The supermodel is supposed to have said “Even I don’t wake up looking like Cindy Crawford”, as a response to chatter about all the beautification, and Air-brushing that abounds in the fashion industry.
We know that since that time, the media has intensified its efforts to try to create cases of Body dysmorphic disorder in the population, by continually giving the impression that perfection is normal and that everyone must fit with its one-size fits all digitally enhanced idea of beauty.
By definition, models and especially supermodels are better looking than the average person. But, apparently if you don’t have large breasts, high cheek bones, a good chin, botox injections, large eyes, perfect fingernails, perfect hair, a hairless body, long legs, collagen lips, faultless musculature, an aquiline nose, smooth skin, tanned skin, a flat stomach, porcelain teeth, thin thighs and so on; there must be something terribly wrong with you!
The Americans are especially guilty of this, and using an already enhanced image of the not particularly unattractive Keira Knightley, we can see the additional enhancements made to the image, for the American public.
In the end, the media has made lots of money, and all the stories about people going to extraordinary lengths to look perfect will most likely keep spinning for years to come, despite the fact that we’re all going to end up old, grey and wrinkly at some point in the future.
Posted by Jonathan as Psychology, Sociology at 1:14 PM EDT
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An article in today’s Times2, which seemed mainly to gripe about men’s roles in society, and propose that women are on the whole rather unpleasant; suggested that men prefer to get dumped by women at the end of a relationship. Included in the article was an amusing list of ways to get dumped by a woman. So, dear reader, if you should find yourself in the position of wanting to be dumped, the following tips might be of use to you:
- Leave love letters from old girlfriends on your bedside table
- Never flush the toilet
- Forget her birthday
- Tell her that you don’t believe in marriage (doubly effective if you are married)
- Tell her that you have had a Vasectomy
- When you are patently sober, proposition - or even attempt to smooch with - your partner’s best friend.
- While sitting next to her, send her a text message reading “She’s being a right pain in the a**e today”. Then say out loud: “Sorry, that wasn’t meant for you.”
- Accidentally call her “Gordon” in bed.
- Invite your male friends around for a porn evening. Ask her to cook.
- Ask her who her perfect man is. When she says “Brad Pitt” and asks about your perfect woman, say “the receptionist at work”
Posted by Jonathan as Humour at 12:49 PM EDT
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Permanently removing all your pubic hair improves your sex life, according to a sample of women surveyed by the Cosmetic Physicians Society of Australasia.
Apparently, more than 80% of women who embraced the Brazilian phenomenon had hair lasered off for aesthetic reasons. While 60% claimed hygiene was a factor. Half of the 100 women surveyed claimed that being hairless made them feel sexier, and enhanced their sexual pleasure.
Posted by Jonathan as Miscellaneous at 5:13 PM EDT
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According to a slightly better than usual (they bothered to include a little methodology) publicity puff piece, backed by Prophylactic manufacturers Durex. It seems that the Greeks are having the most regular sex, with 87% of people surveyed claiming to have sex weekly, whilst the poor old Japanese are having the least, with only 34% claiming to have sex weekly. The UK weighs in at a lowly 55%, just beating USA and Nigeria (both 53%)
Full results can be found here.
Posted by Jonathan as Sociology at 4:55 PM EDT
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I find myself having some strange conversations these days; recently I spoke to a lady that lamented the fact that whilst she had hoped to start a relationship, all the gentlemen she had met had used her for sex, and then left her.
This of course is due to the defective information peddled by ‘Dating experts’ (which a casual browse through the titles on offer by Amazon reveals are nearly all written by women). Now, I think it’s fair to say that women have not experienced life from a male perspective, and in the same way, men have not experienced life from a female perspective. Therefore writing a book telling a different sex how they should behave seems like the ultimate in arrogance, to me.
However, I do know this; many women will say they prefer to have attention, music, moonlight, romantic walks, candlelit dinners and a sense of connection etc. first in a relationship; whereas most men would prefer to have sex first. Of course, both sets of activities are enjoyable, and both are important parts of a long term relationship.
Now, a woman might enjoy all the romance etc. without sex, and a man can enjoy sex without romance. But, if you give a woman sex only or a man romance only, neither is likely to be very happy, and the relationship becomes unstable. To put it crudely, a sort of trade takes place in a successful relationship.
So, if a man expects just sex, but doesn’t want to create any romance, then the woman will tend to end up dumping him, because he is a ‘Playa’ using her for sex. And if a woman expects just romance, without sex, then he will tend to end up dumping her, because she is just using him for emotional stimulation.
