Sunday, March 21, 2004
Brave New World in the making?
I wonder if this could possibly be an evolutionary trend that could extend to other species. It would be a different version of the Brave New World that always frightened me if applied to humans (although the queen-thing doesn't seem too bad, he, he!).
"Finding a mate can be difficult. But at least we only have one other sex to worry about." I don't think the author considered bisexuals. . .but thinking science, I had to remember that a mate is defined as associating with another to propagate the species.
"Pity, then, Pogonomyrmex. These ants are, in effect, the first organism to have evolved more than two sexes. . .Pogonomyrmex has gone a step further down the path of interdependence by institutionalizing different roles in the genes. . .colony-founding queens must mate with a male of their own genetic strain to produce queens and need sperm from males of another strain to produce workers. . .as far as the superorganism is concerned, one male and one female may not be enough."
-5 March 2004 Vol.303:1464 SCIENCE magazine
"Finding a mate can be difficult. But at least we only have one other sex to worry about." I don't think the author considered bisexuals. . .but thinking science, I had to remember that a mate is defined as associating with another to propagate the species.
"Pity, then, Pogonomyrmex. These ants are, in effect, the first organism to have evolved more than two sexes. . .Pogonomyrmex has gone a step further down the path of interdependence by institutionalizing different roles in the genes. . .colony-founding queens must mate with a male of their own genetic strain to produce queens and need sperm from males of another strain to produce workers. . .as far as the superorganism is concerned, one male and one female may not be enough."
-5 March 2004 Vol.303:1464 SCIENCE magazine
