Question

Cladistic classification:Answer
places more weight on certain arbitrarily selected characters of a group of organisms
places weight only on characters unique to a specific taxon
unites groups of taxa into clades based on their possession of shared derived characters

Answer 1

C. unites groups of taxa into clades based on their possession of shared derived characters

Because: Cladistics attempts to classify organisms based on their evolutionary lineage. In a cladistic classification system, a single catagory, known as a clade, contains the most recent common ancestor of all organisms in the clade as well as all organisms decended from that ancestor. The organisms in a single clade may be morphological different, but they share an evolutionary relationship. Organsims that have developed similar morphological characteristics through converent evolution will generally be in different clades.