Intelligent, witty, charming men that understand psychology and can create the right emotions will tend to be very successful with women. And thus, when women choose them, they take a big risk. Whereas if they were looking to stay in a steady relationship, in the way dating experts describe, then they should really choose a geek: after all, geeks tend to be quite clever, most likely have a good job doing things with computers or in accountancy, and will tend to stick to just one woman; and once they do get one, they would do anything they can for her.
Therefore, we can only wonder why, if a woman chooses a ‘Playboy’ or a ‘Playa’, why does she freak out, when she discovers that he also has two or three other girlfriends? Obviously, if a man is ‘good’ with women, then he will in all likelihood have more than one… After all, how do you think he became ‘good’ with women in the first place?
This misunderstanding comes about because of the lies and falsehoods perpetuated by ‘Dating’ guides, such as telling women that they should pretend that they don’t enjoy sex, and they shouldn’t have it until they’ve known a man for some (quite lengthy) period of time. So, a girl that does want to have sex will end up saying that she doesn’t want sex, until the man acts like he wants a relationship with her… However, by that time, it becomes a ‘grudge fuck’ because the girl made the guy jump through so many hoops to have sex with her, when he knew that she wanted to have sex, and she wanted to have sex with him too. But instead, she made him lie to her and act like he was going to be with her after they had sex; when instead, she could have remained a friend (a very special friend, with whom she shared an orgasm or ten). But the Dating guide told her to make him play stupid games, so he ends up ‘fucking a bitch’ instead of making love with a friend.
Posted by Jonathan as Philosophy, Psychology at 12:52 AM EDT
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The Scientific method is a useful tool for modelling new technical skills and acquiring new knowledge, as well as for correcting and integrating previous information. Unfortunately, several times I have spoken to gentlemen who tell me that they should like to meet more women, but their friends seem rather more interested in going out and getting completely drunk than applying a systematic approach to having more sex. Given this appalling state of knowledge, it therefore seems that I would be doing a great service to women, everywhere, by giving men in general some clues about how to meet women, without leching, leering or committing some form of sexual assault in the process. Whilst I write this article primarily for men, I believe that the same principles should hold true for more proactive girls who may wish to seduce a man themselves.
Evolutionary biology tells us that males would like to have as much sex as possible, while women would like to make the best choice possible when selecting a sexual partner. Although women in general seem happiest to wait around until a reasonable prospect presents itself, men are predictably keener to generate new prospects. Thus the male strategies seem to fall into one of three main schools of thought.
- The generally ignorant: who seem to believe that women will respond favourably to a drunken “You’re sexy”, “Nice jugs” or an offer to purchase a drink.
- Readers of standard dating literature: who apparently believe that waiting about for the perfect opportunity is the way to go, even if it takes many many years to arrive.
- More interestingly, (and perhaps more disturbingly frequent) are those who have paid money to Seduction panjandrums, and now believe they are competing in some type of competition.
I propose that the simpler and more effective way is as follows: The first section is the most important. It can be given as guidance to a friend, in only a few minutes. The second section consists of points that will help, if you are prepared to sit down, think and formulate a strategy.
- Stay relatively sober – Obviously you do not want to look like a recovering alcoholic or the designated driver, but too much alcohol will impair your judgement, and you will end up doing stupid and unattractive things.
- You need to be relaxed and have an upbeat talkative attitude - Agree that for a few hours, you’re going to leave all your problems at home, and stay away from overly serious conversation. For many people I’ve met, fun seems to consist of trying to ‘Network’ everyone they meet. Personally, I have found that spending anything more than a short while with someone who insists upon asking the same tired questions over and over again to be highly tedious and boring.
- If you are with a friend - They should understand that they either join the conversation, or stay out of the way. I have been told many times, by different women that seeing men standing around, staring at them, and looking creepy makes them feel uncomfortable. It is not hard to have a conversation; if your friend is painfully shy all they have to do is nod and agree with you occasionally, smile and look cheerful. (See recommended media section for advice on therapeutic interventions)
- If you must analyse your performance - Do it just before you go home; sitting about and crying into a beer for ages because some girl didn’t like you accomplishes nothing. If something goes wrong (and it will do, quite often) the answers are usually always pretty similar. Likewise, success is its own reward, and excessive back-slapping also accomplishes nothing. Perhaps the most effective way is to spend a few moments sitting somewhere quietly, and reviewing all the interactions you had. Soon enough, you’ll realise what you were doing wrong, and can plan to do something different next time you are in that situation.
