From what I understand, this is sorta like a hangover from pre-DNA taxonomy. We went “yeah, those all look like fish, we’ll put them in the fish group”, only to find out later that a bunch of them weren’t very closely related at all. So now we have a ‘fish’ group that’s a total mess, and we’re in the middle of getting it organized and re-labelled.
Comment on Bees don't have lungs.
frigidaphelion@lemmy.world 2 days agoIn a nutshell: speaking cladistically, there is no such thing as a fish, or alternatively, all tetrapods are fish. You cant define a monophyletic group that includes “fish” that doesnt also include humans (and all other tetrapods eg birds and such). That’s my understanding anyway
faythofdragons@slrpnk.net 2 days ago
frigidaphelion@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Yeah exactly lol science is full of silly stuff like that but that’s the price of knowledge and of using models to understand things. Same with trees and such, they look alike to us so we call a lot of organisms trees but they are VASTLY different from each other in many cases
Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world 2 days ago
frigidaphelion@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Excellent pic and excellent username. The tooooth!
Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Can’t we just un-fish it like we do for other clades when we need to?
“There’s an ape in the office!”
“Yes, his name is Tom. More importantly, he is a human being, and we don’t refer to them as apes outside of an academic context and even then, only when necessary.”
[Tom eats a banana, screams at an intern, and starts picking his nose]
Klear@lemmy.world 2 days ago
No, fuck paraphyletic groups.
Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I meant, can’t we just be more specific rather than use paraphyletic grouping?
“What’s for dinner?”
“Fish”
“That could mean anything!”
“You know I meant Actinopterygii.”
“Still pretty broad.”
“Oncorhynchus.”
“You know how I feel about trout.”
“Ugh. tshawytscha.”
“Well, why didn’t you just say so in the first place?”
FauxLiving@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Some commenters here really need to go and come into contact with Eremochloa ophiuroides
Soggy@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Fish is a polyphyletic group. It’s a shorthand to refer to various lines of aquatic vertebrates with a similar anatomy. It’s not a clade but that’s not the only way to logically group organisms. People trot it out like a “gotcha” or just misuse it in much the same way they don’t understand speciation (or most science terminology, to be frank)
We are not fish by anyone’s honest definition, but “there’s no such thing as a fish” is the kind of attention-grabbing false revelation I hate: it’s the headline with none of the understanding to actually learn something.
frigidaphelion@lemmy.world 2 days ago
My knowledge on the subject is purely at a youtube video level so i am happy to have someone else provide better knowledge and insight
faythofdragons@slrpnk.net 2 days ago
I too have seen that Clint’s Reptiles video, lmao