Mass burial

@article{crossref1849chinese,
    title = "Chinese Burial-Place",
    year = "1849",
    journal = "Scientific American",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican08181849-378m",
    doi = "10.1038/scientificamerican08181849-378m",
    number = "48",
    openalex = "W4234106702",
    pages = "378-378",
    volume = "4"
}

@misc{anderson1987chinese1,
    author = "Anderson, I",
    title = "Chinese Unearth a Dinosaurs' Graveyard",
    year = "1987",
    howpublished = "New Scientist, v. 116, p. 28-29",
    note = "talkorigins\_source = {true}; raw\_reference = {Anderson, I., 1987, Chinese Unearth a Dinosaurs' Graveyard: New Scientist, v. 116, p. 28-29.}"
}

@article{christiansen2004mass,
    author = "Christiansen, P. and Fariña †, R.A.",
    title = "Mass Prediction in Theropod Dinosaurs",
    year = "2004",
    journal = "Historical Biology",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1080/08912960412331284313",
    doi = "10.1080/08912960412331284313",
    number = "2-4",
    openalex = "W2034352770",
    pages = "85-92",
    volume = "16",
    references = "doi101017cbo9781139167826, doi101017cbo9781139878302, doi101086277182, doi101111j146979981985tb04915x, doi101139e93179, doi103998mpub9690664, doi105860choice290302, openalexw1558456135, openalexw1577806554"
}

@incollection{crossref2013mass,
    title = "Mass Burial Guidelines",
    year = "2013",
    booktitle = "Mass Fatality Management Concise Field Guide",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1201/b14976-8",
    doi = "10.1201/b14976-8",
    openalex = "W2485120945",
    pages = "101-102"
}

@incollection{crossref2014to,
    title = "to unearth",
    year = "2014",
    booktitle = "Dictionary Geotechnical Engineering/Wörterbuch GeoTechnik",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-41714-6\_210543",
    doi = "10.1007/978-3-642-41714-6\_210543",
    openalex = "W4236218859",
    pages = "1460-1460"
}

Large-scale adaptive radiations might explain the runaway success of a minority of extant vertebrate clades. This hypothesis predicts, among other things, rapid rates of morphological evolution during the early history of major groups, as lineages invade disparate ecological niches. However, few studies of adaptive radiation have included deep time data, so the links between extant diversity and major extinct radiations are unclear. The intensively studied Mesozoic dinosaur record provides a model system for such investigation, representing an ecologically diverse group that dominated terrestrial ecosystems for 170 million years. Furthermore, with 10,000 species, extant dinosaurs (birds) are the most speciose living tetrapod clade. We assembled composite trees of 614-622 Mesozoic dinosaurs/birds, and a comprehensive body mass dataset using the scaling relationship of limb bone robustness. Maximum-likelihood modelling and the node height test reveal rapid evolutionary rates and a predominance of rapid shifts among size classes in early (Triassic) dinosaurs. This indicates an early burst niche-filling pattern and contrasts with previous studies that favoured gradualistic rates. Subsequently, rates declined in most lineages, which rarely exploited new ecological niches. However, feathered maniraptoran dinosaurs (including Mesozoic birds) sustained rapid evolution from at least the Middle Jurassic, suggesting that these taxa evaded the effects of niche saturation. This indicates that a long evolutionary history of continuing ecological innovation paved the way for a second great radiation of dinosaurs, in birds. We therefore demonstrate links between the predominantly extinct deep time adaptive radiation of non-avian dinosaurs and the phenomenal diversification of birds, via continuing rapid rates of evolution along the phylogenetic stem lineage. This raises the possibility that the uneven distribution of biodiversity results not just from large-scale extrapolation of the process of adaptive radiation in a few extant clades, but also from the maintenance of evolvability on vast time scales across the history of life, in key lineages.

