TUD - The Theory Of Unintelligent Design

The intelligent designer, if there is one, sure seems to have gotten confused when it came to reproduction in animals and plants. We are all familiar with sexual reproduction, but many organisms use asexual reproduction. Some even use both sexual and asexual reproduction at different times. Most asexual reproductive strategies result in offspring that are clones of the parent (horror). Some species that use parthenogenesis reproduction (there are no males in these species) have females that act like a male and have simulated sex with another female (horror of horrors). In species that use gynogenesis, there are no males, but females must mate with males of another species, although these males contribute no genetic material to the offsprint. Did the intelligent designer have trouble getting the details of reproduction worked out, or is he/she just a little kinky?

Wikipedia, the user built web encyclopedia, is amazing. If you haven’t used it, you should. The scientific discussion below was mostly copied from Wikipedia. You can use the links to further explore this interesting subject.

There are several methods of asexual reproduction including binary fission. Asexual plants also use: regeneration, vegetative reproduction, and spore formation. (from Wikipedia, Reproduction)

Parthenogenesis (Partheno-genesis from the Greek παρθενος, "virgin", + γενεσις, "birth") means the growth and development of an embryo or seed without fertilization by a male. Parthenogenesis occurs naturally in some lower plants (called agamospermy), invertebrates (e.g. water fleas, aphids) and some vertebrates (e.g. lizards, salamanders, some fish, and even turkeys). (from Wikipedia, Parthenogenesis)

A form of asexual reproduction related to parthenogenesis is gynogenesis. In gynogenesis, offspring are produced by the same mechanism as in parthenogenesis, but with the requirement that the egg be stimulated by the presence of sperm in order to develop. However, the sperm cell does not contribute any genetic material to the offspring. Since gynogenetic species lack males, activation of the egg requires mating with males of a closely related species. (from Wikipedia, Parthenogenesis)

In hybridogenesis reproduction is not completely asexual but instead hemiclonal, with half the genome passing intact to the next generation while the other half is replaced. In hybridogenetic species, females mate with males and both individuals contribute genetic material to the offspring. But when the female offspring produce their own eggs, the eggs contain no genetic material from their father; instead the eggs contains an exact copy of the chromosomes those offspring got from their own mother. This process continues, so that each generation is half (or hemi-) clonal on the mother's side and half new genetic material from the father's side. (from Wikipedia, Parthenogenesis)

# posted by LogicalOne @ 2:57 PM