I’m sure you will agree that this isn’t rocket science: if you can follow the guidelines above then you are already way ahead of the average person. So, onward to more advanced tactics.
- Pay attention, and communicate - Your primary goal is having fun, so make sure your friends are having a good time; if they’re out of their depth, or you’re boring them to tears, while they are too shy to tell you, then they won’t be having fun and will probably leave. Likewise, if you are unhappy with something they have said or done, make sure you take them aside, and explain what is making you upset.
- People sometimes think it’s funny or clever to sabotage things - Jealousy is very unattractive: if your friends blatantly sabotage you, they are being unhelpful and you should reconsider who you spend your time with. Accidental sabotage is a different matter; it’s good to make mistakes, just so long as you learn from them.
- Whoever starts the conversation gets the first choice – It’s probably best to agree who in advance, so that no arguments break out later. However, this may change if it turns out that the selected person has no personality, or blatantly prefers your friend to you. Whoever grasped the nettle of starting a conversation deserves first choice, and no matter how funny or clever you might think it would be to steal the choice, it’s just bad manners. If you wanted to lead, you should have started the conversation.
- If you feel bored, frustrated, too serious or unhappy – Leave: you can always come back later, when you feel better. There are plenty of people about, and you have ample time to organise a seduction.
- If you are out with a friend, realise that it is your job get them laid, and their job to get you laid. You work as a team, not as competitors. This also includes the possibility that you might end up talking to someone whom you feel no attraction for, while possibly your friend gets to know someone much more attractive; and vice versa.
- Realise that being sociable isn’t a non-stop activity – Sometimes, nothing may happen for ages, other times you might end up chatting to someone for an hour or more. If you are with a friend, they either need to have patience or they can leave and catch up later, there is no need for them to be your tail. Most people have cell phones these days, and it’s easy to stay in touch.
- It is very bad manners to go bragging to your friends - Just because some girl gave you her number, or said she liked you, you should still exercise self-control. If you really have so little power of mind, at the very least, do your boasting and high-fiving out of earshot of the people you were just speaking to.
Posted by Jonathan as Philosophy, Psychology at 6:50 AM EDT
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I am fortunate to know people from many cultures, from around the world, so I am able to see many different viewpoints, from many different peoples.
One thing I’ve been told by immigrants to Britain is that their children tend to be a lot less respectful to their cultures and old ways, than they were when they were younger. On the other hand, when meeting young British-Indian girls, I’ve noticed that they are often a lot more willing to enjoy sex than many British girls; who often seem to want to pretend to be virgins.
Up until now, this has only been circumstantial evidence, and I’ve felt it not worth commenting upon. But it seems that this phenomenon has in part been documented and confirmed by the Department of Medical Informatics at Columbia University.
The original study concerns beliefs and decisions about sex, among South Asians, immigrating to the USA: The results reveal very low levels of sexual activity in the first generation immigrant population, as compared to the second generation.
It seems that the immigrant’s eventually adopt the sexual practices of the new culture, after an intermediate period of uncertainty in which they have not abandoned the prior beliefs, and have not accepted the new ones completely.
77.8% of first-generation South Asians reporting never engaging in any sexual activity, whereas 81.8% of second-generation South Asians reported engaging in sexual activity.
Posted by Jonathan as Anthropology, Sociology at 10:40 PM EDT
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Often times, men have a bizarre way of thinking. Many times there will be notices in the newspaper, whereby some chap has seen a pretty girl somewhere, and then rather than saying ‘Hello‘ to her and being friendly; he spends a lot of extra time and effort sending a missive to some publication or other. Presumably in the hope that said girl he saw will happen to read the same paper, on the correct day, and look at the right section, and read his message, and realise that it was the same gentleman, and conclude that he wasn’t leering at her, and thus she will feel inclined to make a response to the suitor.
If that last sentence leaves you out of breath, then imagine the improbability of it all actually panning out, and the fellow managing to contact the lady, let alone arrange a meeting. For some reason I have in my minds eye a picture of the drippy thirty something guy from the BT adverts. I can only guess that this is how the media would like guys to see themselves (probably so they can sell them more stuff, and thereby partly ameliorate the problem they created).
