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120-730: Expedition: Being an Account in Words and Artwork of the 2358 A.D. Voyage to Darwin IV is a 1990 speculative evolution and science fiction book written and illustrated by the American artist and writer Wayne Barlowe . Written as a first-person account of a 24th-century crewed expedition to the fictional exoplanet of Darwin IV, Expedition describes and discusses an imaginary extraterrestrial ecosystem as if it were real. The extraterrestrial or alien organisms of Darwin IV were designed to be "truly alien", with Barlowe having grown dissatisfied with

240-403: A T. rex toe exposed above ground, making him the youngest person to discover a Tyrannosaurus . The specimen, dubbed Bucky in honor of its discoverer, was a young adult, 3.0 metres (10 ft) tall and 11 metres (35 ft) long. Bucky is the first Tyrannosaurus to be found that preserved a furcula (wishbone). Bucky is permanently displayed at The Children's Museum of Indianapolis . In

360-642: A scavenger . The question of whether Tyrannosaurus was an apex predator or a pure scavenger was among the longest debates in paleontology . Most paleontologists today accept that Tyrannosaurus was both an active predator and a scavenger. Specimens of Tyrannosaurus rex include some that are nearly complete skeletons. Soft tissue and proteins have been reported in at least one of these specimens. The abundance of fossil material has allowed significant research into many aspects of its biology, including its life history and biomechanics . The feeding habits, physiology , and potential speed of Tyrannosaurus rex are

480-433: A "hunters, floaters and sinkers" ecosystem could populate the atmospheres of gas giant planets like Jupiter, and scientifically described it in a 1976 paper. In extraterrestrial-focused speculative biology, lifeforms are often designed with the intention to populate planets wildly different from Earth, and in such cases concerns like chemistry , astronomy and the laws of physics become just as important to consider as

600-437: A TV adaptation of the book, Alien Planet (2005) where exploration of Darwin IV is instead carried out by robotic probes and the segments detailing the ecosystems of the planet are intercut with interviews with scientists, such as Michio Kaku , Jack Horner and James B. Garvin . Other examples of speculative evolution focused on extraterrestrial life include Dougal Dixon's 2010 book Greenworld , TV programmes such as 1997

720-497: A benevolent and technologically superior alien race, the Yma, humanity begins to repair their ravaged world while simultaneously learning more about the universe around them. When an uncrewed Yma probe discovers evidence of alien life on Darwin IV, the titular "expedition" is sent to investigate. Barlowe presents his findings in a collection of paintings, sketches, field notes, and diary entries from his explorations of Darwin IV. He details

840-448: A biological defense mechanism. James Cameron 's 2009 film Avatar constructed a fictional biosphere full of original, speculative alien species; a team of experts ensured that the lifeforms were scientifically plausible. The creatures of the movie took inspiration from Earth species as diverse as pterosaurs , microraptors , great white sharks , and panthers , and combined their traits to create an alien world. Darren Naish praised

960-455: A broad postorbital and hourglass shaped nasals. Some of the more derived pantyrannosaurs lack nasal pneumaticity and have a lower humerus to femur ratio with their arms starting to see some reduction. Some pantyrannosaurs started developing an arctometatarsus. Eutyrannosaurs have a rough texture on their nasal bones and their mandibular fenestra is reduced externally. Tyrannosaurids lack kinetic skulls or special crests on their nasal bones, and have

1080-420: A civilization of "cheela" that lives a million times faster than humans. In some cases, artists and writers exploring possible alien life conjure similar ideas independent of each other, often attributed to studying the same biological processes and ideas. Such occasions can be called "convergent speculation", similar to the scientific idea of convergent evolution . Perhaps the most famous speculative work on

1200-410: A convex front of the vertebral body and a concave rear. The vertebral bodies had single pleurocoels, pneumatic depressions created by air sacs , on their sides. The vertebral bodies of the torso were robust but with a narrow waist. Their undersides were keeled. The front sides were concave with a deep vertical trough. They had large pleurocoels. Their neural spines had very rough front and rear sides for

1320-483: A few subjects of debate. Its taxonomy is also controversial, as some scientists consider Tarbosaurus bataar from Asia to be a third Tyrannosaurus species, while others maintain Tarbosaurus is a separate genus. Several other genera of North American tyrannosaurids have also been synonymized with Tyrannosaurus . At present, two species of Tyrannosaurus are considered valid; the type species, T. rex , and

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1440-536: A fictional version of the planet Mars which appeared in ten novels published from 1912 to 1941, featured a Martian ecosystem with a variety of alien creatures and several distinct Martian cultures and ethnic groups . Stanley Weinbaum 's Planetary series also includes significantly conceptualized and developed alien life. Frederik Pohl wrote that before Weinbaum, science fiction's aliens "might be catmen, lizard-men, antmen, plantmen or rockmen; but they were, always and incurably, men . Weinbaum changed that. ... it

1560-428: A hallmark of science fiction throughout the 20th century, ideas were only rarely well-developed, with some exceptions such as Stanley Weinbaum 's Planetary series , Edgar Rice Burroughs 's Barsoom , a fictional rendition of Mars and its ecosystem published through novels from 1912 to 1941, and Gerolf Steiner 's Rhinogradentia , a fictional order of mammals created in 1957. The modern speculative evolution movement

1680-440: A hypothetical alien ecosystem is Wayne Barlowe 's 1990 book Expedition , which explores the fictional exoplanet Darwin IV. Expedition was written as a report of a 24th-century expedition that had been led to the planet by a team composed of both humans and intelligent aliens and used paintings and descriptive texts to create and describe a fully realized extraterrestrial ecosystem. Barlowe later served as an executive producer of

1800-464: A lacrimal with a distinctive process on it. Tyrannosaurids also have an interfenestral strut that is less than half as big as the maxillary fenestra. It is quite likely that tyrannosauroids rose to prominence after the decline in allosauroid and megalosauroid diversity seen during the early stages of the Late Cretaceous. Below is a simple cladogram of general tyrannosauroid relationships that

