From https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~chazelle/linernotes.html

 In the world of algorithms, it is useful to distinguish among three types 
of recursion: binary search gives you the non-branching kind; quicksort 
gives you the no-clone branching sort (no data replication); linear 
selection (median finding) gives you the cloning branching variety (with 
data replication). This last flavor is the tastiest of them all because it 
features two competing exponential growths (as in fractional cascading). 
Confession time: I've always had a weakness for linear selection and its 
sky-high coolness-to-simplicity ratio. I'll admit that RSA and FFT have 
enviable ratios, too, but both owe their sparkle to algebra whereas median 
finding is pure algorithmic sizzle. Just as Hume is said to have 
interrupted Kant's "dogmatic slumber," so linear selection interrupted the 
sorting snoozefest I once endured in Algorithms 101.