Over at Why Evolution Is True, Jerry Coyne has posted one hell of a great image.
This fan of evolution is 4 years old. His mother or father writes in to say:
He can’t seem to get enough of all the pictures and diagrams in the book. He is particularly fond of the diagram near the beginning of the book that shows the evolutionary change from reptiles to dinosaurs to birds. Since I have explained the diagram to him he now goes around telling everyone that birds came from dinosaurs. You can never start teaching them science and critical thinking too early!
Filed under: Evolution | Tagged: Jerry Coyne, Why Evolution is True |
For the Sake of Science 
Actually, birds only evolved “out of” dinosaurs in the same sense that we evolved “out of” primates. But, people are STILL primates, and in the same way, birds are STILL dinosaurs.
AronRa’s got a great video on this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhZeowON8l8
Species are often defined in hindsight. It’s the gift of extinction that usually separates one species from another. Or, in the case, one class from another.
Of course, for the sake of acknowledging the evolutionary history of birds, it doesn’t hurt to call them dinosaurs.