Dinosaurs are nature’s celebrities. We love them. Many of us, in the near-ubiquitous “dinosaur phase” of our youth, quickly master names like Tyrannosaurus, Diplodocus, and—the challenge of any young fossil fan—Pachycephalosaurus by the time we start kindergarten. But dinosaurs are changing so fast that the monstrous creatures we imagine in our youth become strangers as scientific discovery continues to tweak what we know about them. This disjunction spurs myths and misunderstandings that persist for decades, and often obscure how wonderful dinosaurs truly were. Time to do a little pop culture housekeeping to clear out old assumptions.
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