Data from: Rapid radiations underlie most of the known diversity of life

Abstract: Adaptive radiations and other rapid radiations are of considerable interest to evolutionary biologists, in large part because they are thought to underlie much of the species diversity of life. Yet, this fundamental idea has only been tested at a limited scale, within frogs. Here, we test this idea across living organisms and within many of the largest clades (e.g., animals, plants). Specifically, we quantify how much species richness is contained in clades with high net diversification rates. We find that among the major clades of living organisms and among land plant phyla and animal phyla, >80% of known species richness is contained within the few clades that are in the upper 90th percentile for diversification rates in each group. Thus, these exceptionally rapid radiations contain most of Earth's extant species diversity. Patterns were broadly similar using smaller clades (orders, families), with the majority of species generally contained within clades in the upper 75th percentile. We found similar patterns among major clades of insects and vertebrates, with clades with above-average diversification rates encompassing >95% of species in each group. Overall, these results show for the first time that most of the known species richness of life is explained by rapid radiations.