warmbloodedness and the structures of dinosaurs' lives; sometime in the early 20th century - 1920-1940 or thereabouts - the conventional wisdom totally switched to seeing them as giant, coldblooded, sluggish reptiles. Why, and exactly when, and who/what drove this change...nothing is explained, and it's a fascinating question to me! I'll have to look for mentions of this attitude switch elsewhere. ( )

Dr. Bakker explains much of what had been learned about dinosaurs in his time, emphasizing his theory of their warm-bloodedness in the process. Very interesting and entertaining. ( )

I loved this book, and Bakker was (and is) a rebel worth listening to. ( )

I love Bakker and his theories, and this was a great book. Mostly, he talks about why he believes the dinosaurs were warm-blooded, which was pretty controversial at the time, but is now, I think, mostly accepted as fact. I expect the same to happen with his more recent theories as well. He's definitely my favorite "popular" paleontologist. I've also heard him speak, and he's hilarous - especially great with children. ( )