If birds are descendants of dinosaurs, are birds reptiles ? What makes an animal a reptile then ?
In: Biology
To build on what others have said the only really taxonomically consistent way to define reptiles, that doesn’t include mammals, is as all diapsids, which is all vertebrates with two holes in the side of their head (although some have secondarily lost them) as opposed to synapsids, which includes us with a single hole in the side of our head.
Related interesting tid bit, about our conceptions of reptiles. Crocodilians are believed to be endothermic secondarily, to adapt to a lifestyle of being a very still ambush predator. And that goes for sprawled legs too as an adaptation for living in the water. As they evolved from terrestrial active predators, that are much closer related to birds than any other reptile.
Birds are considered reptiles by nature of their evolutionary history and nearest ancestors- they are considered theropods and thus are dinosaurs in the taxonomic sense.
Modern reptiles are a different **class** taxonomically from birds (Reptilia vs Aves), so birds are not reptiles in the sense we know them today (although birds are closely related to crocodiles taxonomically).
Reptiles are cold blooded vertebrates with dry skin. Birds are not reptiles, regardless of being descended from dinosaurs. The categorisation of creatures is based on their typical characteristics rather than their lienage, otherwise all life would just be categorised as single cell organisms.
Yes they are.
Traditionally the science of birds and the science of reptiles and amphibians (Herpetology) are seperate. But the according to our new knowledge that is kind of a wrong seperation. More correct would be Amphibians versus reptiles (including birds).
Birds are the only warm-blooded reptiles though, wich makes them pretty distinct and made this misconception very justifiable.
Mammals also seperated from reptiles, but much earlier, and we are not considered part of that group anymore.
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