"You're Basically The Hagfish of Reptiles"

What's this about being the hagfish of reptiles? I mean, I can live with being a fish. If sharks and trout are both fish, then I'm a fish, but I'm not hagfish! And what does this have to do with reptiles? Clint, you better explain!
#phylogenetics #clintexplains #clintsreptiles
Image Address: live.staticfli...

[@cs4870]

That graphic of the hagfish and the little green person-hagfish should absolutely be a shirt

[@MirrimBlackfox]

Along with the tag line "You're basically the Hagfish of Reptiles."

[@rosetownstumpcity]

you should promote this channel more on Clint's Reptiles because i had no idea about this until it was mentioned in todays venom video, I could have been watching it all this time! At least now I have something to binge today and I am very excited for that :-) thanks Clint, for all the great stuff that you make for all of us

[@anthonygordon9483]

A good arguing point you probably could of mentioned is the fact that reptiles lay eggs. And if we were reptiles we would probably be laying eggs as well.

[@RobotNinjaZombieBatman]

​@@anthonygordon9483 I mean if you just ignore all of the reptiles that give live birth, and also the mammals that lay eggs, then I guess you have a point 🙄

[@dschortz]

I hope this explains what the heck it means every time he says “the hagfish of…”

[@kinilas]

I love how bad humans are and classifying things. We tried using phenotypes and where like "well, this doesn't really work because that means the coconut is a mammal." So we tried using genotypes and we were like "well that doesn't really work because it means cabbages are a mammal" so we tried using phylogeny and we were like "that doesn't work because everything is now a fish"

[@mooniejohnson]

That *would* explain why the vet told me to get out when I brought them my pet coconut for his yearly checkup…

[@er4110]

Of course because by then it was already too late. RIP this guy's coconut. 😢

[@AllanTidgwell]

Why doesn't that work? If all animals are animals and that's not an issue, then why would all chordates being called fish be an issue?

[@NickWeissMusic]

Scoff all you want, but humans are better at phylogeny than most hagfish. Most.

[@nickkorkodylas5005]

Hiccups are now incurable! CURSE YOU DARWIN!

[@capitanpredapool6548]

Love the simple, but epic explanation.

[@katelillo1932]

I’m okay with being a fish but I’m not a great swimmer 😬 where’s my swim bladder, dagnabbit! 😫

[@newtscamander7713]

Well, if your lungs function, then you happen to be breathing with it right now!!

[@42ZaphodB42]

You could eat a lot of beans to mimick one 😬

[@naturegirl1999]

Keeping my breath held makes it hard to dive, letting out some of the air will help you sink, our lungs are swimbladders

[@VeryLastIfried]

I am proud to be an ape, a primate, a mammal, an amniote, a tetrapod, a vertebrate (or a fish however you wanna call it), a bilaterally symmetrical animal and a multicellular animal!

[@liammurphy2725]

I am a reader of books. It is known.

[@recipoldinasty]

Well you got past alot lol, synapsid etc

[@VeryLastIfried]

@@recipoldinasty of course I did... there is way too much and it is not needed for the joke.... Synapsid being one of the big ones but all the small subgroups inbetween...

[@sampagano205]

One point I'd want to bring into this discussion is also the geologic ages of the groups in question alongside the strict phylogeny. Because the main reason I tend to bristle at calling the lobe finned fish, ray finned fish, and cartilaginous fish clade "fish" is just that tetropodomoprhs diverged very early on in the history of lobe finned fish (late Silurian vs early Devonian). I think that this gives a lot of people a mistaken impression of evolutionary history where fish as we know them are much older than tetropods rather than the reality that they evolved alongside each other to a big extent. This is generally why I prefer to call the group including tetropods, cartilaginous fish, and ray finned fish Jawed Vertebrates or if I'm feeling particularly edgy Placoderms (since it's likely placoderms are ancestral to all other living jawed vertebrates).

[@pol...]

Tetropods is different than tetrapods?

