In each of the images below; the red circles are the species (or genera) included in the assemblage, the white circles are not included. The pink bars are just to highlight the lineages present in the assemblage. I wrote this page out of the frustration I was feeling because of a troll in my favorite usenet newsgroup. He seemed to finally understand the definitions after I made mention of this page.
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A group composed of a collection of organisms, the most recent common ancestor of all those organisms, and all the descendants of that most recent common ancestor. A monophyletic assemblage is also called a clade.
Examples : Mammalia, Aves, obligate biped primates, etc. |
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A group composed of a collection of organisms and the most recent common ancestor of all those organisms. Does not include all the descendants of the most recent common ancestor. Example : Traditionally defined Dinosauria |
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A group composed of a collection of organisms in which the most recent common ancestor of all the included organisms is not included. Examples : marine mammals, bipedal mammals, flying vertebrates, swimming amniotes, etc. |
I've used the newsgroup sci.bio.paleontology and the web site "UCMP Glossery of Natural History Terms" for my information in constructing this page.