My conversations with average guys have nearly always taken the same strange turns. Often times they will say something along the lines of:
I saw this special girl, she was so beautiful, I wanted her to notice me, but now she’s with another guy… I hope they split up, and then maybe she’ll notice me. Perhaps if I start spreading lies and gossip about them, they’ll split up and she’ll notice me… Perhaps if I get my mates to warn the guy off, she’ll notice me… Perhaps if I can get the girl alone one night…
That’s a seriously messed up behaviour pattern, and it’s no wonder girls have to be so cautious these days.
If these guys started learning about polygyny or even just did something different from sitting on their hands, wishing, and thinking messed up thoughts, they’d probably find one girl just by chance alone.
Posted by Jonathan as Miscellaneous, Sociology at 11:50 PM EDT
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Last weeks decision by the Court of Appeal to clear a 25 year old man of raping a student, after they both got extremely drunk is quite surprising.
I know a number of people, both men and women, who have become seriously intoxicated and ended up having sex. Although, maybe I’m strange in not seeing any attraction to shagging a liquored up girl; but I know enough guys that, given the slightest encouragement, would see it as a chance to put another notch on their bedposts.
Views among women seen to differ - I’ve met girls that will be honest and say they need to get drunk so that they can drop their prissy exterior and have an excuse to jump into bed with a guy they haven’t been dating for ages. Other girls will say they felt dirty, used or ashamed after a night of drunken sex with some guy. From this, I conclude that there is a huge difference between actually being raped, and feeling like you’ve been raped; this is a subtle but very important distinction.
Government ministers had planned to introduce a ‘Sex Breathalyser‘, meaning that a woman could then be deemed to be too drunk to give consent. However, we already have a system where a woman can decide that if she doesn’t like a man for whatever reason, she can cry rape and have him publicly dragged through the courts, all while retaining her anonymity. If it later transpires that he is innocent, his reputation will be in tatters, and the woman will walk away with maybe a caution for time-wasting.
The court therefore made the correct decision, because no matter how inebriated you are, if you said “Yes” the night before, your still responsibility for your actions. Girls, if you’re worried that some opportunistic guy might take advantage of you, while you’re in an agreeable state, then the answer is simple: drink less!
Unfortunately modern men, and now woman, having gained equality, think they both have to out do each other in the drinking stakes, downing countless pints and then spewing up all over the place before falling over or doing something stupid. And then most likely trying to claim compensation for it afterwards, rather than accepting any responsibility.
Drinking and sex are both fun, but if you don’t want to have sex then don’t agree to it. If you choose to have sex, then do remember that sex isn’t love, and you won’t be very lovable, if you’re covered in vomit, and reeking of booze.
Posted by Jonathan as Sociology at 8:02 PM EDT
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I’m always surprised at how little the people interested in having as much sex as possible actually know about reproduction and procreation. Much of the history is fascinating stuff, filled with interesting characters who had amazing ideas.
Things that we take for granted today weren’t always so, and by way of a quick primer, I should like to offer this extract from the work of Tim Birkhead (Professor of Behavioural Ecology at the University of Sheffield) who explains this subject far better than I could, and really brings the history to life.
Eggs and sperm - the stuff of occasional miracles and frequent accidents. Although we now take it for granted that sperm and egg must fuse to produce a new being, the road to this discovery was as long and winding as the oviduct itself. This is hardly unexpected given the microscopic size of sex cells and the temporal separation of insemination, fertilization and birth. It is also not surprising that our understanding of male and female roles in reproduction should have fluctuated through the course of time, In Homer’s day females ruled supreme in reproduction and pregnancy was thought to result from microscopic ‘animalculae’ carried in the air which somehow found themselves inside the female. The man’s role was unimportant and the concept of paternity unknown since ‘man lacked all sense of responsibility for survival of the species’[1] The very term ‘Mother Nature’ stems from this period in which goddesses were all important and females dominated reproduction. Easter is the pagan legacy of this; named after the goddess Oestrus and celebrated with the ultimate symbols of female fertility - Easter eggs.
Only when the parallel between planting seeds into the womb of mother earth and the impregnation of a female with semen became apparent did the male’s role in reproduction assume a special significance.[1] That insemination was known to be an integral part of reproduction is clear from the Greek story of Pasiphae and her husband Minos. Fed up with his persistent infidelity, Pasiphae put a spell on Minos so that in subsequent affairs he ‘poured forth in his semen a swarm of poisonous snakes, scorpions and centipedes, which devoured the woman’s entrails’.