[@naturegirl1999]

@@pol...typos exist

[@FatMarioHeads]

I guess Mr. Limpet's wish to be a fish was in vein, already was one

[@EIBrown]

While monophyletic groups are clearly important and useful - this video was unwittingly the best argument I've seen against monophytic groups being the only basis for nomenclature and classification. It shows just how absurd monophyletic groups can get when taken to their logical conclusions, unless some other parallel method of nomenclature is used beside them. Why not use paraphyletic groups in context of monophyletic groups instead? This would give you all the advantages of monophyletic groups, without the absurdities and contradictions like calling humans fish. You would still be able to tell important things about an organism by which group it fell into, because the paraphyletic groups would exist in context of the larger monophyletic group to which they belonged. And it will also have the added feature of noting when a branch takes a particularly distinct path from other branches in the monophyletic group. And it does this without creating the contradictions and problems of polyphyletic groups. Paraphyletic groups are king. Change my mind.

[@DFX2KX]

Calling us 'fish' has always struck me as just a fun/silly way to say 'you're still part of the Osteichthyes clade'. ie "You may blame your fish ancestors for hiccups". But yes, it has it's limits beyond mere 'you're in a family that also includes..."

[@wilhelmtan5301]

well i am proud to be called a hagfish. hagfish is cool anyway

[@clintexplains5327]

They do make some rad slime!

[@SHENworks]

@@clintexplains5327 We also make abundant slime, such as mucus, yes?

[@crystaltripi7574]

Ten out of ten Clint I was a Little Mermaid fan as wee little girl, I always wanted to be a mermaid now thanks to your brilliant teaching I am kind of ☺️ thank you ever so much for sharing and best wishes always.

[@pamelapilling6996]

Thanks Clint. Such fun learning these tidbits. I am perfectly fine being a fish. 😁🐳🐬🐠

[@tarab4617]

The most apt description of dimetrodon I’ve ever heard

[@jedavisLV426]

Please please please please do an episode on parthenogenisis!

[@malusignatius]

"Harry, you're a Fish."

[@Ricewater94]

Hey Clint! Big fan of your main channel. Have you thought about adding a bit of background music? Small and subtle but its what I've generally seen with educational videos on KZbin. Great content though :)

[@clintexplains5327]

People always complained about it on our reptile channel, so we got rid of it.

[@zoeisabagel2855]

@@clintexplains5327 People are all entitled to their opinions I guess...even if those opinions are wrong

[@liammurphy2725]

I found the usual clarity of speech somewhat lacking. Were you using a different sound rig?

[@steam9140]

This channel is criminally underrated

[@liammurphy2725]

By who? Criminals?

[@keithharper9595]

So in the popular British science fiction comedy series Red Dwarf, when in a fit of exam stress one of the characters writes "I am a fish" on his answer sheet 400 times, he is in fact correct? Who would have guessed?

[@jaredkillgoar8548]

You are a great educator!

[@samuelkane1717]

This makes "so long and thanks for all the fish" seem vaguely threatening.

[@VeryFamousActor]

Just stumbled across this channel. I only knew about the other channel. This is great!

[@jejvoice6855]

Couldn't we have terms that are more ''descriptive'' than ''relational''. Like couldn't ''fish'' just be a term that refers to water breathing vertebrates as a superficial description for practical everyday uses? And not be a taxonomic term? the term ''tree'' is similar. It can't be monophyletic without including many plants that most people wouldn't call ''trees''. But, can't ''tree'' just mean ''big woody plants'' and not have taxonomic meaning?

[@rayvnekieron8587]

The issue with the definition "water breathing vertebrates" is that you would be including things like axolotls and Sirenidae, which most folks would not consider to be fish.

[@arandolph846]

Excellent content that I didn't know about. I do have a request though: can you cite sources please? This accomplishes a few things 1) we know where to look for more information 2) our trust for information provided is no longer reliant on our trust of you but on the trust of your sources. Generally, I find your prior stated credentials sufficient, but some things like things stated in this video are REALLY surprising! How did we learn that trout are more closely related to us than cartilaginous fish? What evidence do we have?

[@miketufaro5915]

Remember that hp Lovecraft story about that deserted island with all those fish people that worshipped Dagon? I wish he could have seen this video. Lol nah but for real great job Clint this wa fascinating and very thought provoking

[@sleddog3092]

I thin this just means our current classifications are imperfect

[@SomeGal6637]

No, it means that the term "fish" is unscientific, referring to multiple groups of animals and only some members of certain groups. We basically took anything that looks similar and called it fish, which is not how classifying life works.

[@jjoohhhnn]

I agree, clades are usually refered to by their scientific name, like actinopterygii instead of Ray finned fish, or osteichthyes instead of boney fish. Boney fish is a linean or common term and isn't used in phylogenetic taxonomy.

