Jai Ho

You Are A Fish

Jai Ho

Jai Ho

Educational videos and stories

By MinuteEarthFrom BoclipsOctober 14, 2025
More about this video

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.
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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: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=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

#Explainer
#Physical Sciences
#Geography and Earth Science
#Life Sciences
#Biology
#Advanced Secondary

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