Unveiling my love and excitement for dinosaurs is often followed by a form of apologetic confession along the lines of - “Yeah… I’m a bit of a dinosaur geek,” - usually triggered by the bemused look I’m given after uncontrollably providing someone with a lot more information about a dinosaur than they ever wished to know. It’s a subject I feel passionately about and even recently found myself deploring the inaccuracies of a small plastic toy that was claiming to be a Spinosaurus. Although in all fairness, it didn’t look anything like one.
Like a large number of people, I adored dinosaurs as a child. I had magazines, models, films, toys, clothes, shoes and anything else I could get my hands on. My parents even had a painter from our village paint a selection of dinosaurs on my bedroom wall. As I grew up, this excitement never left me but had been suppressed to fit in to the expectations of ‘growing up’. Whenever the subject came up my head would fill with images from my childhood. I couldn’t hide my excitement when hearing about an upcoming dinosaur film or documentary and I still visit the Natural History Museum whenever possible.
It was in getting to know my girlfriend that the love of prehistoric creatures that had so fascinated me as a child was rekindled. The epiphanous moment came on our second date. We were sat drinking outside a pub talking over that days trip to Longleat Safari Park (a proposal I thought seemed geeky enough), when the conversation turned to our shared love of dinosaurs. I had thought of myself as more knowledgeable than most on the subject and went about describing my childhood favourite, which I had long forgotten the name of. In an instant she replied “Pachycephalosaurus,” and through a mixture of admiration, jealousy, wonder and a dawning sense of my own stupidity, I fell in love in an instant.
The biggest revelation was realising how foolish I had been in not pursuing and indulging in something I loved so much for so long. Something clicked into place in my brain at that moment, from then on I have been active in my pursuit of dino-knowledge. I have felt guilt free in engrossing myself in all the latest paleontological findings and really making the extra effort to memorise all I can.
Outwardly expressing this admiration as a child is easy but it didn’t take long to find out how much of a struggle it can be as an adult. A quick google search for pretty much any dinosaur emblazoned merchandise results in page after page of cartoon covered children’s clothes, toys and bed sheets (yes, I’ve looked for dinosaur bed sheets). Finding any decent, serious ‘grown up’ prehistorically themed items can be hard work. I recommend Drop Dead for some really cool dinosaur clothes - thank you Oli Sykes.
Unfortunately there does seem to be a deeply ingrained attitude that dinosaurs are for children, to me this seems absurd. Dinosaurs have an ability to capture a child’s imagination like very few other subjects can, but why are we expected to grow out of this fascination? A Triceratops is no less amazing if seen by a either a four or forty year old, yet even mentioning the name sounds immature. Palaeontology is one of the most diverse, fascinating and important subjects when it comes to understanding our world and establishing our beginnings as a species. That this is beyond the imagination of the adult mind is a saddening thought and largely untrue. By comparison an early love of a football team is something which is openly nurtured and catered for through to adulthood and beyond. There is no shortage of child and adult sized Manchester United merchandise yet, in the scale of things, can it really be said that they truly deserve the devotion they receive?
I am not belittling the football fan - each to their own - but the discrepancy seems far too large. Most people could probably only name a maximum of two palaeontologists - Dr. Grant and Ross Gellar, yet even I, a self proclaimed football ignoramus, could name well over a hundred footballers. The problem could stem from the scientific method of palaeontology which presents an ever-changing representation of prehistoric life. As a child you are presented with an image of ‘The Dinosaur’ which was to me, a large scaly lizard like creature with horns, teeth and stature beyond anything we find today. With theories such as the evolution of feathered dinosaurs into modern birds, this definite image of ‘The Dinosaur’ has changed remarkably, even since my childhood.
Dinosaurs lived, a meteor hit, they died and we took over, that’s how it used to seem. Now the lines are being blurred everywhere. Keeping up with the amazing multitude of new discoveries is a challenge in itself. Palaeontology is a science that is still in its infancy and every new discovery has the possibility of changing all previous assumptions of truth. Amphicoelus and Argentinasaurus are dwarfing all the previously thought of largest creatures to ever walk the planet and Carnotaurus and Pachyrhinosaurus are wonderfully bizarre and beautiful steps in evolution that would have looked ridiculous to imagine decades ago.
We can never know all of what was alive before present day but this makes trying to find out all the more fascinating. The FA won’t suddenly discover a new football team and tell fans that all the previous scores were actually slightly different and it won’t be discovered that Brian May actually played the tuba and all Queen albums have to be re-recorded and re-released. The ever changing face of prehistoric life takes time and passion and it deserves them both. You have to accept uncertainty but be able to love the theories as they stand and embrace progression as it comes.
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