1920-452: A mainstay in discussions about creature design and speculative biology for some time yet." Similar to alternate history , alternative evolution is the exploration of possible alternate scenarios that could have played out in the Earth's past to give rise to alternate lifeforms and ecosystems, popularly the survival of non-avian dinosaurs to the present day. As humanity is often not a part of

2040-428: A marine alien lifeform, that "in the future, I may further explore the oceans of some distant world". In The Alien Life of Wayne Barlowe , Barlowe also included a section on a joint speculative evolution/science fiction project between Barlowe and visual effects supervisor Phil Tippett , concerning another fictional planet with life, called 'Belon 3'. Though nothing has yet materialized, both the marine alien painting and

2160-908: A mass estimation technique that extrapolates from the circumference of the femur, Scotty was estimated as the largest known specimen at 8.87 t (8.73 long tons; 9.78 short tons) in body mass. Not every adult Tyrannosaurus specimen recovered is as big. Historically average adult mass estimates have varied widely over the years, from as low as 4.5 t (4.4 long tons; 5.0 short tons), to more than 7.2 t (7.1 long tons; 7.9 short tons), with most modern estimates ranging between 5.4 and 8.0 t (5.3 and 7.9 long tons; 6.0 and 8.8 short tons). A 2024 study estimated based on allometry that world-record sized T. rex specimens (1 in 100,000 individuals) may have reached lengths and weights exceeding 15 m (49 ft) and 15,000 kg (33,000 lb) respectively, though no individuals close to this size have ever been found. The study also found that there

2280-456: A narrow snout, allowing unusually good binocular vision . The skull bones were massive and the nasals and some other bones were fused, preventing movement between them; but many were pneumatized (contained a "honeycomb" of tiny air spaces) and thus lighter. These and other skull-strengthening features are part of the tyrannosaurid trend towards an increasingly powerful bite, which easily surpassed that of all non-tyrannosaurids. The tip of

2400-585: A painting of Belon 3 are included on the Expedition section of Barlowe's website under the heading "Expedition II . . . . . . ?". In 2005, Expedition was adapted into the television special Alien Planet , which first aired on the Discovery Channel on 14 May 2005. Barlowe served as the executive producer and design consultant of the adaptation. The lifeforms in Alien Planet are for

2520-630: A reconstructed skull displayed at the Museum of the Rockies . The 1990s saw numerous discoveries, with nearly twice as many finds as in all previous years, including two of the most complete skeletons found to date: Sue and Stan . Sue Hendrickson , an amateur paleontologist, discovered the most complete (approximately 85%) and largest Tyrannosaurus skeleton in the Hell Creek Formation on August 12, 1990. The specimen Sue, named after

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2640-489: A scenario truly began with the publication of Dixon's The New Dinosaurs in 1988, in which dinosaurs were not some lone stragglers of known species that had survived more or less unchanged for the last 66 million years, but diverse animals that had continued to evolve beyond the Cretaceous. In the vein of Dixon's The New Dinosaurs imagination, a now largely defunct, but creatively significant collaborative online project

2760-455: A strong presence in popular culture. The eponymous monster of Alien (1979), particularly its life cycle from egg to parasitoid larva to 'Xenomorph', is thought to be based on the real habits of parasitoid wasps in biology. Further, H. R. Giger 's design of the Alien incorporated the features of insects, echinoderms and fossil crinoids, while concept artist John Cobb suggested acid blood as

2880-490: A variety of alien lifeforms such as "Gyrosprinters", "Arrowtongues", "Grovebacks", "Daggerwrists", "Skewers", "Emperor Sea Striders", and "Eosapiens". Unlike the creatures presented in much of popular science fiction, which often seem to be variations of terrestrial lifeforms, Barlowe's animals are truly alien; none of them possess eyes or true jaws, their body structures are often unlike any found on Earth, and they have unique modes of locomotion, sensing, and eating. Very late in

3000-552: Is Wild (2002), Primeval (2007–2011), Avatar (2009), Terra Nova (2011), and Alien Worlds (2020). The modern explosion of speculative evolution has been termed by British paleontologist Darren Naish as the "Speculative Zoology Movement". Although primarily characterized as entertainment, speculative evolution can be used as educational tool to explain and illustrate real natural processes through using fictional and imaginary examples. The worlds created are often built on ecological and biological principles inferred from

3120-431: Is also an example of future evolution, this time exploring an imagined future evolutionary path of humanity. Peter Ward 's Future Evolution (2001) makes a scientifically accurate approach to the prediction of patterns of evolution in the future. Ward compares his predictions with those of Dixon and Wells. He tries to understand the mechanism of mass extinctions and the principles of recovery of ecosystems. A key point

3240-479: Is essential in understanding what is being studied. Paleontologists apply their own understanding of natural processes and biology to understand the appearances and lifestyles of extinct organisms that are discovered, varying in how far their speculation goes. For instance, All Yesterdays and its sequel All Your Yesterdays (2017) explores highly speculative renditions of real (and in some cases hypothetical) prehistoric animals that do not explicitly contradict any of

3360-538: Is generally agreed to have begun with the publication of Dougal Dixon 's 1981 book After Man , which explored a fully realized future Earth with a complete ecosystem of over a hundred hypothetical animals. The success of After Man spawned several "sequels" by Dixon, focusing on different alternate and future scenarios. Dixon's work, like most similar works that came after them, were created with real biological principles in mind and were aimed at exploring real life processes, such as evolution and climate change , through

3480-658: Is more likely a juvenile Tyrannosaurus , and the most complete juvenile example known; Jane is exhibited at the Burpee Museum of Natural History. In 2002, a skeleton nicknamed "Wyrex", discovered by amateur collectors Dan Wells and Don Wyrick, had 114 bones and was 38% complete. The dig was concluded over 3 weeks in 2004 by the Black Hills Institute with the first live online Tyrannosaurus excavation providing daily reports, photos, and video. In 2006, Montana State University revealed that it possessed

