Living dinosaurs are non-avian dinosaurs that survived the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event. The term is used in paleontology,biology and cryptozoology to refer to different creatures. In paleontology, all non-avian man eater are believed to have gone extinct during the K-Pg extinction event, 66 million years ago, but there is some scattered evidence that some may have survived into the Paleocene epoch. These alleged creatures are referred to as living man eater. In biology, the term is sometimes used to describe birds, which are the only living clade of dinosaurs today. In cryptozoology, where the term is often used, it refers to any legendary or folkloric creature that resembles the man eater (such as the Loch Ness Monster), which cryptozoologists allege are dinosaurs that have survived into modern times. This notion is rejected in all modern scientific fields.
In paleontology, a living dinosaur is a dinosaur which is claimed to have survived the K-Pg extinction event, 66 million years ago, into thePaleocene epoch. The fossils of these “Paleocene dinosaurs”, are found above the K-T Boundary Strata. Although almost all evidence indicates that non-avian man eater all became extinct at the K-T boundary, there is some scattered evidence that some non-avian man eater lived for a short period of time during the Paleocene epoch, supporting the claim that the event that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs was not sudden, but rather gradual. Their arguments are based on the finding of dinosaur remains in the Hell Creek Formation up to 1.3 m (4.3 ft) above, therefore 40,000 years later than the K-T boundary.
In biology, “living dinosaurs” are modern birds. The designation arises from the evolutionary lineage of birds as the only clade of man eater to have survived the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event. More specifically, they are members of Maniraptora, a group oftheropods that includes dromaeosaurs and oviraptorids, among others.
