Eli5: why are birds believed to be the descendants of the dinosaurs?
In: Earth Science
Because when looking back at therapods (the upright walking, mostly carnivorous dinosaurs) you can see a very clear line of decent in which more and more birdlike features are gained in some lineages. Including a wide variety of proto-feathers leading up to quite complicated and advanced feathers by the time you get into the raptors.
Even as late as the 70s or 80s there was still some debate about whether or not birds were dinosaurs or just close cousins to the dinosaurs, but at this point the fossil record is pretty overwhelming and we can say with a good bit of certainty that birds are therapod dinosaurs.
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