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Can't a guy just be curious? (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/funny@lemmy.world
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[–] 13 points 2 years ago (8 children)

Assuming a liberal definition of fish (I doubt this guy cares about scientific classifications), that would be a blue whale

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  • [–] 14 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    I would like to know where you could reasonably buy a blue whale. That would be amazing.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    Just like to point out, there is no scientific definition of fish. It doesn't make sense from a evolutionary perspective (many types of fish are evolved from land animals and vice versa).

    However if you categorize it as animals that with gills, you lose a bunch of animals typically considered fish like several species of amphibious fish, while including many animals not typically considered fish, like several frogs. Then there is of course lungfish with both lungs and gills, and fish with other breathing organs entirely.

    Many biologist therefore argue that even whales should be considered fish despite being mammals, i don't remember the exact reasoning though, but i think it's related to evolution and the clade(s) they belong to.

    Sorry for pulling the "um ashtuly" card, just a big autistic nerd.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    Land animals are land fish. You can not evolve out of a clade, therefore all land creatures are cladistically a type of fish, as well as land animals that became water animals again.

    I'm a fish, you're a fish, we're all fish. And worms!

    If the subset of cladists that don't think that's true have a problem with it they should reconsider whether they actually like cladistics, because they're rejecting evolution to deny it and embracing vibe based classification which kind of defeats the whole point.

    But, of course, that's the thing with clades, it's all relative. Yes, we're all fish/worms, but generally speaking when someone's talking about fish vs whales you know they're talking about those loser fish who never left the ocean vs the land chads who went back to the ocean solely to bully them because the distinction is useful.

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