@article{doi101371journalpbio1001853,
    author = "Benson, Roger and Campione, Nicolás E. and Carrano, Matthew T. and Mannion, Philip D. and Sullivan, Corwin and Upchurch, Paul and Evans, David C.",
    title = "Rates of Dinosaur Body Mass Evolution Indicate 170 Million Years of Sustained Ecological Innovation on the Avian Stem Lineage",
    year = "2014",
    journal = "PLoS Biology",
    abstract = "Large-scale adaptive radiations might explain the runaway success of a minority of extant vertebrate clades. This hypothesis predicts, among other things, rapid rates of morphological evolution during the early history of major groups, as lineages invade disparate ecological niches. However, few studies of adaptive radiation have included deep time data, so the links between extant diversity and major extinct radiations are unclear. The intensively studied Mesozoic dinosaur record provides a model system for such investigation, representing an ecologically diverse group that dominated terrestrial ecosystems for 170 million years. Furthermore, with 10,000 species, extant dinosaurs (birds) are the most speciose living tetrapod clade. We assembled composite trees of 614-622 Mesozoic dinosaurs/birds, and a comprehensive body mass dataset using the scaling relationship of limb bone robustness. Maximum-likelihood modelling and the node height test reveal rapid evolutionary rates and a predominance of rapid shifts among size classes in early (Triassic) dinosaurs. This indicates an early burst niche-filling pattern and contrasts with previous studies that favoured gradualistic rates. Subsequently, rates declined in most lineages, which rarely exploited new ecological niches. However, feathered maniraptoran dinosaurs (including Mesozoic birds) sustained rapid evolution from at least the Middle Jurassic, suggesting that these taxa evaded the effects of niche saturation. This indicates that a long evolutionary history of continuing ecological innovation paved the way for a second great radiation of dinosaurs, in birds. We therefore demonstrate links between the predominantly extinct deep time adaptive radiation of non-avian dinosaurs and the phenomenal diversification of birds, via continuing rapid rates of evolution along the phylogenetic stem lineage. This raises the possibility that the uneven distribution of biodiversity results not just from large-scale extrapolation of the process of adaptive radiation in a few extant clades, but also from the maintenance of evolvability on vast time scales across the history of life, in key lineages.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001853",
    doi = "10.1371/journal.pbio.1001853",
    openalex = "W2155522161",
    references = "doi101007b97636, doi101017s009483730001263x, doi101017s009483730001280x, doi10103835086500, doi10103844766, doi101038nature11631, doi10108010635150490445706, doi101086284325, doi101093bioinformaticsbtm538, doi101093oso97801985052350010001, doi101093oso97801985404720010001, doi101098rspb20122526, doi101111j001438202003tb00285x, doi101111j1469185x201000137x, doi101111j15585646201201723x, doi101126science1144066, doi101126science1161833, doi101146annurevecolsys39110707173447, doi101159000452856, doi101186174170071060, doi101198tech2003s146, doi101371journalpbio1001853, doi101371journalpone0007390, doi101371journalpone0044318, doi10166612041, martinsander2006bone, openalexw2145250129"
}

Titanosauria was the most diverse and successful lineage of sauropod dinosaurs. This clade had its major radiation during the middle Early Cretaceous and survived up to the end of that period. Among sauropods, this lineage has the most disparate values of body mass, including the smallest and largest sauropods known. Although recent findings have improved our knowledge on giant titanosaur anatomy, there are still many unknown aspects about their evolution, especially for the most gigantic forms and the evolution of body mass in this clade. Here we describe a new giant titanosaur, which represents the largest species described so far and one of the most complete titanosaurs. Its inclusion in an extended phylogenetic analysis and the optimization of body mass reveals the presence of an endemic clade of giant titanosaurs inhabited Patagonia between the Albian and the Santonian. This clade includes most of the giant species of titanosaurs and represents the major increase in body mass in the history of Titanosauria.

@article{doi101098rspb20171219,
    author = "Carballido, José Luis and Pol, Diego and Otero, Alejandro and Cerda, Ignacio A. and Salgado, Leonardo and Garrido, Alberto C. and Ramezani, Jahandar and Cúneo, N. Rubén and Krause, J. Marcelo",
    title = "A new giant titanosaur sheds light on body mass evolution among sauropod dinosaurs",
    year = "2017",
    journal = "Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences",
    abstract = "Titanosauria was the most diverse and successful lineage of sauropod dinosaurs. This clade had its major radiation during the middle Early Cretaceous and survived up to the end of that period. Among sauropods, this lineage has the most disparate values of body mass, including the smallest and largest sauropods known. Although recent findings have improved our knowledge on giant titanosaur anatomy, there are still many unknown aspects about their evolution, especially for the most gigantic forms and the evolution of body mass in this clade. Here we describe a new giant titanosaur, which represents the largest species described so far and one of the most complete titanosaurs. Its inclusion in an extended phylogenetic analysis and the optimization of body mass reveals the presence of an endemic clade of giant titanosaurs inhabited Patagonia between the Albian and the Santonian. This clade includes most of the giant species of titanosaurs and represents the major increase in body mass in the history of Titanosauria.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2017.1219",
    doi = "10.1098/rspb.2017.1219",
    openalex = "W2742460947",
    references = "doi101016jcretres201304001, doi101038srep06196, doi101038srep19165, doi101046j10963642200200029x, doi101098rsbl20120263, doi101098rspb20171219, doi101111j10960031200600122x, doi101111j10960031200800217x, doi101111j109636421998tb00569x, doi101111j1469185x201000137x, doi101111zoj12029, doi1011300091761320020300123dsproe20co2, doi101186174170071060, doi101371journalpbio1001853, doi101371journalpone0093105, doi101525california97805202420980030015, doi1016660094837320080340247ositlb20co2, doi1022179revmacn7344, doi10560219780801881206"
}

