the specifics of cladistics. For a first approximation I compare it to the textual analysis that classical scholars use to establish the lineages of ancient texts. They analyze them for identifiable descent from older texts. They even have the equivalents to geographic isolation and subsequent remixing that might occur with climate and geologic changes to biological species.

For biology I assume there is a much less subjective methodology than in textual analysis. With texts it is as much art as science. But in both cases I imagine that experience and individual skill have a strong bearing on the lasting or ephemeral nature of the individual's impact on the field.

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