▶ Your Answer :
In
the reading passage, there is ample support for the author's claim that there
is a lot of evidence that Sauropods' neck was held in a horizontal position.
However, the professor in the lecture gives several reasons as a rebuttal to
the author's point.
First, the lecturer argues that the neck did not need to have an upright
position. sauropods' tails were very slender and the bones were hollow and
filled with air. Due to the fact that the necks had very low weight, they did
not need to maintain its balance. This casts doubt on the reading passage's
claim that the sauropod's neck would have been held horizontally, considering a
sauropod's tail was never dragged on the ground.
Second, the lecturer asserts that sauropods could have eaten a variety
of other planets. There were not sufficient marine food supply for such huge
dinosaurs. In this reason, they should eat other diverse food and an upright
position is rather beneficial to access the food, such as leaves at the top of
tall trees. This refutes the reading passage's suggestion that horizontal neck
position was necessary to eat marine vegetation.
Finally, the lecturer contends that sauropods had enough muscle power to
keep their necks horizontally. It is true that their neck muscles were not that
strong enough to support vertical neck positions. However, their sufficient
robust shoulder muscle connected with other bones make it possible to maintain
its upright neck postures. This challenges the reading passage's assertion that
their necks should be balanced with horizontal positions since they did not
have strong neck muscle.
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