The natural burial movement is popularly portrayed as the reemergence of simpler death practices and spiritualities. Without denying its ecological simplicity and ritual honesty, this article identifies some complex and emotionally charged tensions that arise in the current practice of natural burial, largely resulting from dissonance with dominant cultural norms. The areas of dissonance explored in this article relate to memorialization in the wild, the naturalness of death itself, and assertions of ecological anthropology.

@article{stewart2018fault,
    author = "Stewart, Benjamin M.",
    title = "Fault lines in the graveyard: The contested nature of green burial",
    year = "2018",
    journal = "Dialog",
    abstract = "The natural burial movement is popularly portrayed as the reemergence of simpler death practices and spiritualities. Without denying its ecological simplicity and ritual honesty, this article identifies some complex and emotionally charged tensions that arise in the current practice of natural burial, largely resulting from dissonance with dominant cultural norms. The areas of dissonance explored in this article relate to memorialization in the wild, the naturalness of death itself, and assertions of ecological anthropology.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1111/dial.12438",
    doi = "10.1111/dial.12438",
    number = "4",
    openalex = "W2904444259",
    pages = "295-302",
    volume = "57"
}

Inferring the body mass of fossil taxa, such as non-avian dinosaurs, provides a powerful tool for interpreting physiological and ecological properties, as well as the ability to study these traits through deep time and within a macroevolutionary context. As a result, over the past 100 years a number of studies advanced methods for estimating mass in dinosaurs and other extinct taxa. These methods can be categorized into two major approaches: volumetric-density (VD) and extant-scaling (ES). The former receives the most attention in non-avian dinosaurs and advanced appreciably over the last century: from initial physical scale models to three-dimensional (3D) virtual techniques that utilize scanned data obtained from entire skeletons. The ES approach is most commonly applied to extinct members of crown clades but some equations are proposed and utilized in non-avian dinosaurs. Because both approaches share a common goal, they are often viewed in opposition to one another. However, current palaeobiological research problems are often approach specific and, therefore, the decision to utilize a VD or ES approach is largely question dependent. In general, biomechanical and physiological studies benefit from the full-body reconstruction provided through a VD approach, whereas large-scale evolutionary and ecological studies require the extensive data sets afforded by an ES approach. This study summarizes both approaches to body mass estimation in stem-group taxa, specifically non-avian dinosaurs, and provides a comparative quantitative framework to reciprocally illuminate and corroborate VD and ES approaches. The results indicate that mass estimates are largely consistent between approaches: 73% of VD reconstructions occur within the expected 95% prediction intervals of the ES relationship. However, almost three quarters of outliers occur below the lower 95% prediction interval, indicating that VD mass estimates are, on average, lower than would be expected given their stylopodial circumferences. Inconsistencies (high residual and per cent prediction deviation values) are recovered to a varying degree among all major dinosaurian clades along with an overall tendency for larger deviations between approaches among small-bodied taxa. Nonetheless, our results indicate a strong corroboration between recent iterations of the VD approach based on 3D specimen scans suggesting that our current understanding of size in dinosaurs, and hence its biological correlates, has improved over time. We advance that VD and ES approaches have fundamentally (metrically) different advantages and, hence, the comparative framework used and advocated here combines the accuracy afforded by ES with the precision provided by VD and permits the rapid identification of discrepancies with the potential to open new areas of discussion.