In his book Ornithologia, published in 1599, the Italian scholar Ulisse Aldrovandi commented on the great lustfulness of the rooster.[2] In contrast to other birds like the eagle and sparrow, who ‘copulate less frequently and are content with a single partner, the rooster treads his numerous wives fifty times a day.’ Aldrovandi also noted that aggression among cockerels was not associated with the acquisition of food or protection of their offspring, but was motivated entirely by the desire to maintain sole control over their females: ‘The rooster fights because he does not wish any of his hens to be touched by anyone and he thus performs the functions of a wise father protecting his honour.’ The cause of the cockerels’ salacity, Aldrovandi suggested, was their ‘especially abundant genital semen: since they cannot endure the irritation it produces they hurry towards sexual satisfaction.’ The Italian anatomist Fabricius ab Aquapendente (1537-1619) was the first to identify the ovary of the hen as the source of ova, but was unable to transpose the concept to humans because the ovaries of birds and women are so different in appearance. Fabricius taught and greatly influenced William Harvey (1578-1657), whose main claim to fame was discovering the circulation of the blood. The two men differed on a number of points relating to reproduction. Fabricius thought that hens could store viable sperm for an entire breeding season (several months) following a single insemination, but Harvey accurately showed that thirty days was the maximum duration.[3] Fabricius thought that semen stimulated the generative process without entering the egg; Harvey was convinced that embryonic development was initiated by semen penetrating the egg, but without a microscope he was unable to demonstrate this.
The story of the discovery of spermatozoa - literally ‘sperm animals’ – by Anton Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723), or more likely by his student Johan Ham, is well known.[4][3] Leeuwenhoek reported to the Royal Society how, by means of his home-made microscope – comprising a single exquisitely ground lens, which magnified 300 times – he had observed in his own semen millions of vigorously swimming spermatozoa. His letter to the Royal Society is somewhat coy: ‘What I investigate is only what, without sinfully defiling myself, remains as a residue after conjugal coitus. And if your Lordship should consider that these observations may disgust or scandalise the learned, I earnestly beg your Lordship to regard them as private and to publish or destroy them as your Lordship thinks fit.’ Luckily, the Royal Society thought it appropriate to publish Leeuwenhoek’s findings, in which he suggested that is was the minute microscopic creatures swimming in the semen that entered the egg and resulted in fertilization. This was controversial stuff, and some of his colleagues at the Royal Society thought that all that Leeuwenhoek had seen were parasites. After all, Leeuwenhoek had shown the existence of numerous microscopic animals when he examined the scrapings from his teeth!
It wasn’t until a further century had passed that another Italian, Lazzaro Spallanzani, a priest cum scientist, provided unequivocal evidence for Leeuwenhoek’s spermatozoa hypothesis for fertility. Given its current unease with matters sexual, it seems rather surprising that the Church should have provided Spallanzani with both moral protection and financial assistance in his efforts to establish the role of semen in reproduction. Spallanzani worked mainly with frogs, whose reproductive behaviour had been lovingly described by the Dutch biologist Jan Swammerdam (1367-80) in his Book of Nature.[3] During the breeding frogs
“become so eagerly intent on the business of propagation, that they take no care in a manner of their own safety … The male frog leaps upon the female, and when seated on her back, he fastens himself to her … and throws his forelegs round her breast … He most beautifully joins his toes between one another, in the same manner as people do their fingers at prayer … and closes them so firmly that I found it impossible to loosen them with my naked hands … At last the eggs are discharged in the female’s fundament in a long stream, and the male … immediately fecundifies, fertilizes or impregnates them by an effusion of his semen. As soon as these eggs have escaped from the female body, between hers and the male’s hinder legs, and have been impregnated by the male’s semen, the two frogs abandon each other.”
Inspired by some novel but unsuccessful experiments of two colleagues, Spallanzani made pairs of prophylactic oilskin trousers for male frogs to prevent their semen from reaching the females eggs.[3] The experiment worked: despite the encumbrance of the trousers the males grasped the females, whose eggs were not fertilized, ‘for want of being bewedded with semen’. Spallanzani then conducted the other essential part of the experiment. Recovering the drops of semen from inside the trousers, he applied these to a female’s eggs which subsequently developed. Moving swiftly from external to internal fertilization and from frogs to dogs, Spallanzani performed the ultimate experiment. He took a female spaniel and before she came on to heat placed her under lock and key inside his apartment, away from male dogs. When she was obviously in oestrus Spallanzani found a male spaniel ‘which furnished me, by spontaneous emission, with nineteen grains of seed, which were immediately inseminated’ into the female. Sixty-two days later ‘the bitch brought forth three very lively puppies’ which resembled both the male and the female. This was the first ever successful artificial insemination involving internal fertilization. With some justification Spallanzani was delighted with his efforts: ‘the success of this experiment gave me a pleasure which I have never experienced in any of my philosophical researches.’
