thinking about the past extinctions and impending future extinctions (some very soon like the 'akikiki) of hawaii's native bird species again
>>5115250dude nothing lasts forever lmaooo
Their presence in the first place has irrevocably influenced the future. The traces of their existence remain a part of the universe forever.
>>5115250>amphibians: fucked already>turtles: getting fucked>mammals except humans: dying, or farm animals, or pets, and those will die too>birds that are hyper specialists: mega fuckedMy bets are that birds that are generalists will be able to fly and easily find food in the wastelands and breed to outcompete land mammals that have to deal with gestation. It’s even possible that generalist birds could displace all mammals and only small rodents, primates, bats and cats will be left, which isn’t far off from Mesozoic mammalian genera.If this happens, welp, le dinos never went away.
>>5115436You think they're ever gonna re-evolve front legs?
>>5115267wrong, theres countless species that we will never know that existed, even in modern day, we wouldnt have known about all the cave creatures had nobody walked in them>>5115443evolution doesnt work that way, once something is a way, its almost impossible to it have it return to its original version so you it can keep adding on to the jenga tower that is their genetics to fix it, its like you did something that caused the inability to turn left, so you have to turn right 3 times to order to go left now; and then its like saying you can breed out congenital defects, also statistically impossible; and even then those transitory forms have to appear at the right time to be able to compete with species in those established niches or become another genetic dead end, and even then they still have to compete with other transitory forms, so a 4 legged bird has to compete with every other terrestrial vertebrate quadruped that already exists
>>5115450Just because we humans don't have records of them doesn't mean they didn't affect the universe. If they never existed, the world would have turned out differently.You're thinking too small here.
>>5115450By "re-evolve front legs", I meant so as in "start using their wings as anything other than flight".
>>5115512>and even then those transitory forms have to appear at the right time to be able to compete with species in those established niches or become another genetic dead end, and even then they still have to compete with other transitory forms, so a 4 legged bird has to compete with every other terrestrial vertebrate quadruped that already exists
