More Awesome Breakthroughs In YE SCIENCE!

[bloodyrosemccoy]

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I’ve seen this a few times from various sources. Check it out: Female Sperm!

 

In my capacity as a science fiction writer* I am COMPLETELY OPPOSED to this, on account of it’s screwing up my definition of male and female EVEN MORE, GOD DAMMIT. For me, the distinction is simple—if you’re going to use the terms female and male, when you boil away all the extra hormones and secondary characteristics and mechanics and hermaphrodites and culture and whatnot, then you’re left with “females produce ova, and males produce sperm.” With critters like mine, that’s the only distinction you can make, and even that gets really confusing when even more sexes show up.  Now what am I going to do?

 

On the other hand, this would rather help with the problem I’m having with that one character who absolutely refuses to be female, despite the fact that no adult in his species has male sex organs in any way, and he frequently lays eggs.

 

And on the not-sci-fi hand, how cool is this?

 

 

*More or less.

Comments

[ellixis.livejournal.com]

Sex and gender oddities and alternatives fascinate me.

[queenlyzard.livejournal.com]

me too... any books you'd recommend on the topic? I've read a few interesting ones on transgenderism (I don't know if that quite counts as an "oddity", but it's certainly unusual).

it sounds more ranty than I meant, sorry... this is more amused musing

[queenlyzard.livejournal.com]

Wiiildd... and a bit hard to believe. Also, I don't think it poses much danger to the male/female classification system, as it's still something that requires scientific assistance rather than occurring in nature. Well, maybe you're looking at the "science behind the science" more than I am here.

What's odd, though, is while I was reading the article, it's all about how now gay couples can have their very own babies... which, yay! ...but I run into the same feeling of weirdness that I get about fertility science in general. Namely... as a species, we have made this planet unbearably full of ourselves. We are in no danger of having a baby shortage any time in the foreseeable future. In fact, we have rather more babies floating around than people willing/qualified to care for them, never mind about the resources they consume.

And yet, top minds are working out ways for us to have *more* babies, because everyone is still entrenched in this evolutionarily outdated addiction to having one's own personal genetic offspring. Frankly, considering what I've seen of humans, I'm really not sure all of us *should* be breeding. I know a good number of people who shouldn't. So... I always feel a bit weird reading about stuff like this. I mean, intellectually I understand that passing along one's genes is *a great huge life-shattering issue* for many otherwise rational people... but I still don't quite get it, or agree that it should be a critical issue for scientists to work on. Pity they can't instead work on a way of making parents willing to love and raise any offspring, not just their own. That would be a vast improvement to the human race.

Re: it sounds more ranty than I meant, sorry... this is more amused musing

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

I agree 100%.

I don't understand the obsession with A Baby Of My Very Own, especially since we KNOW this world is overpopulated. (I also never really understood why being sterile was such a tragedy, for the same reasons). I've always been amazed that scientists work so hard to figure out how we can have MOAR BABIEZ! when we've kinda got too many already.

I think part of it is that we still have that outdated sense not only of passing on our own genes, but that MAKING a baby is a sign of success right there on its own. (Unless you do it in a socially unacceptable way, of course, like having sex before you've been safely paired off.) There's the sense that "I made it; it's mine!" There's a lot of possessiveness involved, too--even adoptive parents can be pretty crazy about waiting around for the mother to give birth, then whisking the baby away so it can instantly bond with its new mommy. I think it's a case of people believing that the earlier the bond, the more complete it is--and there is no earlier bond than conception.

Then, of course, there's religion--*sigh*.

Add that to the fact that adoption has many things wrong with it--there's the refusal of adoptive parents to consider children who are older/not of their race/"defective" in some way, which leads to subterfuge on the part of people trying to get the kids adopted. There are the cultural difficultires of interracial and international adoption. But the fact remains that even so, there are ids out there who already need homes, and real kids are more important than hypothetical ones. So the emphasis on having more of these hypothetical kids is high.

Re: it sounds more ranty than I meant, sorry... this is more amused musing

[queenlyzard.livejournal.com]

*hugses* Thank you so much for understanding, and agreeing. After a week of arguing about racism at work and having a constant stomach-ache thinking about Issues, it's so wonderful to connect with someone who's on the same wavelength as me.

Also, since I forgot to mention it in my first comment, I'm glad to know I'm not the only girl who listens to "Mambo #5", too :)

Re: it sounds more ranty than I meant, sorry... this is more amused musing

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

I was definitely more excited by the "Hey, look what science can do!" aspect than by the consequences. Sure, it's probably not the BEST idea, but it's cool that we can do it. ;)

Constant issue battles are a pain in the ass.

"Mambo #5" is goofy and fun! It always sounds a little like he's got a big damn group of friends-with-benefits rather than that he's a slimy playa. It's like a less suggestive version of Tom Lehrer's "I Got It From Agnes." ("I love my friends, and they love me, and we're as close as we can be! And just because we really care, whatever we get, we share!")