Re: Origin of female

On Mon, 10 Dec 2007 03:11:42 GMT, John Harshman
<jharshman.diespamdie@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

r norman wrote:

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 16:26:14 -0600, Ferrous Patella
<FerrousPatella@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Lauren <laurenh@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in news:d8f1eb29-4f63-4644-88c4-
898f222cb9cc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:


Not so long ago I read a post in one of the threads in this group
giving an explanation how the original cells of abiogenesis split to
form what is now known as the first female. I can not find it again.
Will someone please help me find it? If the original poster sees this,
please help me to find it. If someone can put me on track to find
something similar, I shall be very grateful.
Tnx,
Lauren


I think females are like atheists. The concept would not exist if it
weren't for males/theists. Life was happily reproducing before genders came
along. Even sexual recombination was possible without sexual dimorphism
(see earthworms). So I see the whole baby-carrying state as being the
default mode (again like atheism) until someone comes up with this bizarre
divisive concept to mess with our heads.


Sorry about the blank post ---

You are sort of wrong about earthworms. They are fully sexual, with
male and female sex organs and produce fully functional sperm and
eggs. It is just that they, like very many other organisms,
especially plants, have single individuals that carry both male and
female parts. Some the individual is not sexually dimorphic, but the
organs or distinctly sexual in morph. Still, they have aspects that
are distinctly male and other aspects that are distinctly female.

There are, indeed, eukaryotes like Chlamydia who go through full
sexual reproduction: fertilization (or, more technically, syngamy) and
meiosis, with no morphological distinction at all between different
sexes (although there is a biochemical-molecular biological
distinction between mating groups).

But more fundamentally, as you indeed suggest, the real question is
not the origin of 'female' but rather the origin of 'male'.

I wouldn't say that. It's more the origin of distinct gender
reproductive cells, one (the egg/megaspore/whatever) specialized to
provide nutrients to an embryo and the other (the
sperm/pollen/microspore) specialized to move around and find eggs. You
don't get one without the other (you can lose the male, but all such
cases are secondary loss as far as I know).

I must protest. In cases of syngamy, where the two gametes seem
indistinguishable, they each look like and act like the egg form
stuffed with appropriate nutrients and with all the organelles and
cytoplasmic structures necessary for complete development. The sperm
is lacking in all of that. Two eggs can fertilize each other with the
development of a new diploid individual; two sperm cannot.

I would guess that sexual reproduction first arose through the
development of alternating haploid and diploid states, alternating
occurrences of syngamy and meiosis within the complete life cycle.
That is true "sexual reproduction" without any sign of separate sexes.
Only later did the differentiation of gametes into nutritive and
developmental vs. motile occur which probably happened with the
specialization of the sperm from what was originally a nutritive and
developmental precursor, that is, the development of "male". And only
later still did the differentiation occur to produce an organ to
produce sperm (testes or antheridium) separate from one to produce
eggs (ovary or archegonium). The final step is a whole individual
that is exclusively male vs. one exclusively female.

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Origin of female
    ... form what is now known as the first female. ... distinction between mating groups). ... sperm/pollen/microspore) specialized to move around and find eggs. ... like sperm too, in having some means of motility. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Origin of female
    ... form what is now known as the first female. ... distinction between mating groups). ... sperm/pollen/microspore) specialized to move around and find eggs. ... like sperm too, in having some means of motility. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Ancistrus eggs
    ... Yes lots of bogwood with plants growing on. ... The male seems to be playing no part, but the female is now hiding ... The eggs are laid on ...
    (uk.rec.aquaria.misc)
  • Re: Gaywood S2E8 Pregnant, or Welshbirds Wedding, or Bump in the Night, or Alienpsychobitch
    ... males produce sperm to ferilize the eggs with. ... into the male, who then fertilises them and carries them to term. ... conclude that the other shapeshifter is a female since her part has ...
    (rec.arts.drwho)
  • Re: Gaywood S2E8 Pregnant, or Welshbirds Wedding, or Bump in the Night, or Alienpsychobitch
    ... males produce sperm to ferilize the eggs with. ... into the male, who then fertilises them and carries them to term. ... conclude that the other shapeshifter is a female since her part has ...
    (rec.arts.drwho)