3600-400: Is naturalistically unconvincing. Many animals look like dinosaurs designed by a committee and discerning readers will suspect that Darwin IV wouldn't work as an ecological system, no matter how alien". Barlowe has hinted that he at some point intends to return to do something similar to Expedition again. In the 1995 artbook The Alien Life of Wayne Barlowe , he wrote, concerning a painting of

3720-410: Is one of the best represented theropods. It lived throughout what is now western North America , on what was then an island continent known as Laramidia . Tyrannosaurus had a much wider range than other tyrannosaurids . Fossils are found in a variety of rock formations dating to the latest Campanian - Maastrichtian ages of the late Cretaceous period , 72.7 to 66  million years ago . It

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3840-458: Is sometimes presented in museum exhibitions. For instance, both After Man and The Future is Wild has been presented in exhibition form, educating museum visitors on the principles of biology and evolution through using their own fictional future creatures. A popular subset of speculative evolution is the exploration of possible realistic extraterrestrial life and ecosystems. Speculative evolution writings focusing on extraterrestrial life, like

3960-407: Is still among the largest known land predators, with its estimated bite force being the largest among all terrestrial animals. By far the largest carnivore in its environment, Tyrannosaurus rex was most likely an apex predator , preying upon hadrosaurs , juvenile armored herbivores like ceratopsians and ankylosaurs , and possibly sauropods . Some experts have suggested the dinosaur was primarily

4080-533: Is that "champion supertaxa" who diversify and speciate at a greater rate, will inherit the world after mass extinctions. Ward quotes the paleontologist Simon Conway Morris , who points out that the fantastical or even whimsical creatures devised by Dougal Dixon, echo nature's tendency to converge on the same body plans. While Ward calls Dixon's visions "semi-whimsical" and compares them to Wells' initial visions in The Time Machine , he nonetheless continues

4200-440: Is the first. Besides conventional environment-driven evolution -during which offshoots of humanity experienced both elevated and the total loss of sentience - the book anticipates the science of genetic engineering , and is an early instance of the fictional group mind idea. Published in 1957, German zoologist Gerolf Steiner 's book Bau und Leben der Rhinogradentia (translated into English as The Snouters: The Form and Life of

4320-415: Is the son of two natural history illustrators, and viewed Expedition as a way to continue in their tradition, but also doing it in his way. The first painting completed for the book was that of the 'Rayback' a 'liquivorous' predator. At the time, the painting was just an "alien wildlife painting", with Barlowe not yet having decided to write an entire book. It was only with the second painting, which depicted

4440-452: Is unknown and could well have varied between individuals but probably numbered at least forty. Sue was mounted with forty-seven of such caudal vertebrae. The neck of T. rex formed a natural S-shaped curve like that of other theropods. Compared to these, it was exceptionally short, deep and muscular to support the massive head. The second vertebra, the axis, was especially short. The remaining neck vertebrae were weakly opisthocoelous, i.e. with

4560-469: The BBC2 / Discovery Channel special Natural History of an Alien and the 2005 Channel 4 / National Geographic programme Extraterrestrial as well as a variety of personal web-based artistic projects, such as C. M. Kosemen 's " Snaiad " and Gert van Dijk 's "Furaha", envisioning the biosphere of entire alien worlds. Through science fiction, the speculative biology of extraterrestrial organisms has

4680-608: The Hell Creek Formation in Montana in 1902, comprising approximately 34 fossilized bones. Writing at the time Brown said "Quarry No. 1 contains the femur, pubes, humerus, three vertebrae and two undetermined bones of a large Carnivorous Dinosaur not described by Marsh . ... I have never seen anything like it from the Cretaceous ." Henry Fairfield Osborn , president of the American Museum of Natural History , named

4800-593: The Hell Creek Formation of Montana. This second track measures 72 centimeters (28 in) long, shorter than the track described by Lockley and Hunt. Whether or not the track was made by Tyrannosaurus is unclear, though Tyrannosaurus is the only large theropod known to have existed in the Hell Creek Formation. A set of footprints in Glenrock, Wyoming dating to the Maastrichtian stage of

4920-582: The Speculative Dinosaur Project followed in the same zoological worldbuilding tradition. Since 1988, alternative evolution has sometimes been applied in popular culture. The creatures in the 2005 film King Kong were fictitious descendants of real animals, with Skull Island being inhabited by dinosaurs and other prehistoric fauna. Inspired by Dougal Dixon's works, the designers imagined what 65 million years or more of isolated evolution might have done to dinosaurs. Concept art for

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5040-434: The coracoid , which was rounded. Both shoulder blades were connected by a small furcula . The paired breast bones possibly were made of cartilage only. The forelimb or arm was very short. The upper arm bone, the humerus, was short but robust. It had a narrow upper end with an exceptionally rounded head. The lower arm bones, the ulna and radius, were straight elements, much shorter than the humerus. The second metacarpal

5160-480: The 'Daggerwrist', that the idea of the project took form. With the 'Daggerwrist' painting, Barlowe decided on the ground rule that none of the creatures were to have eyes, hair or external ears. Barlowe used various sources of inspiration to come up with the creatures of Darwin IV. The 'Arrowtongue', a large predator, was inspired by the dinosaur Tyrannosaurus rex . In some cases, features of several different Earth animals were combined to create something otherwordly:

5280-465: The 'Sac-back' took inspiration from hornbills , camels and cuttlefish . In other cases, the inspirations were not even biological: the flying predatory 'Skewers' were inspired by airplanes and the 'Emperor Sea Strider' was inspired by ships at sea. The 'Eosapiens', the most intelligent and sophisticated of Darwin IV's creatures (roughly on the level of australopithecines ) were deliberately designed to be as non-human as possible, due to Barlowe disliking