[@sharkestry1119]

they are perfect i am fishman

[@andrewminczeski8528]

What a great example of the necessity of embracing philosophy within science! Alaska is more closely related to Siberia than to the rest of the United States, therefore Alaska is also Russia.

[@liammurphy2725]

Nyet it's not.

[@thanatos454]

Apparently, we are ALL Old Greg. What a twist.

[@lindsyfish6704]

I want to take some of your university-level classes, Clint! I'm satisfied with these tiny classes because the last bio course I took was 20ish years ago. So I have a lot to catch up on!

[@dan_e]

Good strategy to bring extra light and views to this video bouncing it off of your latest video which is also a cat video. The great to KZbin algorithm looks fondly upon cats.

[@JordanBeagle]

I love the terrariums in the background

Thank you Clint for all the great videos! One question really bugs me: "the trout is closer related to us than to the white shark": isn't that an oversimplification? It feels counterintuitive, and I also see a logical problem there. Maybe the trout and the shark are not the best examples, as I guess cartilagenous and bony fish are indeed quite different, but to claim that the lamprey is closer related to humans than to the hagfish seems like kind of reductio ad absurdum. I mean, look at these two jawless fish... I think to define "relatedness" in a way that is more meaningful you have to take mutation rates and ecology into account. For example leaving the water and living on land will kind of dramatically estrange your species from your close relatives that still live in the ocean, it will obviously do a great change to your species' phenotype and possibly genotype(?). But in the phylogenetic tree it makes as much a difference as the split between hagfish and lamprey. Would it not be more helpful to quantify "genetic distances" (at least in living species) or something like "the amount of morphological change" (I see the problem with subjectivity here...) in extinct species to give some meaning to the length of the branches and the distance between the nodes of the phylogenetic tree? And then draw something like concentric circles around a species to define "relatedness"? My phylogeny knowledge is nearly exclusively based on Clint's content, so maybe this is utter nonsense or impossible or an outdated debate in professional circles. But I find it interesting. For example take some very early dinosaur, I don't know, Herrerasaurus or something even older/more basal. Of course it has a more recent ancestor with modern birds than with crocodiles. Maybe it even IS the bird's ancestor... But if it lived in close temporal proximity to the split between the ancestors of birds and crocodiles and the crocodiles' line would not change that much genetically and physically over the next 200 mio years or so whereas the evolution of birds would encompass several drastic changes: would that not make the very basal dinosaur more closely related to crocodiles than to birds in a way? I know that there are no living fossils and I've read that coelacanths do not have a small mutation rate and that a similar body plan does not mean genetic similarity, convergent evolution and so on. But does on the other hand a dramatic change in appearance or behaviour not require a substantial amount of genetic change? And thus create a big distance in "relatedness" if you understand it as something like "genetic similarity"? Is the lamprey's genome really more similar to the human genome than to the hagfish's genome? I guess I need something like a Clint for genetics... 😂

[@valenshyy]

i finally understand my deep longing for the ocean & love of swimming lol

[@gemmachaos]

Hang on, so dolphins and whales are fish after all? All these years of being pedantic and correcting people! Turns out I wasn't pedantic enough.

[@astrogecko1650]

Only if you define fish as a monophyletic group, which in common parlance they are not

[@barry6129]

Incredible

[@sampagano205]

I'm just waiting for notable phylogenetics crank Dave Peters to find this video and starts a fight about one of his newer crazy theories that Hagfish are actually the largest kind of nematode. He basically picks a fight with anyone who posts anything that doesn't line up with his proposed vertebrate tree where mammals are a kind of archosaur, pterodactyls are lepidosaurs, whales are polyphyletic, and a bunch of other wild things.

