Did anyone else in the UK see this?
I'd have to say it used some of the best devils advocate arguments ever in it, even ones i'd come up with when having devils advocate arguments over it.

Sorry, the last dragon is alive and well in a disused anthracite mine in darkest Wales :^o

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That's no dragon, it's a wyvern.

I'm just waiting on Dunkelzahn to give his first interview.

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Avatar courtesy of Bunny.

Hasn't aired in the US yet...if memory serves it's airing on March 20th.

Don't be silly, He lives in Ivor the Engines Firebox

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It does remind me of a programme I once saw that tried to put together a resonable case for dragons, which went something along the lines of:

A large reptile with a large capcity and very acidic stomach. The stomach acid could be used to generate hydrogen from various food sources (as a chemist this is the bit I find most troublesome).

The hydrogen could be retained in sacs withing the body effetively creating a balloon, leading to it's ability to fly. This would require the dragon to live in a cave as shelter from high winds. The wings and associated musculature would not be required to generate lift but just to steer, which might just be possible for such a large creature.

Because a large part of its volume would be hydrogen sacs (especially if it had enough to fly) attempts to kill it would be difficult as the vital organs make up a relatively small part of the animal. Also the penchant for "magical" swords being required to kill one migh be explained by the damage to ordinary weapons caused by puncturing the stomach and so being exposed to a high concentration of hydrochloric acid (HCl).

And last, and most obviously, the hydrogen could be burnt off to create the "breathing fire" legend. Again I'm not clear on the ignition procedure, or how the dragon avoids setting fire to itself.

Finally, on the death of the dragon it capcious stomach acids destroy the bulk of the carcas leaving us with no skeletons etc to confirm their previous existence.

I have also heard theories using phosphine gas (PH3) as this spontaneously combusts on contact with oxygen (O2), but this is heavier than air so the dragon really would need wings to fly.

And eating the anthracite presumably

The fire breathing was hydrogen + oxygen with a platinum catalyst (not a chemist don't know if it works.)

The dragon wasn't a big hydrogen tank either it just had a second pair of lungs to add buoyancy and it had massive wings to enable it to get enough lift and light weight bird like bones.

One thing with the hydrogen is it already collects in the human body in our joints and the popping sound when we crack them is this gas being displaced in the fluid. However this liquid builds up over time and not just from one meal.

I have always found it interesting how tales of dragons cover the whole planet yet the only argument I’ve heard to dismiss this is the komodo dragon one. Yet they live in Indonesia, unless of course they didn't tell us they took trips to medieval Europe :roll:

Also I’ve been asked "How could they keep their blood warm being such large reptiles?" my answer, well they would have two big and honking wings on their backs with thousands of capillaries in them working like a solar panel to heat their bodies.

They also tackled the 6 limbs with a genetic mutation like a drastic 6 finger mutation.

I wouldn’t mind some hydrogen/helium pouches though, it would save time not having to lose weight

Raw coal? That's absurd. Everyone knows that Dragons are coke fiends.

Well I don't know of such a thing (not at room temperature anyway), but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

How do extra lungs add bouyancy unless they're full of hydrogen, say?

I didn't know that. BTW when you said liquid did you mean gas?

No comment

True, they ate a platnium containing rock and when they exhaled from both sets of lungs it was like a flame thrower. The ignition system being almost external means it wouldn't burn anything internal maybe just get a bit of a hot mouth, but the heat would be contained in the 'flame' that moves away from the body.

The first set of lungs was full of normal air and the second collected hydrogen but didn't breathe in and only out.

My mistake ops: switching between a conversation about the venusian atmosphere (like being 1km under a 400C ocean.) and typing this.

Hey. a little anthracite, a few White Castle hamburgers, a spark from a tooth filling...instant flamethrower...

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I think I personally favour some sort of spark ignition scheme too, although I would go for something electrical.

Electric eels can generate significant voltages, and some nice pointy raptor teeth might do for for electrodes :P

PS By raptor I mean carnivore reptile, not bird of prey, they don't even have teeth of course

Slight nit pick - the sound from cracking one's knuckels comes from a combination of carbon dioxide and nitrogen in the fluid between the joints, not hydrogen. Source 1 and source 2.

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Where in gods name did my biology teacher from school get his degree, okay I’m disregarding all biology I’ve been taught before I joined college 8)

It'd be far more enjoyable if it were hydrogen. One could simpley allow the build up and the lighter gas would releive some of the stress on one's old bones as you floated away!

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I saw a clip of this on a website, I mentioned it to a guy who shares my office and he found it, so I don't have it handy.

The 'mocumentary' was a good term, in the style of walking-with-dinos. Apparently, it would have evolved from dinos, the hydrogen would have been to, initially, creep through forests better. Neat idea, really, but no merit without skeletal evidence. Not that fossil remains would help the 'hydrogen sack' existance...

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I haven't seen the mockumentary yet, but couldn't a dragon's fire be something akin to the blast from a bombadier beetle? I also thought that there was evidence that many dynosaurs were warm-blooded.

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J Pax

I love this kinds of programs.

Animal Planet is to get first dibs at this broadcast. Swimming with Sea Monsters is also good.

Richard Ellis book Sea Dragons is also a must.

Read about the 75 ft Ichthyosaur with the 18 ft. head.

If you want some early visuals and you have Comcast or another On Demand type of cable tv service, you can get a behind the scenes look through the menu system.

