Source: /cirosantilli/taxonomic-rank

= Taxonomic rank
{wiki}

Naming taxonomic ranks like <genus>, <domain (biology)>, etc. is a fucking waste of time, only useful before we developed <molecular biology>.

All that matters is the tree of <clades> with examples of species in each clade, and common characteristics shared by the clade.

And with <molecular biology>, we can build those trees incredibly well for <extant> species. When <extinct> species are involved however, things get more complicated.