Summary
Well, you know how it is with the stories we tell kids. We leave a few things out of that birds-and-bees yarn. The truth is that many bees don't have daddies. Neither do some birds. It's called parthenogenesis -- literally, virgin birth. We're finding more and more animals that can reproduce this way, and we're learning how to engineer it in others. We're even tinkering with mommy-daddy procreation in humans. If you think sex is kinky, wait till you see the alternatives.
For explaining everyday life -- babies, puppies, puberty -- the mommy-daddy story of procreation works fine. But at life's edges, conventional biology, like conventional physics, breaks down. As you approach the speed of light, time slows and distances shrink. And as you approach extinction, genes find new ways to pass themselves on. Scientists call it "reproductive plasticity." A shark's got to do what a shark's got to do.We're not there yet, but we're on the way. Two years ago, British officials authorized human procreation using sperm, nuclear DNA from one woman, and mitochondrial DNA from a second woman. Three weeks ago, they proposed legislation that would approve the creation, for research, of "a human embryo that has been altered by the introduction of any sequence of nuclear or mitochondrial DNA of an animal." The categories we've always taken for granted -- mommy, daddy, people, animals -- are blurring.See the full content of this document
Extract
Who's Your Daddy?
For some animals, the answer is no one
By William SaletanIT'S time to talk about the birds and the bees.No, I don't mean sex. You've already heard that story: Boy meets girl, sperm meets egg, a baby grows in Mommy's tummy. That's the way of all flesh. Or so y...See the full content of this document
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