5400-399: The 1972 book Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino , in which Marco Polo in a dialogue with Kublai Khan describes 55 cities, which, like Lionni's "parallel" plants, are "only as real as the mind's ability to conceptualize them". One of the significant "founding" works of speculative evolution is After Man by Dougal Dixon , published in 1981. To this day, After Man is recognized as

5520-462: The 2004 mockumentary The Last Dragon and the Dragonology series of books. The evolution of organisms in the Earth's future is a popular subset of speculative evolution. A relatively common theme in future evolution is civilizational collapse and/or humans becoming extinct due to an anthropogenic extinction event caused by environmental degradation. After such a mass extinction event,

5640-491: The 2013 book All Your Yesterdays , and in 2014, the actual Cambrian anomalocarid Tamisiocaris was discovered to have been a filter-feeder. In honor of Meszaros's prediction, Tamisiocaris was included in a new clade named the Cetiocaridae . Dougal Dixon's The New Dinosaurs was heavily influenced by paleontological ideas developing during its time, such as the ongoing dinosaur renaissance , and as such many of

5760-464: The Late Cretaceous and hailing from the Lance Formation were described by Scott Persons, Phil Currie and colleagues in 2016, and are believed to belong to either a juvenile T. rex or the dubious tyrannosaurid Nanotyrannus lancensis . From measurements and based on the positions of the footprints, the animal was believed to be traveling at a walking speed of around 2.8 to 5 miles per hour and

5880-702: The Rhinogrades ) described the fictional evolution, biology and behavior of an imaginary order of mammals, the Rhinogradentia or "rhinogrades". The Rhinogrades are characterized by a nose-like feature called a "nasorium", the form and function of which vary significantly between species, akin to Darwin's finches and their beak specialization. This diverse group of fictional animals inhabits a series of islands in which they have gradually evolved, radiating into most ecological niches. Satirical papers have been published continuing Steiner's imagined world. Although

6000-404: The accident from Darwin IV's environment. At the conclusion of the expedition, Darwin IV is left in the same pristine state it was in prior to the expedition, with the exception of a metal obelisk placed in a remote area by the Yma. According to Barlowe, the book was partly inspired by the books on prehistoric life published by paleontologist Josef Augusta and paleoartist Zdeněk Burian . Barlowe

6120-498: The adaptation. Expedition is written as though it is published in the year 2366, five years after Barlowe partook in a crewed expedition to the planet Darwin IV. In the 24th century , the exploitation of the Earth's ecosystem has created an environment so toxic that mass extinctions have wiped out nearly most of its nonhuman animal population. Most of the remaining fauna, with the exception of humans themselves, have suffered horrible mutations and can only be found in zoos. Aided by

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6240-437: The attachment of strong tendons. The sacral vertebrae were fused to each other, both in their vertebral bodies and neural spines. They were pneumatized. They were connected to the pelvis by transverse processes and sacral ribs. The tail was heavy and moderately long, in order to balance the massive head and torso and to provide space for massive locomotor muscles that attached to the thighbones. The thirteenth tail vertebra formed

6360-548: The auspices of Prof. Arthur Lakes near Golden, Colorado . In the early 1890s, John Bell Hatcher collected postcranial elements in eastern Wyoming . The fossils were believed to be from the large species Ornithomimus grandis (now Deinodon ) but are now considered T. rex remains. In 1892, Edward Drinker Cope found two vertebral fragments of a large dinosaur. Cope believed the fragments belonged to an "agathaumid" ( ceratopsid ) dinosaur, and named them Manospondylus gigas , meaning "giant porous vertebra", in reference to

6480-484: The behavior of the various creatures, "help maintain the illusion of realism and immediacy such a first person narrative demands". In his 2005 review in The Space Review of Alien Planet , a 2005 TV special based on Expedition , space historian Dwayne A. Day described Expedition as "highly regarded". The book was nominated for the 1991 Chesley Award for Artistic Achievement. Also in 1991, Expedition

6600-613: The birds after a severe mass extinction which killed 99% of all species on the moon. Another relevant seed world, Batrachiterra , involves various species of frogs seeded by humans on the fictional planet Heqet, originally for the purpose of studying batrachotoxin. Tyrannosaurus rex Tyrannosaurus ( / t ɪ ˌ r æ n ə ˈ s ɔː r ə s , t aɪ -/ ) is a genus of large theropod dinosaur . The type species Tyrannosaurus rex ( rex meaning 'king' in Latin ), often shortened to T. rex or colloquially T-Rex ,

6720-547: The blog Furahan Biology , use realistic scientific principles to describe the biomechanics of hypothetical alien life. Although commonly identified with terms such as "astrobiology", "xenobiology" or "exobiology", these terms designate actual scientific fields largely unrelated to speculative evolution. Though 20th century work in exobiology sometimes formulated "audacious" ideas about extraterrestrial forms of life. Astrophysicists Carl Sagan and Edwin Salpeter speculated that

6840-431: The bone. Various functions have been proposed for these foramina, such as a crocodile-like sensory system or evidence of extra-oral structures such as scales or potentially lips, with subsequent research on theropod tooth wear patterns supporting such a proposition. The vertebral column of Tyrannosaurus consisted of ten neck vertebrae, thirteen back vertebrae and five sacral vertebrae. The number of tail vertebrae

6960-475: The collections of the Natural History Museum , London. Dynamosaurus would later be honored by the 2018 description of another species of tyrannosaurid by Andrew McDonald and colleagues, Dynamoterror dynastes , whose name was chosen in reference to the 1905 name, as it had been a "childhood favorite" of McDonald's. From the 1910s through the end of the 1950s, Barnum's discoveries remained

7080-512: The common science fiction trope of alien life being similar to life on Earth, especially the notion of intelligent alien humanoids. None of Darwin IV's wildlife have eyes, external ears, hair, or jaws, and they bear little resemblance to terrestrial organisms . Various sources of inspiration were used for the creature designs, including dinosaurs , modern beasts and different types of vehicles. Expedition garnered very favorable reviews, being praised particularly for its many illustrations and for