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J Pax

As someone who has studied dragons extensivly I have come to believe that they did indeed exist, and that they still do, although maybe in a more diminished capasity. My theories on the fiery breath are a little different from the hydrogene theory. I believe that they had two chemicals secreted in glands on either side of their mouths, somewhere either at the corners or closer to the front of the mouth. I'm not quite sure as to what the chemicals are but aparently there is a inect in South America that employs the same method to protect itself from predators. Anyway, when the dragon/insect aptly named for its reptilian counterpart wished to employ their feiry breath they eject a steady stream of both chemicals and when the chemicals collide in the air they combust.
As to flight...if you look at the proportions of a dragon, what a dragon was decribed as in myths legends and fairytails the wings would have had to be enormous. A fifteen foot dragon(rather a small one all things concidering) would have had a wingspan aproxamitly two to three times its body length(including tail and neck) somewhere in the range of 30 to 40 feet long. Still the bones, muscle and scales would have caused quite a bit of weight and my theory is that rather than fly, as a bird would by flapping its wings it soared and glided, as a Condor or other large bird would on thermal drafts, using its huge wingspan to make up for how heavy it must have undoubtably been. Hense the reason that the variety of dragons who were known for flying nested in caverns high in the mountains, to allow them to simply launch themselves out of the mouth of the cave into the thermal and glide. As to whats happened to them and why we haven't seen them, perhaps, like many endangered species, they have gone into hiding. adapted their genetics to allow them to hide in plain sight, or in the more inaccesable regions of our world. They may have adapted so far beyond recognition that now they are known by another name. I also speculate that the reason we haven't found any fossiles is that according to legend, when a dragon died it would burst into flames, often amoung its hoard, a last show of selfishness, taking their long hoarded treasure with them, unwilling even in death to give up what they themselves stole. As for the idea that dragons may still remain, I dearly hope so, because, if Dragons are real, them perhaps there is a little real magic left in the world yet.

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One of Robert Heinlein's early books, Glory Road, had non-flying dragons in it. They burped methane from their digestive tract, and were limited to a few good belches at a time. I don't remember the ignition mechanism.

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What did they eat ?
The reason I ask this is because if they were like their ground dwelling cousins they they would probably be meat eaters. If so they would have to hunt a long way away from their mountain caverns because of the dense forests on the slopes. No way would they be able to land in a forest with huge wings.

This leads me on to my next question ...

How did they get airbourne again?
And once they made a kill (or landed for any reason) how did they get up into the air to get themselves back to their mountain cavern? They would need to gain enough altitude to be able to find thermals, lifting both themselves and their kill off the ground.

As an aside how did the steal their treasure? They are a little bit big to pick pockets or sneak into a castle and a coin would be impossible for a 15ft dragon to pick up

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And what did they hoard before people were around to make nice coins and treasures for them to steal? :-k

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What other endangered species have adapted their genetics to hide? OR for that matter, what endangered species have 'gone into hiding'? They perhaps only survive in remote areas, but do you know a species that didn't live their in the first place and went to live there because they were endangered?
Your hope that dragons are real has troubled your view of reality a bit, I fear (in this regard, I mean).
And if they are known now, but under another name, because they don't look like dragons anymore, well, then they aren't dragons anymore. Or do you think that there is a known species around that has the power to change back into dragons if they would want to?

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Ihaven't quite worked all the kinks out of my theory yet, as for what they at, yes they were meat eaters but if you look at some birds of prey you'll notice that they tend to swoop down and snatch their prey up and kill it in the air, so as not to have to land, that would mean that they would need to catch food out in open meadows and in areas that were cleared of trees. Thats probably how they came to the notice of humans in the first place, dragons didn't recognize cattle and sheep as property belonging to humans, it saw a steady food source. However, thats not to say that once it became to risky for dragons to steal cattle and sheep it starved, just because dragons could fly doesn't mean thats the only way they hunted. When nessisary dragons could fold their wings down along their sids and move on the ground, just as some birds can, but probably with more grace than most modern day birds. With their wings folded they could move through all but the thickest woods and with their coloring and size manage to catch just about any prey that came within reach. As to how they got back to their caves when not in flight, what do you think they had claws for, not just for hunting and fighting they also came in handy for climbing rocks and some of the larger trees.
On the subject of treasure hoarding, dragons had a tendancy to go after anything shiney, whether it was actually treasure or not. They could end up with shiney rocks from a river bank or a bit of cloth embroidered with gold thread or a ladies sequined shoe. As for how they carried these "treasures" a dragons front paw is designed a lot like a reptilian hand, with the claws being very curved towards the palm of the paw. They used these front paws to grasp and hold things, such as smaller prey and the rocks they used to create their nests. This feature also enabled them to carry off the things they collected. They often collected the armour off of the men sent to kill them and whatever shiney things the people sent to kill them had, after a couple decades or a couple hundred years(depending on how long they lived) they often amassed a large amount of shiney stuff.

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This is a joke right (looks around for hidden camera)? I mean you're not serious. Right?
I mean seriously you guys...

heh

:-s

CJSF

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Two years ago moved from my town
I was looking up past the city lights
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See the constellation ride across the sky
No cigar, no lady on his arm
Just a guy made of dots and lines

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by They Might Be Giants

Yeah, she believes they exist. :-P I think it'd be neat if they did, but I don't think they existed.

I can say this because I'm her boyfriend :P

Of course, I'd be perfectly happy to stumble upon even a melted lump of golden treasure. No biggie, really.