Difference between root canal and endodontic extraction? How is the distinction made by definition?

Root canal therapy is to be categorized into two types, root canal therapy for teeth with living pulp and root canal therapy for teeth with dead pulp.

Root canal treatment of a tooth with living pulp involves removing the pulp from the tooth under local anesthesia or killing the pulp with medication, enlarging and disinfecting the root canal, and then filling the canal with root canal filling. Root canal treatment for dead pulp teeth (or even periapical periodontitis) omits the pulpotomizing/pulp-killing step and instead is an open drainage ......

And the pulpotomizing that you're talking about is just one step in the oversharpening of the root canal...