7200-404: The course of the next few million years by showcasing its effects through the eyes of future human descendants. Today, many artists and writers work on speculative evolution projects online, often in the same vein as Dixon's works. Speculative evolution continues to endure a somewhat mainstream presence through films and TV shows featuring hypothetical and imaginary creatures, such as The Future

7320-411: The creature design of 2022's Avatar: The Way of Water as well, admitting suspension of disbelief on the humanoid Na'vi protagonists. He notes the other creatures, aliens and their anatomies and lifestyles are inspired by evolution and ecology to a significant degree, with probable inspirations such as mycorrhizal fungi , marine reptiles , and simian evolution. According to Naish, "the series will be

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7440-528: The creatures implausible. In his 2005 review of Alien Planet , which featured the same lifeforms, Dwayne A. Day stated that "the animals are bizarre and frequently border on the implausible" and that "they do not appear to have been developed with a single biological theory in mind". Day however also noted that they are thought-provoking and that their strangeness is a good departure from the typical science fiction approach of making alien life look much like Earth life (such as using humanoid aliens). According to Day,

7560-537: The crested proceratosaurids, while later and more derived members belong to the Pantyrannosauria . Tyrannosaurs started out as small theropods; however at least some became larger by the Early Cretaceous . Tyrannosauroids are characterized by their fused nasals and dental arrangement. Pantyrannosaurs are characterized by unique features in their hips as well as an enlarged foramen in the quadrate,

7680-426: The decades following After Man 's publication, Dixon remained one of the sole authors of speculative evolution, publishing two more books in the same vein as After Man ; The New Dinosaurs in 1988 and Man After Man in 1990. Dixon cited The Time Machine as his primary inspiration, being unaware of Steiner's work, and devised After Man as a popular-level book on the processes of evolution that instead of using

7800-441: The dinosaurs in it are feathered, something not widely accepted at the time of its publication but seen as likely today. Similarly, After Man in 1981 represents a sort of time capsule of geological thought before global warming was fully discerned, but Dixon also portrays a sixth mass extinction or Anthropocene before it was commonplace to do so. Speculative evolution can be useful in exploring and showcasing patterns present in

7920-468: The dinosaurs in the book are energetic and active creatures rather than sluggish and lumbering. Dixon extrapolated on the ideas of paleontologists such as Robert Bakker and Gregory S. Paul when creating his creatures and also used patterns seen in the actual evolutionary history of the dinosaurs and pushing them to an extreme. Perhaps because of this, many of the animals in the book are similar to actual Mesozoic animals that were later discovered. Many of

8040-516: The discoverer, was the object of a legal battle over its ownership. In 1997, the litigation was settled in favor of Maurice Williams, the original land owner. The fossil collection was purchased by the Field Museum of Natural History at auction for $ 7.6 million, making it the most expensive dinosaur skeleton until the sale of Stan for $ 31.8 million in 2020. From 1998 to 1999, Field Museum of Natural History staff spent over 25,000 hours taking

8160-497: The earlier in age and more recently discovered T. mcraeensis . As the archetypal theropod, Tyrannosaurus has been one of the best-known dinosaurs since the early 20th century and has been featured in film, advertising, postal stamps, and many other media. A tooth from what is now documented as a Tyrannosaurus rex was found in July 1874 upon South Table Mountain (Colorado) by Jarvis Hall (Colorado) student Peter T. Dotson under

8280-527: The earliest works usually recognized as representing one of speculative evolution is H. G. Wells 's science fiction novel The Time Machine , published in 1895. The Time Machine , set over eight hundred thousand years in the future, features post-human descendants in the form of the beautiful but weak Eloi and the brutish Morlocks . Further into the future, the protagonist of the book finds large crab-monsters and huge butterflies. Science fiction authors who wrote after Wells often used fictional creatures in

8400-427: The entire shaft of the element. The rear ischium was slender and straight, pointing obliquely to behind and below. In contrast to the arms, the hindlimbs were among the longest in proportion to body size of any theropod. In the foot, the metatarsus was "arctometatarsalian", meaning that the part of the third metatarsal near the ankle was pinched. The third metatarsal was also exceptionally sinuous. Compensating for

8520-428: The evolution of a small surviving group of humans into a sea lion -like species. Stephen Baxter 's 2002 science fiction novel Evolution follows 565 million years of human evolution, from shrewlike mammals 65 million years in the past to the ultimate fate of humanity (and its descendants, both biological and non-biological) 500 million years in the future. C. M. Kosemen 's 2008 All Tomorrows similarly explores

8640-494: The evolutionary history of fictional organisms has been used as a tool in biology education. Caminalcules , named after Joseph H. Camin, are a group of animal-like lifeforms, consisting of 77 purported extant and fossil species that were invented as a tool for understanding phylogenetics. The classification of Caminalcules, as well as other fictional creatures such as dragons and aliens, have been used as analogies to teach concepts in evolution and systematics. Speculative evolution

8760-464: The existence of organisms that were later discovered to resemble something real. Many of the animals featured in Dixon's After Man are still considered plausible ideas, with some of them (such as specialized rodents and semi-aquatic primates) being reinforced with recent biology studies. A creature dubbed " Ceticaris ", conceived by artist John Meszaros as a filter-feeding anomalocarid , was published in

8880-456: The expedition, the explorer encounters lifeforms which use tools (the Eosapiens), giving a very strong indication they are intelligent. A conservationist theme is present throughout the book. The expedition is designed to have as minimal an impact as possible on Darwin IV's environment. When two of the expedition's members suffer a fatal accident, Yma technology is used to remove all traces of

