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nemo-ramjet — Brontosapiens
Published: 2010-06-14 20:25:28 +0000 UTC; Views: 31417; Favourites: 302; Downloads: 311
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"-But what use would a mind have if no force in nature could hurt you?""-Well, it always helps to remember... and never forget!"
Aside from just being cool, I drew this intelligent sauropod to illustrate one of my educated suspicions about these great animals - namely, the presence of soft-tissue display organs on the skull and (maybe) the neck. If you look at the level of pneumaticity in a sauropod skeleton and observe some of their weird skulls, there is no way something weird WASN'T involved in the whole structure.
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Comments: 135
Wow, that is wild! Great concept and as always fantastic execution!
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...OMG I hate you ! I was going to upload a sapient sauropod too LOL Amazing job , and I'm glad to see that you're still working away !
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Do go on and draw it, I really like your line-art style, and I'd love to take your take on the intelligent sauropod idea. It could look radically different - like Isisaurus with a bigger head, perhaps?
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Well thank you ! Actually, it resembles Bellusaurs, with a large cone-shaped head, and uses both tail and tongue to manipulate objects. It also had a fleshy sack near it's nasal region, that when blown up, would unfurl, and unleash a synth-trumpet type sound. It also had fleshy lips...love fleshy lips in my animals XD
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Nice, I wonder how it will turn out! However, not to seem like a naysayer, but I think the tail as a manipulator and fleshy lips on a sauropod are not very plausible scientifically.
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True, though the tail was inspiration derived from the WWD series Diplodocus, and the way the tip the tail moved....they'd mostly hold weapons, as one would rather lose their tail, than their tongue. The lips could just be fleshy sacks that resemble lips, and aid in communicating.
In reality, they don't resemble sauropods too much, and rather look like bloated hadrosaurs...a new branch of sauropods if you will
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from what I remember of that episode of wwd (if I may join the conversation), the tips of the diplodocus tails were not actually prehensile, but rather highly flexible, and acted as whips do when the muscles contracted toward the base of the tail...
not that that really matters of course...
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It's okay 
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oh, of course, I was just recalling something from a memory... I have not watched that show in years!
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Hah, I'm totally with you on the sauropod pneumaticisity (sic?)! I've long suspected something like the inflatable sacs often depicted on hadrosaurs...The size of the nasal openings suggests SOMETHING was going on, but the skulls are far too delicate to support the oft-suggested proboscidean "trunks." Really nice take on one very likely possibility.
This is kind of a weird coincidence, BTW--quite a while back somebody (I can't remember who now, maybe ~dromornis??) suggested to me the idea of sapient dinosaurs evolved from some lineage other than the stereotypical raptors or oviceratopsians...One of the ideas he (?) suggested was intelligent sauropods. I did a sketch playing with the trunk-as-appendage approach, but never really pursued it any further...I think the prehensile tongue is a great alternative.
Fantastic work, as always!
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That may have been me. Mind you I never thought of a way to make it work and had the triceratops with a trunk like tongue instead. Mind you it may not have been me.
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What really interests me is the possibility of a giant air sac lining the bottom of the entire neck. Imagine what a sound that would make - like bagpipes played by gods! I'm not sure if this is scientifically kosher, however.
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I always imagined dinosaurs with long necks trumpeting like cranes, except much louder. One idea we played with for spec was having sauropods sound like foghorns.
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This was possibly the case... Also, there is no way to know it for sure, but the skulls of brachiosaurs seem like they hosted some major soft-tissue display organs.
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perhaps the throat was the resonator and the nose was the "reed"?
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Well, what ever happened to the theory that sauropods could crack their tails like whips to produce sonic booms?
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Who cares? It would look awesome!
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Thanks! Where do these awesome discussions take place? I always seem to miss them.
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I don't know, man! That one may have been in the form of Notes, though, so....
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I'd like to see your restoration of a real sauropod with your hypothesis of the soft display organs!
Is that a long prehensile tongue, too? Do you think all truly sapient animals must have some form of grasping appendages? Dolphins seems to have gone far without any...
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yes, but manipulatory appendages do certianly come in usefull when developing and using devices, or simply carrying objects...
if you think about it however, a set of jaws can be used as a very capable appendage, so the use of other limbs is not required...
but if a jawless sentient species were to evolve, it would likley have some form of appendage, weather it be a true limb or some form of prehensile probiscius,otherwise it would not have a means to manipulate the world around it, and thus it would have little need to evolve sentience in the first place, being quite able to survive in a limbless and unintelegent fashion...
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Obviously, not all intelligent animals have to have manipulation tools, or vice versa. I just liked this guy better with a long, grasping tongue, and a pipe.
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Hoorah for the return of the...the...what's this project called?
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Hehe, I don't know either... All Sophonts? Children of Endless Earths?
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: D
Anyway, it's good to see this again. Mayhaps there shall be Paleozoic sophonts (unless there are some I'm not aware of)?
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Simply beautifull! You will colour it?
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I think I'll leave it B&W, I really enjoy the intricate linework standing out all by itself.
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