Sex: do we really need it?

Australian Broadcasting Corporation Science ^ | Tuesday, 8 July 2003 | Wilson da Silva in Melbourne

[I_dmc]

Sex: do we really need it?

Wilson da Silva in Melbourne

ABC Science Online

 

 

Birds do it, bees do it, humans do it - but nobody knows why sex evolved at all, the world congress of genetics heard in Melbourne today.

"The evolution of sex has presented a paradox to evolutionary biology for over a century," said Associate Professor Sally Otto, an evolutionary biologist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, to delegates attending the 19th International Congress of Genetics.

"It's known there are a lot of costs to reproducing sexually. Why make sons and males, if you could just produce females that were able to reproduce by themselves? That's a division of resources into two sexes that seems unnecessary," she said.

Not only does this seem to waste resources, the whole process is prone to failure. There's the risk of not finding a mate, and the risk of getting a disease during mating. There's also a more subtle risk: if an individual reaches reproduction age and finds a mate, it is a successful genotype - a tried and true model of a species. But then that individual mixes their genotype with a mate, with no guarantee that the mixture is going to be any better.

[I_dmc]

From the Why Do We Do What We Do Dept...

[Mr. Jeeves]

Why make sons and males, if you could just produce females that were able to reproduce by themselves?

The NOW platform in a nutshell.

[Little Ray]

'Cause you'd lack the genetic variation that would allow new traids to be developed and re-inforced, and you would be unable to transmit successful traits through the population.

[Maceman]

Not only does this seem to waste resources, the whole process is prone to failure. There's the risk of not finding a mate, and the risk of getting a disease during mating. There's also a more subtle risk: if an individual reaches reproduction age and finds a mate, it is a successful genotype - a tried and true model of a species. But then that individual mixes their genotype with a mate, with no guarantee that the mixture is going to be any better.

For some reason, this paragraph makes me think of the way Demeocrats and the main stream media criticize the obviously successful war in Iraq.

[Abe Froman]

Because God wanted husbands and wives to have a good time.

[joesnuffy]

'Cause you'd lack the genetic variation that would allow new traids to be developed and re-inforced, and you would be unable to transmit successful traits through the population.

Like syphylis? :)

[Pan_Yans Wife]

It sounds like they are extremely frustrated.

[Lost Highway]

Why make sons and males, if you could just produce females that were able to reproduce by themselves?

Because there would be no one to kill the spiders.

[Hank Rearden]

Nope. We have Dove bars.

[Snowy]

Because there would be no one to kill the spiders.

LOL!

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[Billthedrill]

You can live for years without sex. I am living proof.

[XJarhead]

Why make sons and males, if you could just produce females that were able to reproduce by themselves? That's a division of resources into two sexes that seems unnecessary," she said

I cannot believe a person with those academic credentials could ask such a stupid question. The genetic variation and natural selection argument seemingly cuts that to ribbons.

[UseYourHead]

Speaking of evolving...

Her web page: http://www.zoology.ubc.ca/~otto/

[Cobra64]

What is a "Dove bar"? As in Dove soap?

[Conspiracy Guy]

Why shouldn't the amoeba be the highest life form. Seems their intelligence is equal to these scientists. God made so many mistakes. These people can straighten all that out.

[r9etb]

'Cause you'd lack the genetic variation that would allow new traids to be developed and re-inforced, and you would be unable to transmit successful traits through the population.

If that's the case, then how did sex evolve in the first place?

That's the paradox, see?

[r9etb]

I cannot believe a person with those academic credentials could ask such a stupid question. The genetic variation and natural selection argument seemingly cuts that to ribbons.

I cannot believe that somebody as smart as you can't see the problem. If sex evolved, how could it evolve without some means of transmissible genetic variation?

[theDentist]

"...nobody knows why sex evolved at all"

Bwahahaha... all that "brilliance" and they can't figure it out.

[CommandoFrank]

Hey, I need some right now!!!!!!!!!!!!