9000-516: The film was published in the book The World of Kong: A Natural History of Skull Island (2005), which explored the world of the film from a biological perspective, envisioning Skull Island as a surviving fragment of ancient Gondwana . Prehistoric creatures on a declining, eroding island had evolved into "a menagerie of nightmares". A hypothetical natural history of dragons is a popular subject of speculative zoology, being explored in works such as Peter Dickinson's The Flight of Dragons (1979),

9120-402: The first truly large-scale speculative evolution project involving a whole world and a vast array of species. Furthering its significance is the fact that the book was made very accessible by being published by mainstream publishers and being fully illustrated with color images. As such, After Man is often seen as having firmly established the idea of creating entire speculative worlds. Through

9240-521: The future evolution of humanity. Speculative biology and the future evolution of the human species are significant in bio art . Seed worlds, or seeded worlds, are another popular subset of the genre. It involves a terraformed planet or a habitable, yet uninhabited planet being "seeded" by already existing species of animals, plants and fungi, which will speciate in order to fill the different niches by adaptive radiation . The focus can be on one or multiple species, but usually more taxa are present on

9360-419: The immense bulk of the animal, many bones throughout the skeleton were hollowed, reducing its weight without significant loss of strength. Tyrannosaurus is the type genus of the superfamily Tyrannosauroidea , the family Tyrannosauridae , and the subfamily Tyrannosaurinae; in other words it is the standard by which paleontologists decide whether to include other species in the same group. Other members of

9480-400: The largest Tyrannosaurus skull yet discovered (from a specimen named MOR 008), measuring 5 feet (152 cm) long. Subsequent comparisons indicated that the longest head was 136.5 centimetres (53.7 in) (from specimen LACM 23844) and the widest head was 90.2 centimetres (35.5 in) (from Sue). Two isolated fossilized footprints have been tentatively assigned to T. rex . The first

9600-422: The level of detail in the text, which serves to maintain the illusion of realism. Several reviewers also criticized the life forms, finding some of them to be implausible or doubting that Darwin IV could actually function as an ecosystem. In 2005, Expedition was adapted into a TV special for the Discovery Channel titled Alien Planet . Barlowe served as the design consultant and one of the executive producers of

9720-538: The life of Darwin IV "makes the point that alien life, if it is detected, will challenge our abilities to understand and even comprehend it". A review of Alien Planet in the Washington Post noted that "a few too many of the creatures seem like cartoonish monsters". The Publishers Weekly review also pointed out the bizarre nature of some of the creatures, stating that "while superbly executed, Barlowe's visualization of an alien world falls short imaginatively and

9840-488: The lower jaw, except at the rear. The largest found so far is estimated to have been 30.5 cm (12.0 in) long including the root when the animal was alive, making it the largest tooth of any carnivorous dinosaur yet found. The lower jaw was robust. Its front dentary bone bore thirteen teeth. Behind the tooth row, the lower jaw became notably taller. The upper and lower jaws of Tyrannosaurus , like those of many dinosaurs, possessed numerous foramina , or small holes in

9960-445: The most part faithful to their depictions in the book; however, the expedition is conducted by sophisticated robotic flying machines instead of humans. Speculative evolution Speculative evolution is a long-standing trope within science fiction, often recognized as beginning as such with H. G. Wells 's 1895 novel The Time Machine , which featured several imaginary future creatures. Although small-scale speculative faunas were

10080-489: The numerous openings for blood vessels he found in the bone. The M. gigas remains were, in 1907, identified by Hatcher as those of a theropod rather than a ceratopsid. Henry Fairfield Osborn recognized the similarity between Manospondylus gigas and T. rex as early as 1917, by which time the second vertebra had been lost. Owing to the fragmentary nature of the Manospondylus vertebrae, Osborn did not synonymize

10200-548: The only specimens of Tyrannosaurus , as the Great Depression and wars kept many paleontologists out of the field. Beginning in the 1960s, there was renewed interest in Tyrannosaurus , resulting in the recovery of 42 skeletons (5–80% complete by bone count) from Western North America. In 1967, Dr. William MacMannis located and recovered the skeleton named "MOR 008", which is 15% complete by bone count and has

10320-464: The past to tell the story projected the processes into the future. A central idea of After Man , besides a wave of extinction following humans, is convergent evolution as new species bear a close resemblance to their unrelated predecessors. When designing the various animals of the book, Dixon looked at the different types of biomes on the planet and what adaptations animals living there have, designing new animals descended from modern day ones with

10440-448: The present and in the past, and there is a useful aspect to hypothesizing on the form of future and alien life. By extrapolating past trends into the future, scientists could research and predict the most likely scenarios of how certain organisms and lineages could respond to ecological changes. As such, speculative evolution facilitates authors and artists to develop realistic hypotheses of the future. In some scientific fields, speculation

10560-528: The project's planet, that won't be covered in as much detail. One of the most well-known works in this category is Serina: A Natural History of the World of Birds by Dylan Bajda, in which the focal species is the domestic canary , Serinus canaria domestica , who is the progenitor of all other bird species that come later. A minor species that later becomes more relevant is the guppy ( Poecilia ), whose descendants become terrestrial tripods and compete against

10680-436: The real evolutionary history of life on Earth and readers can learn from them as such. For example, all of Dixon's speculative works are aimed at exploring real processes, with After Man exploring evolution, The New Dinosaurs zoogeography and both Man After Man and Greenworld (2010) exploring climate change, offering an environmental message. In some cases, speculative evolution artists have successfully predicted

10800-475: The rear surface, were incisiform (their tips were chisel-like blades) and curved backwards. The D -shaped cross-section, reinforcing ridges and backwards curve reduced the risk that the teeth would snap when Tyrannosaurus bit and pulled. The remaining teeth were robust, like "lethal bananas" rather than daggers, more widely spaced and also had reinforcing ridges. Those in the upper jaw, twelve per side in mature individuals, were larger than their counterparts of

