Flying dinosaurs. How fearsome reptiles became birds / Летающие динозавры. Как устрашающие рептилии превратились в птиц

Most palaeontologists will tell you they arrived in their job because, as a child, they loved prehistoric creatures, particularly dinosaurs. They just never grew up – or at least they never stopped seeing a world filled with wonder and excitement. In that sense, I never grew up either. I never stopped being the little kid staring up in awe at the 32-metre-long fossil of ‘Dippy’ the Diplodocus that fills the vaulted Central Hall of London’s Natural History Museum.I’ve long been in awe of the museum too, a grand cathedral to the natural world and Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection, all showcased in architect Alfred Waterhouse’s great neo-Romanesque confection of a building. The overall effect is one of Victorian grandeur, but with splendid detailing, right down to the gargoyles and statues of pterodactyls, cats, sabre-toothed lions, wolves, bears and numerous other creatures both prehistoric and modern. <...>