Greg Dwyer

9th Nov 2015

Jurassic World (2015)

Question: Since dinosaurs are cold blooded reptiles, why do they try to observe and detect them with heat-seeking cameras? They would have been of the same temperature as their surrounding and therefore invisible from the get go.

Answer: Dinosaurs aren't cold-blooded reptiles. They are warm-blooded (or possibly somewhere between) and are more closely related to birds. Remember the first movie where Dr. Wu told Ellie that dinosaurs hold a temperature above that of the air.

Greg Dwyer

Dinosaurs and birds have different blood temperatures so I highly doubt that they're related. Lizards, like dinosaurs, are cold-blooded; birds are warm-blooded.

The most reliable and modern research shows that dinosaurs were not cold-blooded and were more similar to birds or mammals than modern-day reptiles.

LorgSkyegon

Warm-blooded means the animal's body attempts to maintain a relatively constant core temperature, and cold-blooded don't. This is because many of the body's systems work better when warm, like muscles. But all animals generate heat when expending energy, like when their muscles are operating for movement, so a "cold-blooded" animal will still normally be at a higher temperature than its surroundings unless it has been staying still for a while. Even then, heart and digestive action is still generating at least a little heat. It is the issue of being warmer, even by a small amount, that allows a thermal device to see the difference.

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