[@FrankenSlug]

I love videos like these. 😁

[@JustAWalkingFish]

Crazy how that works lol

[@sierrasicard4593]

This video came out suspiciously close to when the movie "Luca" was released 🤔

[@brawlholic9960]

If it were up to me, I would choose the word "reptile" to be synonymous with Amniotes rather than a groop of Sauropsids(Eureptilia), because the first Amniotes and Synapsids were very reptilian in appearance. Also if you think about it logically the clade Reptiliomorpha to which the Amniote group belongs means "reptile-like". For those who don't know, the Reptiliomorpha were a group of tetrapods more closely related to amniotes than say temnospodils or lysamphibians. Amniotes were within this clade (Reptiliomopha). The first Amniotes were split between Sauropsids and Synapsids. A Reptiliomorph sister clade to Amniotes was the Diadectomorphs, creatures very reptilian in appearance but probably had an amphibian breeding lifestyle as well as other amphibian anatomical features. ''morpha'' in Greek mean (appearance or form) and the definition of the word reptile means an animal that crawls. Its an other Greek word ''Ερπετο'', ''Erpeto''. The word ''Serpent'' whitch later become ''Reptile'' came from that and is a synonim of the word Snake which means literally in Greek ''Crawls'' or ''Crawling''. So, the definition of the word reptile(based on the old scientific model of two or more centuries ago) means an animal that crawls, cold-blooded that lay eggs. The ancestors of modern mammals and modern Eureptilia were the first amniotes, animals that crawls, laying eggs on land and are scaly which is the definition of a Reptile. So, Let's pretend for now that the word reptile doesn't belong to a group of sauropsids (Eureptilia). I'm only saying that we could use it as synonym word(Which practically mean when someone refers to an animal as a reptile it also mean that refers to it as an amniote. So, In my point of view both Mammals and modern Eureptilia are Reptiles because they evolved from such ancestors(*amniotes*). Ofcourse that also means to make some aggressive changes to the whole catalogue of cladistic names in the process starting with the clade (Eureptilia) for example. We can't in my hypothetical example use the term reptile inside a clade that is very far inside the cladistic tree of amniotes. An alternative for Eureptilia could be a hypothetical name such as ''Diapsidomorpha'' and for Parareptiles an alternative name such as ''Anapsidomorpha'' etc.. To sum up, What I proposed here is an alternative naming of things, and I do not compromise/jeopardise the current view of the evolution or characteristics/traits of all these organisms. I change the names, not the essence, because the name/word ‘’Mammal’’ for example, literally indicates something about this particular group of organisms, in contrast the word ‘’Reptile’’(and ‘’Amphibian’’ and ''Fish'' respectively) indicates nothing. It is a general term(Reptiles) that fits to many many different groops of amniotes old ones and modern ones. I've already addressed the linguistics reasons

[@se6369]

Although I agree, you can't change scientific names like that, even if they're illogical, right? And Reptilia (but not necessarily the common English word 'reptiles') has to follow Laurenti's definition from 1768, since oldest names take precidence. I think

[@Vandalia1998]

Two things. 1.) We may not be Reptiles but we and all Synapsids as well as Diapsid are all Reptilamorphs 2.) in the “Fish” phylogenetic Cladogram were the Hagfishs or the Lampreys on the closer branch in your illustration?

[@AllanTidgwell]

Hagfish are the most distantly related Lamprey are a more recent lineage

[@nicoleholte9486]

If I'm going to be a fish, I want to be a loach. Maybe a ropefish. Also, perhaps Clint's Reptiles could do a video on ropefish and their cool semi-aquatic behavior.

[@vansnakenstein5149]

Medical doctors are just hyper-specialized ichthyological veterinarians.

[@AllanTidgwell]

Yes

[@Dodl1]

Yeeeesss, I always knew I was a fish! 🐟🐠😁

[@shamik_sathe]

Well, seems like i gotta gwt to the water.

[@Jotto999]

When people use the word fish, they are usually referring to a cluster of traits. Like the word "tree" which does not conform to a specific group of plants. Your attempt to force it into a geneological context made this feel more tedious and frustrating than it needed to be. If we meant something geneological, we can use a word suited for that context. I just don't see the point in trying to force "fish" into this context.

[@CricketsMa]

How interesting! Hagfish of reptiles 😂 What a funny thought!

[@AllanTidgwell]

We're not. We are to reptiles as birds are to dinosaurs. Synapsids evolved from reptile ancestors so they are still reptiles Clint said reptile means diapsid. Reptile actually means Amniote

[@SomeGal6637]

This whole fish issue is because people name things based on how they look, not what they are fundamentally. Coelacanths, sharks and lung "fish" look similar to ray finned fish. Classifying these things as fish essentially makes the term "fish" useless because it makes most of the animals we see fish. Which means that in my opinion coelacanths, lung fish, and sharks need to be excluded from being fish.

[@Madchris8828]

Ahh this is why we are just big dumb dolphins who can't swim well 😂

[@pkonneker]

Okay, welp. I'm a fish. Cool.

