Fish

Fish

A fish is any member of a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic craniate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups. Most fish are ectothermic ("cold-blooded"), allowing their body temperatures to vary as ambient temperatures change, though some of the large active swimmers like white shark and tuna can hold a higher core temperature. Fish are abundant in most bodies of water. They can be found in nearly all aquatic environments, from high mountain streams (e.g., char and gudgeon) to the abyssal and even hadal depths of the deepest oceans (e.g., gulpers and anglerfish). At 32,000 species, fish exhibit greater species diversity than any other group of vertebrates.

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Famous quotes containing the word fish:

    The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls
    Are their males’ subjects and at their controls:
    Man, more divine, the master of all these,
    Lord of the wide world and wild watery seas,
    Indued with intellectual sense and souls,
    Of more pre-eminence than fish and fowls,
    Are masters to their females, and their lords:
    Then let your will attend on their accords.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

    Reason is a supple nymph, and slippery as a fish by nature. She had as leave give her kiss to an absurdity any day, as to syllogistic truth. The absurdity may turn out truer.
    —D.H. (David Herbert)

    Here’s a fish hangs in the net like a poor man’s right in the law; ‘twill hardly come out.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)