10920-536: The recovered fossil material. The speculation undertaken for All Yesterdays and its sequel has been compared to that of Dixon's speculative evolution works, though its objective was to challenge modern conservative perceptions and ideas of how dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures lived, rather than designing whole new ecosystems. The books have inspired a modern artistic movement of artists going beyond conventional paleoart tropes, expanding into increasingly speculative renditions of prehistoric life. Additionally,

11040-412: The remaining fauna and flora evolve into a variety of new forms. Although the foundations of this subset were laid by Wells's The Time Machine already in 1895, it is generally agreed that it was definitively established by Dixon's After Man in 1981, which explored a fully realized future ecosystem set 50 million years from the present. Dixon's third work on speculative evolution, Man After Man (1990)

11160-588: The rock off the bones. The bones were then shipped to New Jersey where the mount was constructed, then shipped back to Chicago for the final assembly. The mounted skeleton opened to the public on May 17, 2000, in the Field Museum of Natural History. A study of this specimen's fossilized bones showed that Sue reached full size at age 19 and died at the age of 28, the longest estimated life of any tyrannosaur known. Another Tyrannosaurus , nicknamed Stan (BHI 3033), in honor of amateur paleontologist Stan Sacrison,

11280-408: The same set of adaptations. The success of After Man inspired Dixon to continue writing books that explained factual scientific processes through fictional examples. The New Dinosaurs was in essence a book about zoogeography , something the general public would be unfamiliar with, using a world in which the non-avian dinosaurs had not gone extinct. Man After Man , explored climate change over

11400-402: The same vein, but most such imaginary faunas were small and not very developed. Edgar Rice Burroughs , who wrote in the early 20th century, can like Wells be considered an early speculative evolution author. Although his fictional ecosystems were still relatively small in scope, they were the settings of many of his novels and as such quite well-developed. In particular, Burroughs's Barsoom ,

11520-481: The second skeleton T. rex in 1905. The generic name is derived from the Greek words τύραννος ( tyrannos , meaning "tyrant") and σαῦρος ( sauros , meaning "lizard"). Osborn used the Latin word rex , meaning "king", for the specific name. The full binomial therefore translates to "tyrant lizard the king" or "King Tyrant Lizard", emphasizing the animal's size and presumed dominance over other species of

11640-588: The summer of 2000, crews organized by Jack Horner discovered five Tyrannosaurus skeletons near the Fort Peck Reservoir . In 2001, a 50% complete skeleton of a juvenile Tyrannosaurus was discovered in the Hell Creek Formation by a crew from the Burpee Museum of Natural History . Dubbed Jane (BMRP 2002.4.1), the find was thought to be the first known skeleton of a pygmy tyrannosaurid, Nanotyrannus , but subsequent research revealed that it

11760-527: The time. Osborn named the other specimen Dynamosaurus imperiosus in a paper in 1905. In 1906, Osborn recognized that the two skeletons were from the same species and selected Tyrannosaurus as the preferred name. In 1941, the T. rex type specimen was sold to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for $ 7,000. The original Dynamosaurus material now resides in

11880-422: The transition point between the deep tail base and the middle tail that was stiffened by a rather long front articulation processes. The underside of the trunk was covered by eighteen or nineteen pairs of segmented belly ribs. The shoulder girdle was longer than the entire forelimb. The shoulder blade had a narrow shaft but was exceptionally expanded at its upper end. It connected via a long forward protrusion to

12000-476: The trope of intelligent aliens in science fiction being humanoids. Expedition took nearly five years to write and illustrate. A review in Publishers Weekly stated that the book had an "abundance of lavish full-color illustrations and detailed black-and-white sketches" and that the many details mentioned in the book, such as information on the planet of Darwin IV itself, and the intricate details on

12120-429: The two genera, instead considering the older genus indeterminate. In June 2000, the Black Hills Institute found around 10% of a Tyrannosaurus skeleton ( BHI 6248) at a site that might have been the original M. gigas locality. Barnum Brown , assistant curator of the American Museum of Natural History , found the first partial skeleton of T. rex in eastern Wyoming in 1900. Brown found another partial skeleton in

12240-587: The tyrannosaurine subfamily include the North American Daspletosaurus and the Asian Tarbosaurus , both of which have occasionally been synonymized with Tyrannosaurus . Tyrannosaurids were once commonly thought to be descendants of earlier large theropods such as megalosaurs and carnosaurs , although more recently they were reclassified with the generally smaller coelurosaurs . The earliest tyrannosaur group were

12360-466: The upper jaw was U-shaped (most non-tyrannosauroid carnivores had V-shaped upper jaws), which increased the amount of tissue and bone a tyrannosaur could rip out with one bite, although it also increased the stresses on the front teeth. The teeth of T. rex displayed marked heterodonty (differences in shape). The premaxillary teeth, four per side at the front of the upper jaw, were closely packed, D -shaped in cross-section, had reinforcing ridges on

12480-600: The use of analogous evolution, which is a larger trend in speculative zoology. Future evolution has also been explored on TV, with the mockumentary series The Future is Wild in 2002, for which Dixon was a consultant (and author of the companion book), and the series Primeval (2007–2011), a drama series in which imagined future animals occasionally appeared. Ideas of future evolution are also frequently explored in science fiction novels, such as in Kurt Vonnegut 's 1985 science fiction novel Galápagos , which imagines

12600-635: The use of fictional examples. Speculative evolution's possible use as an educational and scientific tool has been noted and discussed through the decades following the publication of After Man . Speculative evolution can be useful in exploring and showcasing patterns present in the present and in the past. By extrapolating past trends into the future, scientists can research and predict the most likely scenarios of how certain organisms and lineages could respond to ecological changes. In some cases, attributes and creatures first imagined within speculative evolution have since been discovered. A filter feeder anomalocarid

12720-448: The usual biological principles. Very exotic environments of physical extremes may be explored in such scenarios. For example, Robert Forward 's 1980 Dragon's Egg develops a tale of life on a neutron star, and the resulting high-gravity, high-energy environment with an atmosphere of iron vapor and mountains 5-100 millimeters high. Once the star cools down and stable chemistry develops, life evolves extremely quickly, and Forward imagines

