RE: Questions about genders ... male/female
November 4, 2014 at 9:04 pm
(This post was last modified: November 4, 2014 at 9:07 pm by Aractus.)
(November 4, 2014 at 6:14 pm)Reader Wrote: Greetings!That's an excellent question, and also
I'm new here, so I'll add a short reason why I am asking this question on this forum.
I teach worldviews classes to high schoolers. We cover Secularism, Postmodernism, Islam, New Spirituality, Christianity and Marxism. Within each worldview we cover each discipline of theology, philosophy, history, economics, sociology, ethics, biology, psychology, law and politics and how they differ across the board.
We are currently in the biology unit ... and I've pondered this question from an atheistic evolutionary viewpoint for a bit ... and I can't seem to find an answer.
So, I thought I would post here to see if you all could offer some insight.
Why do we only have two genders, male and female? [excluding asexual animal reproduction] ... just humans and almost all animals? Why only two? Why not ... say ... seven, or seven-thousand? If we have evolved over time from a single celled organism ... why did we only evolve into two genders and not more? Why did it stop at two? Thanks for your time.
to the forums.The reason for two is genetic mixing - i.e. you get 50% of your genes from your father and 50% from your mother. There's no need for more than two genders because each generation mixes those genes more and more (by not exclusively practising incest).
The other reason I can think of is DNA itself - it's made up of pairs of chromosomes, in our case (as humans) we have 23 pairs. The sex chromosome is what determines gender - so two X chromosomes produces female and an XY produces male, in humans anyway. In birds it's the opposite - ZW is female and ZZ is male.
Anyway, because we have pairs of chromosomes one of each pair comes from each parent (and is uniquely made up from their original two pairs, except for the paternal sex chromosome which is passed on unchanged). You can't really have more than two genders give an equal participation in the genes, but two genders works perfectly with the system for the parents to each have equal 50-50 participation of the genes of the offspring.
(November 4, 2014 at 6:25 pm)abaris Wrote: You're forgetting transgenders, my friend. The issue isn't as clear cut as it seems.That doesn't apply to biology.
For Religion & Health see:[/b][/size] Williams & Sternthal. (2007). Spirituality, religion and health: Evidence and research directions. Med. J. Aust., 186(10), S47-S50. -LINK
The WIN/Gallup End of Year Survey 2013 found the US was perceived to be the greatest threat to world peace by a huge margin, with 24% of respondents fearful of the US followed by: 8% for Pakistan, and 6% for China. This was followed by 5% each for: Afghanistan, Iran, Israel, North Korea. -LINK
"That's disgusting. There were clean athletes out there that have had their whole careers ruined by people like Lance Armstrong who just bended thoughts to fit their circumstances. He didn't look up cheating because he wanted to stop, he wanted to justify what he was doing and to keep that continuing on." - Nicole Cooke
The WIN/Gallup End of Year Survey 2013 found the US was perceived to be the greatest threat to world peace by a huge margin, with 24% of respondents fearful of the US followed by: 8% for Pakistan, and 6% for China. This was followed by 5% each for: Afghanistan, Iran, Israel, North Korea. -LINK
"That's disgusting. There were clean athletes out there that have had their whole careers ruined by people like Lance Armstrong who just bended thoughts to fit their circumstances. He didn't look up cheating because he wanted to stop, he wanted to justify what he was doing and to keep that continuing on." - Nicole Cooke
