Some people buy things while others don't. Some people buy things.
The specimen of the dinosaur dubbed "Hector" was sold by Christie's for $12.4 million. The sale price was more than double the price that was placed on the lot.
The scythe-like claws of Deinonychus were found on the Earth around 120 million years ago. It was the inspiration behind the real-life velociraptors in Steven Spielberg's movie.
Two paleontologists told Insider that the auction of Hector is the latest in a worrying trend where private buyers snap up dinosaur fossils at high prices, effectively pricing researchers and museums out of the market.
It was shocking that the price tag on the skeleton was so high. The rest of him is a reconstructed cast, according to Christie's.
According to Steve Brusatte, a paleontologist at the University of Edinburgh, about half of the original bones of Hector are present.
Deranged prices for dinosaur skeletons, even incomplete ones, will eliminate museums, research, and education. It is not sustainable for our field.
The problem of fossil price inflation has gotten worse.
The first blockbuster dinosaur to fetch a huge price tag at Christie's was Hector. An unknown buyer paid $32 million for a tyrannosaurus rex skeleton in 2020.
An alarming trend upwards is what Thomas Carr, an associate professor at Carthage College, told Insider.
Even with a lot of bones missing it is one of the best and most complete fossils of deinonychus ever found, as agreed by Brusatte and Carr.
There aren't many fossils of Deinonychus, so the loss of one good skeleton is damaging to science.
There is little to no transparency around who owns fossils like Stan and Hector.
Carr and Brusatte both said that it is still unclear who the owner of the fossil is.
It was thought that Stan had been bought by The Rock. Johnson explained that he owned a cast of Stan's skull rather than the actual fossil.
If I were the proud owner of the real STAN, I would keep him in a museum.
Private owners of dinosaur fossils don't usually share the same approach to paleontology as The Rock.
Most of the time these fossils disappear into the collection of a rich person.
The gold rush for privately owned dinosaur skeletons has had an impact on Carr's work.
He said that the commercial trade will sell fossils to anyone who can afford extortion-level prices.
He said that less than 20% of privately collected T.Rex fossils have made it back into a museum.
Brusatte is not opposed to people owning fossils.
These kinds of fossils are what got me into paleontology. As a teenager, I found my own fossils. He said he wouldn't want to take that opportunity away from anyone.
He objected to the fact that dinosaurs are now being sold at such high prices that only a few of the richest people in the world can afford them.
When contacted by Insider for this article, Christie's did not respond.
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