"Anon."  wrote in
message news:bnjht2$2dd3$1{at}darwin.ediacara.org...
> TWINBLUE wrote:
> >>is it the case that the divisions into gender is as
close as you>can get,
> >
> > evolutionary speaking, to something inevitable?>
> >
> > While there may be other solutions to the
> > problem of genitic diversity and evolution
> > I would expect that where ever you find life
> > you will find sex. Since more than two varities of sex
would be a bit unhandy
> > evolutionwise you would likely find most
> > creatures in the universe that are large enough to see
with the naked eye are
> > divided into "male" and "female".
> >
> What's wrong with a single sex?  I think you have to start
by asking why
> most sexual organisms have multiple mating types (there -
my solution to
> the sex/gender semantic debate!  Do as mycologists do!),
and then you
> can go on to ask about the specialisation of mating types
into
> differentiable sexes.
>
> Bob

I'm not sure what your point is exactly--but then I'm not
much of a mycologist. :) As a former chemist I'm not even
sure what you mean by "multiple mating types"--isn't that
just an analog of "sexes?" Do you mean multiple "modes" of
having sex or multiple ways (techniques?) of transferring
genetic material?

One thing which is obvious in my non-expert observation of
sexual vs nonsexual creatures: only sexual creatures fall
into the class of what I'd call "complex" life (and what are
generally the most commonly used definitions of same.) I
wonder what the general opinion is that sexuality is a
prerequisite for bio-complexity (and possibly, resultant
intelligence,) or if it plays little or no role in evolution
of complex life. BTW, I'm excluding for the moment,
aggregates of biological units in considering complexity
(e.g., hives/nests, slime molds, etc.) although such are
certainly pertinent with regard to semantics in the
definitions of bio-compleity.            ...tonyC

> -- 
> Bob O'Hara
>
> Rolf Nevanlinna Institute
> P.O. Box 4 (Yliopistonkatu 5)
> FIN-00014 University of Helsinki
> Finland
> Telephone: +358-9-191 23743
> Mobile: +358 50 599 0540
> Fax:  +358-9-191 22 779
> WWW:  http://www.RNI.Helsinki.FI/~boh/
>
>
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