[@mayafantana5310]

I'm a fish 🐠 weeeeeeeee🦈🐟

[@wcdeich4]

Or you could group everything descended from the last common ancestor of humans & hagfish as "vertebrates" & leave "fish" as a paraphyletic grouping of aquatic vertebrates that never evolved to be terrestrial. Just saying it could work too

[@TacticusPrime]

But paraphyletic groups are worthless nonsense that should never be used by anyone.

[@talkingmudcrab718]

Dolphins: So long and thanks for all the ... Whatever the herring are...

[@AllanTidgwell]

The herring are fish. Just because dolphins are also fish that doesn't change that herring are fish

[@Hinds57ketchup]

Okay, so I have a question then. Humans are fish, but not Reptiles, because of the Synapsid, Diapsid split. But are Humans (and Reptiles for that matter) Amphibians? Or was there some older split between Amphibians and Synapsids/Diapsids? If so what group would Synapsids/Diapsids be under?

[@orangeanarchy235]

There was a split between Amphibians and Synapsid/Diapsids, and the latter group are called Amniotes

[@se6369]

​@@orangeanarchy235are you sure you don't mean lissamphibians? I'm pretty sure all tetropods are technically amphibians? Our ancestors laid eggs in water. I also would call mammals reptiles, though for totally arbitary reasons (nothing is preventing them from saying all amniotes or all reptilomorphs are reptiles), most scientists say mammals are not reptiles these days

[@lindsyfish6704]

This human is definitely a Fish!

[@Qaos]

I'm a fish, 'n' I want my gills.

[@AllanTidgwell]

You already had them. They developed between 3 and 4 weeks. Then they developed further into your jaw and ears

[@lunaticwhyamihere476]

Blub blub 🐟

[@raphlvlogs271]

are birds reptiles?

[@clintexplains5327]

Yes. We explain why in this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/b4ebg2p8drl3itE

[@DFX2KX]

Yep, Birds are Reptiles, Birds are also dinosaurs!

[@andreydupreez6370]

But are cheetahs the hagfish of cats? and are giant pandas the hagfish of bears? This all assuming hagfish are the hagfish of vertebrates...

[@HEATPACK-reptiles]

Shipping Warmers Heat Pack - for Fish, Plants, Retiles and Baby Chicks kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6HLo3Rvfaeci5osi=xKTtIF9CMphbgrWM

[@timapiepgrass8702]

Do sharks have to be fish?

[@clintexplains5327]

Nope!

[@RS14988]

This is all very interesting, but what about the claim from the biologist Stephen Jay Gould who spend a lifetime studying fish to determine that technically speaking, there is no such thing as a fish? There are many creatures in the sea that we call fish but are not (jellyfish, starfish, cuttlefish, crayfish etc) which could suggest that the word "Fish" has no biological or etymological meaning. What say you to that? Turns out we may not even be fish but what we call fish are not fish either :P

[@clintexplains5327]

If those other "fish" are part of the group, then "fish" are almost every animal on the planet.

[@RS14988]

@@clintexplains5327 Good point, as always :D

[@AllanTidgwell]

Then "fish" is another word for animalia and therefore is a synonym for Animal. That becomes the etymological meaning

[@imfinnriss8569]

I am so confused :P

[@lindsyfish6704]

Also? I feel great about being a fish! Hee!

[@AllanTidgwell]

Reptile does not refer to diapsid. It refers to amniota. You are a fish and you are a reptile

[@eonarose]

Everything is fish.

[@AllanTidgwell]

No. Every chordate is a fish. But not everything is a chordate

[@8h8_illustrates]

Humans make terrible fish then.

[@AllanTidgwell]

Or we're highly specialized fish who make amazing humans

[@RasmusKarlJensen]

This just kinda renders the terms mammal, fish, and reptile useless. Good video though.

[@AllanTidgwell]

Your assessment is false If I say to you everything with a spinal chord is a chordate that doesn't make the term chordate useless. Fish have spinal chords and so do you so the classification for both still holds The same applies to Amniota (reptile) Heck, you are a heterotrophic eukariote (animal) this is why you are not a plant of a fungi. The fact that there are lots of different heterotrophic eukaryotes doesn't mean that the word animal is meaningless, it means there are a lot of animals You seem to be stuck thinking in Linnaen paraphyletic terms