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| Dinosaurs And Non-Dinosaurs |
 Title text: Staplers are actually in Pseudosuchia, making them more closely related to crocodiles than to dinosaurs. |
Explanation
This comic explores the seeming paradox that certain extinct prehistoric species which are popularly thought of as being "dinosaurs" are, from a strict taxonomic viewpoint, not. It also takes into account the fact that all bird species are descended from dinosaurs and thus - again, from a strict taxonomic viewpoint - are themselves dinosaurs as well (see 1211: Birds and Dinosaurs). To illustrate this, Randall provides silhouettes of dinosaurs, of entities that are widely thought of as dinosaurs but are not, of entities that are not widely thought of as dinosaurs but are (i.e., birds), and, lastly, of entities that are neither dinosaurs nor thought of as dinosaurs (which is funny because it's so all-encompassing as to be practically meaningless, just like it would be if you replaced the word "dinosaurs" by any other plural noun, or adjective).
In reading order from upper left in each quadrant of the image:
- Silhouettes in "seem like dinosaurs / are dinosaurs": Stegosaurus, Triceratops, Tyrannosaurus, Diplodocus and Velociraptor
- Silhouettes in "seem like dinosaurs / are not dinosaurs": Mosasaur, Quetzalcoatlus, Pteranodon, Plesiosaur and Dimetrodon
- Silhouettes in "don't seem like dinosaurs / are dinosaurs": Penguin, Heron, Ostrich, Pigeon and may be a Falcon or Petrel
- Silhouettes in "don't seem like dinosaurs / are not dinosaurs": Squirrel, Stapler, Pineapple, Human (here depicted as Cueball) and Bicycle
The title text is a further joke about taxonomy, seemingly predicated on the assumption that staplers are biological organisms, and can thus be sorted into taxa. Pseudosuchia is in fact the clade that encompasses all crocodilians, and staplers bear a certain resemblance to the open mouth of a crocodilian. Also, "suchia" sounds a little like "sutures," and in some sense staples are pseudo sutures.
The original Linnaean taxonomy did at first have a top-level classification for "mineral" taxonomy, in addition to those for animal and plant, which in its broadest sense might allow one to assign a stapler a taxonomic relationship with dinosaurs.
Creatures that seem like dinosaurs and are dinosaurs
- Stegosaurus
- Triceratops
- Tyrannosaurus Rex, whose name literally translates to Tyrant Lizard King, was a Late Cretaceous dinosaur, living during the Maastrichtian Age at the very end of the period. It was a contemporary of Triceratops and Mosasaurs, also listed in this comic. T-Rex is arguably one of the most well-known dinosaurs, due to the recovery of intact skeletons, as well as successful marketing and pop-culture influences, such as Jurassic Park, a movie of which Randall is a known fan.
- Diplodocus
- Velociraptor
Creatures that seem like dinosaurs, but are not
Dinosaur is a paleonotology term which refers to a specific group of reptiles, based upon evolutionary lines, bone structure and living domain. However, it is also a popular science/cultural term which refers to extinct large reptiles, hence the confusion between what is scientifically included and what is culturally assumed to be included. While dinosaurs and pterosaurs had a common ancestor, the archosaur, they diverged around 250 MYA, and are distinct enough to be entirely separate lineages.
The creatures listed are:
- A mosasaur is an extinct aquatic reptile, looking similar to a dolphin, that existed at the same time as the dinosaurs. Whilst it appeared in Jurassic World, momasaurs had a different ancestor than dinosaurs
- Plesiosaurs
- Pterodons are flying reptiles
- Dimetrodon
- Quetzalcoatlus was a genus of flying pterosaurs, related to pterodons, that lived in the Maastrichtian Age alongside Mosasaurs, T-Rex, and many others. They were some of the largest flying animals in history, with wingspans up to 36 feet (11m). They were not, however, dinosaurs, as they had pterosaur ancestry.
Creatures that don't seem like dinosaurs, but are
Strictly speaking, birds are descended from dinosaurs, but that still places them in the evolutionary line, which is close enough for the comic's purposes.
- Penguin
- Heron
- Ostrich
- Pigeon
- Falcon or Petrel (both of them qualify)
Creatures that don't seem like dinosaurs, and are not
- Squirrel: mammal
- Stapler: not a living thing
- Pineapple: plant
- Human: mammal
- Bicycle: not a living thing
Transcript
- [A 2x2 chart where each of the four quadrants contains five silhouettes. These depict various animals, a few objects, and a human. Above each column and to the left of each row there are a label:]
- [Left column:] Are dinosaurs
- [Right column:] Are not dinosaurs
- [Upper row:] Seem like dinosaurs
- [Lower row:] Don't seem like dinosaurs
- [Here follows a list of what are in each of the four quadrants:]
- [Top left (seem like dinosaurs, are dinosaurs):]
- [Stegosaurus, triceratops, tyrannosaurus, diplodocus, and velociraptor.]
- [Top right (seem like dinosaurs, are not dinosaurs):]
- [Mosasaur, quetzalcoatlus, dimetrodon, plesiosaur, and pteranodon.]
- [Bottom left (don't seem like dinosaurs, are dinosaurs):]
- [Penguin, egret, falcon, pigeon, and ostrich.]
- [Bottom right (don't seem like dinosaurs, are not dinosaurs):]
- [Squirrel, stapler, bicycle, human (here depicted as Cueball), and pineapple.]
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