Velociraptor Bad At Disemboweling 298
illtron writes "British scientists at the University of Manchester were apparently bored and decided to find out, once and for all, if the Velociraptor was as mean as Jurassic Park would like everyone to think. They created a robotic Velociraptor leg to simulate the effect that leg would have on pig and crocodile skin. It turns out that disemboweling a dino probably would have been out of the question, since the best that big claw could do was usually just to leave a deep puncture." From the article: "I realized that the sick-claw was not a knife, but was rather more like the claw of a cat. Cats use their claws to pierce and hold prey, not to disembowel. Whereas my work was mostly theoretical, Phil took one step farther as he was given the opportunity to mechanically test the disemboweling hypothesis. His work is very important,"
Re:Cats don't disembowel? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Unconvincing (Score:3, Informative)
Try "sawing away" at something, anything, with an awl. The whole point here is that a velociraptor claw is not a sharp knife, but a pointy stick.
You can make a wound as deep as the "hilt", but no "longer" than the diameter of the claw.
KFG
Definition of Disembowel (Score:3, Informative)
Disembowelment is evisceration, or the removing of vital organs, usually from the abdomen. The results are invariably fatal. It has historically been used as a form of capital punishment.
So, I'm guessing from that post and the definition, disembowelment is when the velociraptor sliced you in the stomach, so your guts spill out, which they're claiming here is untrue.
Re:Cats don't disembowel? (Score:5, Informative)
Everyone knows a cat's claw is Piercing+1, Slashing-5 sheesh
Seriously though. Look at the cat scratch, it's not a clean cut, it's similar to if you got scratched by a pointy stick, not a razor. If the claw went deeper it wouldn't move because only the point is sharp, not the edge.
Velociraptor is the wuss (Score:5, Informative)
Velociraptor has a skull length of 249 mm (9.80 in), a total length of 2.7 m (8 ft 10 in), a hip height of 0.5 m (1 ft 8 in), and weighs 20 kg (45 lb). The 'raptors portrayed there were modelled after a larger relative, Deinonychus.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deinonychus [wikipedia.org]
Re:I remember watching Jurassic Park (Score:3, Informative)
The procedure will break the jaw of a dog. Quite easily. I ended up causing a compound fracture on many parts of the jaw bone.
They had to put down the dog I did that to, but the owner didnt complain.. They were happy I didnt sue.
Re:Unconvincing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Yet again scientist realize (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Unconvincing (Score:3, Informative)
That said, a cat catching prey will tend to just jump on it and bite it on the back of the neck, breaking all the vertebrae. You'd be amazed how powerful a cat's jaws are, for their size. If you watch a cat attacking something in a fight, particularly something larger than it, the cat will grab hold with its front paws and kick with its powerful back legs. The claws on their back paws are much thicker and only a little bit blunter than the ones on their front paws.