Spallanzani’s studies demonstrated unequivocally for the first time that semen was essential for fertilization, and in doing so dispelled the centuries-old concept of spontaneous generation. Notwithstanding these clever experiments Spallanzani still thought that ‘spermatic worms’ played no role in fertilization. The reason for this was the outcome of another ingenious investigation in which he filtered semen in order to establish which component of semen – sperm or seminal fluid – was responsible for fertilization. A mixture of filtered semen and eggs generated fertile eggs and Spallanzani deduced, entirely logically, that it was the seminal fluid rather than the spermatozoa that triggered development. What he had not realized was quite how difficult it was successfully to separate sperm from seminal fluid and it is now obvious to us that some sperm must have remained. On the basis of these experiments Spallanzani believed that the seminal fluid stimulated the foetal heart, which lay pre-formed inside the egg, and triggered development.[5] It was nearly another century before George Newport in 1853 showed, again using frogs, that sperm actually penetrated the egg and were essential if fertilization was to occur.[4]
Spallanzani was an ‘ovist’, believing each egg to contain a pre-formed embryo. In rather vigorous contrast, the ‘spermists’ thought that the sperm contained the entire embryo and that copulation and insemination were little more than embryo transfer. In the spermist’s scheme the female was regarded merely as a recipient vessel to provide the optimum environment for the embryo’s growth. Nicholas Hartsoeker (1665-1725) encapsulated the spermists view of the male’s central role in reproduction in his drawing of a sperm containing an extremely cramped homunculus with a gigantic head, In fact, Hartsoeker never claimed to have seen the little man inside a sperm, merely that if he could this is what it would look like. Nevertheless, the idea of a pre-formed body inside each sperm was an appealing, and not unreasonable, one during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It did, however, worry James Cooke, an English doctor, who wondered in 1762 what happened to all the sperm that did not give rise to a new person.[4] He thought they might not die, but ‘live a latent life, in an insensible or dormant state, like Swallows in Winter, lying quite still like a stopped watch when let down, till [they] are received afresh into some other male Body of the proper kind’.
But it was these wasted sperm, together with their minute size, that finally brought the demise of the spermist viewpoint. The French physician Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertius summed up the spermist’s problem in 1744: ‘This little worm, swimming in the seminal fluid, contains an infinity of generations, from father to father. And each [pre-formed creature inside the sperm] has his seminal fluid, full of swimming animals so much smaller than himself.’ Sperm within sperm within sperm … on and on into infinity. Hartsoeker tried to calculate how small the sperm in the original rabbit would have to have been to account for all the rabbits that had ever lived. But it didn’t add up. Or, rather, it but the answer was so incredible, a figure involving 100,000 zeros, that it seemed ludicrous.
Exactly the same problem faced the Ovists.[3] The mother of us all was Eve and her ovaries must, like a Russian doll, have contained an endless series of smaller and smaller homunculi to sustain the human race. Hardly a likely scenario. There were other objections: the ovist view could not, for example, account for the occurrence of hybrids: if the ovum of a horse contained a pre-formed horse, where do mules come from?
The alternative to the pre-formationist view of both the spermists and the ovists was epigenesis – the idea that embryos resulted from the fusion of male and female sex cells, an idea favoured by William Harvey, among others. But even this had its problems. While the observations of early embryologists were consistent with the generation of new structures arising during development, there had to be some sort of pre-formation to account for the resemblance between offspring and their parents. The transfer of this information, it was deduced, must occur at conception.[4] The turning point came in 1875 when Oscar Hertwig showed, using sea urchins, that the sperm head fused with the female genetic material inside the egg to from the nucleus of a new being.
References:
- Jöchle, W., ‘Biology and pathology of reproduction in Greek mythology’, Conception (1971), 4, 1-13
- Lind, L. R., Aldrovandi on Chickens (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1963)
- Pinto-Correia, C., The Ovary of Eve: Egg and Sperm Preformation (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997)
- Moore, J. A., Science as a way of Knowing (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1993)
- Laurila, A., and P. Seppa, ‘Multiple paternity in the common frog (Rana temporaria): genetic evidence from tadpole kin groups’, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society (1998), 63, 221-32
Posted by Jonathan as Biology, History at 6:00 PM EDT
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