You Are A Fish

2019-03-21

[public] 797K views, 24.3K likes, dislikes audio only

We built the Tree of Life Explorer! Check it out here: https://labs.minutelabs.io/Tree-of-Life-Explorer/

And watch our video about why we made it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eE2fCLay-Q

With our current understanding of evolutionary history and our strategy of cladistic naming, if we wanted to have both goldfish and sharks under a single group called "fish", then mammals must also be called fish.

Thanks also to our Patreon patrons https://www.patreon.com/MinuteEarth and our YouTube members.

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To learn more, start your googling with these keywords:

- Phylogenetic tree: a branching diagram or "tree" showing the evolutionary relationships among various biological species

- Cladogram: a diagram used in cladistics to show relations among organisms

- Monophyletic group (or clade): a group of organisms that consists of all the descendants of a common ancestor

- Paraphyletic group: all of the descendants of a common ancestor minus one or more monophyletic groups

- Similarity trap: people can name different species the same thing, only to find out they aren’t even closely related. We made a video about this phenomana: /youtube/video/flVK-rbeT4g

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Credits:

Script Writer: Jasper Palfree

Script Editor: David Goldenberg

Video Illustrator: Sarah Berman

Video Director: Ever Salazar

Video Narrator: Ever Salazar & Jasper Palfree

With Contributions From: Henry Reich, Alex Reich, Kate Yoshida, Peter Reich

Music by: Nathaniel Schroeder: http://www.soundcloud.com/drschroeder

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References:

Weinstein, Bret (2016). On Being a Fish. Inference, Volume 2, Issue 3 September. https://inference-review.com/article/on-being-a-fish

Lahti, David (2016). An Ambivalent Amphibian (In response to "On Being a Fish"). Volume 2, Issue 4

December. https://inference-review.com/letter/an-ambivalent-amphibian

Podani, János (2013). Tree thinking, time and topology:

Comments on the interpretation of tree diagrams in

evolutionary/phylogenetic systematics. Cladistics Volume 29, Issue 3. May http://real.mtak.hu/9727/1/PodaniOnTreesFINAL.pdf