How did humans get their information about dinosaurs?

Question

Man came to existence about 4 million years ago, and dinosaurs extinct about 65 million years ago. How come humans have information about dinosaurs if they extinct before humans existed? I know its based on scientific evidence like fossils, but information attained is too much that makes us think we existed at the period?

Answer 1

It's called radio-carbon dating.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio-carbon_dating

Answer 2

It is based on comparing fossils and the rocks we find them in to the world around us. You find a complete fossil (or almost complete). You have enough bones to figure out something about the creature. Now, you get detailed. Take each bone and compare it to modern bones and find similarities. From the modern animals you can find how these attributes affect the animal. Also, the bones tell us more than just the size and shape of the animal. We can find where the muscles attached to the bone and get an idea of the anatomy of the creature. Analyze the teeth and find out if the creature was herbivore or carnivore or a little of both. Assemble the bones and find the skeletal limits of motion. This will tell you how the creature was capable of moving. The size of the ocular cavities will tell us about the eyes and the size of the brain cavity will give us an idea of the brain. The stories a pile of bones can tell are numerous.

That is just the bones. If we look at the rock and/or dirt where the skeleton was found, we can also learn amazing things. Different types of rock are formed differently. Limestone does not form the same as sandstone. They do not form in the same kinds of areas. A sandstone might indicate a beach or river. The limestone might indicate deep water as in an ocean or lake. Look at what else can be found in the area. Microfossils can tell alot about the environment. Plant fossils are also very telling. There are even more ways to deduce from a fossil find the ways and lives of dinosaurs.

Factor in that there are thousands of people doing research in the field of paleontology and they have been at it for decades. The man-hours alone are probably in the millions. That is a lot of time to spend studying a subject. Every day new discoveries are made, so our knowledge of dinosaurs is constantly becoming greater.

I am not sure about your last sentence. Are you suggesting that man kind knows so much about dinosaurs because we lived at the same time they did? If so then you are wrong. There are no human fossils in the same layers as dinosaur fossils. There are not even ape fossils in the same layers as dinosaur fossils. Mammals were just getting started and were more like rodents back then. It was a few million more years before anything human like showed up on the scene.

Answer 3

Your information about humans is a little inaccurate. Although humanoids might be as old as 4 million years, Homo Sapiens didn't appear till about 100,000 years ago. Modern man, Homo Sapiens Sapiens appeared about 10,000 years ago. To answer your question by examining the fossil record, and painstakingly applying logic to questions raised, mankind is learning more and more about dinosaurs every day. The same question could be asked about any extinct species, such as trilobites, which died out with the Permian Extinction, or any other species that died out during any of the five major extinctions in the Earth's history. That is what the Science of Geology is all about, applying logic to clues left in the fossil record.

Answer 4

Can't see what your problem is. The bones tell you a huge amount about these creatures - how big, how fast, how vicious, etc etc.

Dinosaur nests tell us they laid eggs, and in some cases the level of fossilised footprints around nests, tells us that they may have even stayed around to look after the young.

Teeth marks in the bones of Tricerotops match the size and shape of T Rex's teeth. So, we know T Rex preyed on these grazing animals.

The thing is that people who study anatomy and bones can find a one inch part of a jawbone and pretty much tell you what animal it came from.

It is no different to the modern forensic scientists who can piece together bits of human remains to show how the person died. These people dedicate their lives to attaining that skill.

It's no mystery, I assure you. Just hard work and dedication.

Answer 5

Fossils...Thats all we know about Dinosaurs...

Answer 6

we looked it up the wilkipedia