12840-462: The work does feature an entire speculative ecosystem, its impact is dwarfed by the later works due to its limited scope, only exploring the life of an island archipelago. In 1976, the Italian author and illustrator Leo Lionni published Parallel Botany , a " field guide to imaginary plants", presented with academic-style mentions of genuine people and places. Parallel Botany has been compared to

12960-403: The worlds envisioned through alternative evolution, it has sometimes been characterized as non- anthropocentric . Although dinosaurs surviving to the age of humans has been adapted as a plot point in numerous science fiction stories since at least 1912, beginning with Arthur Conan Doyle 's The Lost World , the idea of exploring the fully fledged alternate ecosystems that would develop in such

13080-481: Was 3.66–3.96 m (12.0–13.0 ft) tall at the hips, and according to the most recent studies, using a variety of techniques, maximum body masses have been estimated approximately 8.4–8.46 t (8.27–8.33 long tons; 9.26–9.33 short tons). A specimen nicknamed Scotty (RSM P2523.8), located at the Royal Saskatchewan Museum , is reported to measure 13 m (43 ft) in length. Using

13200-558: Was discovered at Philmont Scout Ranch , New Mexico, in 1983 by American geologist Charles Pillmore. Originally thought to belong to a hadrosaurid , examination of the footprint revealed a large 'heel' unknown in ornithopod dinosaur tracks, and traces of what may have been a hallux , the dewclaw-like fourth digit of the tyrannosaur foot. The footprint was published as the ichnogenus Tyrannosauripus pillmorei in 1994, by Martin Lockley and Adrian Hunt. Lockley and Hunt suggested that it

13320-480: Was estimated to have a hip height of 1.56 to 2.06 m (5.1 to 6.8 ft). A follow-up paper appeared in 2017, increasing the speed estimations by 50–80%. T. rex was one of the largest land carnivores of all time. One of its largest and the most complete specimens, nicknamed Sue (FMNH PR2081), is located at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. Sue measured 12.3–12.4 m (40–41 ft) long,

13440-504: Was found after an analysis conducted by Li and colleagues in 2009. Guanlong [REDACTED] Proceratosaurus Dilong [REDACTED] Eotyrannus Xiongguanlong [REDACTED] Appalachiosaurus Tyrannosauridae [REDACTED] Many phylogenetic analyses have found Tarbosaurus bataar to be the sister taxon of T. rex . The discovery of the tyrannosaurid Lythronax further indicates that Tarbosaurus and Tyrannosaurus are closely related, forming

13560-402: Was illustrated by artist John Meszaros in the 2013 book All Your Yesterdays by John Conway , C. M. Kosemen and Darren Naish . In the year following publication, a taxonomic study proved the existence of the filter feeding anomalocarid Tamisiocaris . Explorations of hypothetical worlds featuring future, alternate or alien lifeforms is a long-standing trope in science fiction . One of

13680-408: Was little evidence of size-based sexual dimorphism in T. rex . The largest known T. rex skulls measure up to 1.54 m (5.1 ft) in length. Large fenestrae (openings) in the skull reduced weight, as in all carnivorous theropods. In other respects Tyrannosaurus 's skull was significantly different from those of large non- tyrannosaurid theropods. It was extremely wide at the rear but had

13800-463: Was longer and wider than the first, whereas normally in theropods the opposite is true. The forelimbs had only two clawed fingers, along with an additional splint-like small third metacarpal representing the remnant of a third digit. The pelvis was a large structure. Its upper bone, the ilium , was both very long and high, providing an extensive attachment area for hindlimb muscles. The front pubic bone ended in an enormous pubic boot, longer than

13920-631: Was named the 'Best Book for Teenagers' by the New York Public Library . A portion of the book, "Sea Strider Skull and Littoralope" was reprinted by the American Littoral Society in 1996. A review in The Vindicator described Expedition as a "lavish science-fiction bestiary", but stated that the "weird creatures lack the necessary aura of plausibility". This review was not the only one that found some of

14040-409: Was recovered from the Hell Creek Formation in 1992. Stan is the second most complete skeleton found, with 199 bones recovered representing 70% of the total. This tyrannosaur also had many bone pathologies, including broken and healed ribs, a broken (and healed) neck, and a substantial hole in the back of its head, about the size of a Tyrannosaurus tooth. In 1998, 20-year-old Bucky Derflinger noticed

14160-547: Was the difference in orientation – in drives, goals and thought processes – that made the Weinbaum-type alien so fresh and rewarding in science fiction in the mid-thirties." In 1930, Olaf Stapledon published a " future history ", Last and First Men: A Story of the Near and Far Future , describing the history of humanity from the present onwards, across two billion years and eighteen human species, of which Homo sapiens

14280-889: Was the last known member of the tyrannosaurids and among the last non- avian dinosaurs to exist before the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event . Like other tyrannosaurids, Tyrannosaurus was a bipedal carnivore with a massive skull balanced by a long, heavy tail. Relative to its large and powerful hind limbs, the forelimbs of Tyrannosaurus were short but unusually powerful for their size, and they had two clawed digits. The most complete specimen measures 12.3–12.4 m (40–41 ft) in length, but according to most modern estimates, Tyrannosaurus could have exceeded sizes of 13 m (43 ft) in length, 3.7–4 m (12–13 ft) in hip height, and 8.8 t (8.7 long tons; 9.7 short tons) in mass. Although some other theropods might have rivaled or exceeded Tyrannosaurus in size , it

14400-400: Was very likely the track was made by a T. rex , which would make it the first known footprint from this species. The track was made in what was once a vegetated wetland mudflat. It measures 83 centimeters (33 in) long by 71 centimeters (28 in) wide. A second footprint that may have been made by a Tyrannosaurus was first reported in 2007 by British paleontologist Phil Manning, from

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