Cladistics

Real World Example

Imagine trying to organize a family reunion where you need to decide who sits next to whom based on how closely related they are. This situation is similar to cladistics, where scientists organize species by tracing them back to a common ancestor. Just as you might seat family members by following the branches of your family tree to find the closest relatives, cladistics groups organisms by following evolutionary branches to identify those that share a more recent common ancestor, helping to create a biological "seating chart" based on shared lineage.