@article{doi101111brv12638,
    author = "Campione, Nicolás E. and Evans, David C.",
    title = "The accuracy and precision of body mass estimation in non‐avian dinosaurs",
    year = "2020",
    journal = "Biological reviews/Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society",
    abstract = "Inferring the body mass of fossil taxa, such as non-avian dinosaurs, provides a powerful tool for interpreting physiological and ecological properties, as well as the ability to study these traits through deep time and within a macroevolutionary context. As a result, over the past 100 years a number of studies advanced methods for estimating mass in dinosaurs and other extinct taxa. These methods can be categorized into two major approaches: volumetric-density (VD) and extant-scaling (ES). The former receives the most attention in non-avian dinosaurs and advanced appreciably over the last century: from initial physical scale models to three-dimensional (3D) virtual techniques that utilize scanned data obtained from entire skeletons. The ES approach is most commonly applied to extinct members of crown clades but some equations are proposed and utilized in non-avian dinosaurs. Because both approaches share a common goal, they are often viewed in opposition to one another. However, current palaeobiological research problems are often approach specific and, therefore, the decision to utilize a VD or ES approach is largely question dependent. In general, biomechanical and physiological studies benefit from the full-body reconstruction provided through a VD approach, whereas large-scale evolutionary and ecological studies require the extensive data sets afforded by an ES approach. This study summarizes both approaches to body mass estimation in stem-group taxa, specifically non-avian dinosaurs, and provides a comparative quantitative framework to reciprocally illuminate and corroborate VD and ES approaches. The results indicate that mass estimates are largely consistent between approaches: 73\% of VD reconstructions occur within the expected 95\% prediction intervals of the ES relationship. However, almost three quarters of outliers occur below the lower 95\% prediction interval, indicating that VD mass estimates are, on average, lower than would be expected given their stylopodial circumferences. Inconsistencies (high residual and per cent prediction deviation values) are recovered to a varying degree among all major dinosaurian clades along with an overall tendency for larger deviations between approaches among small-bodied taxa. Nonetheless, our results indicate a strong corroboration between recent iterations of the VD approach based on 3D specimen scans suggesting that our current understanding of size in dinosaurs, and hence its biological correlates, has improved over time. We advance that VD and ES approaches have fundamentally (metrically) different advantages and, hence, the comparative framework used and advocated here combines the accuracy afforded by ES with the precision provided by VD and permits the rapid identification of discrepancies with the potential to open new areas of discussion.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1111/brv.12638",
    doi = "10.1111/brv.12638",
    openalex = "W3082346069",
    references = "doi101016jcub201706071, doi101016jpalaeo201206027, doi101017cbo9780511608551, doi101038417070a, doi101038srep06196, doi101086303327, doi101098rsbl20120263, doi101098rspb20060443, doi101098rspb20171219, doi1011112041210x12226, doi101111evo12150, doi101111j17447429200700272x, doi101111j2041210x201100153x, doi101111pala12329, doi101126science1061967, doi101152physrev1947274511, doi101371journalpone0044318, doi101371journalpone0051925, doi101371journalpone0081917, doi101371journalpone0082000, doi107717peerj857, openalexw1558456135, openalexw195142154, openalexw2593733766, openalexw260994251, pontzer2009biomechanics"
}

@article{price2021scientists,
    author = "Price, Michael",
    title = "Scientists unearth Africa’s oldest burial: a small child, laid to rest 78,000 years ago",
    year = "2021",
    journal = "Science",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abj3237",
    doi = "10.1126/science.abj3237",
    openalex = "W3159962969"
}

@incollection{crossref2023map,
    title = "Map 4 Burial plots in the side graveyard",
    year = "2023",
    booktitle = "Death and Life in the Ottoman Palace",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1515/9781399510455-007",
    doi = "10.1515/9781399510455-007",
    openalex = "W4321223264",
    pages = "xviii-xviii"
}

@incollection{liu2025graveyard,
    author = "Liu, Tianyang and Yuan, Zhenjie",
    title = "Graveyard Politics: Feng Shui and Rural Chinese Cemeteries",
    year = "2025",
    booktitle = "The Chinese Geography of Ordinary Security",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-96-3264-0\_5",
    doi = "10.1007/978-981-96-3264-0\_5",
    openalex = "W4407883927",
    pages = "77-103",
    references = "doi101016jbuildenv200407016, doi101037a0018963, doi101037pspa0000042, doi1011770967010612463490, doi1011770967010619889471, doi101215220119193615880, doi1023072756424, doi1043249780203360675, doi1050409781474272872, openalexw2021709660"
}