Talk:Sex

Hermaphrodites

Plantsurfer and Peter coxhead, I'd like to have a simple, everyday example in the lead that helps people (including older kids) understand that hermaphroditism is normal state for some organisms. In popular culture, it tends to be sensationalized in a freak show kind of way, and I think that waving vaguely in the direction of flowering plants or something else of your choosing would be helpful. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:52, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

I don't know why you think waving vaguely towards a populist view is the solution. Land plants have been swinging both ways for half a billion years, and their aquatic ancestors for twice that. Hermaphroditism is THE NORM in flowering plants. Single-sex flowering plants are in the vast minority, but in-between there is complexity that has no parallel at all in human sexuality.Plantsurfer 19:40, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

I don't think that the first paragraph has much room for complexity. I'd like that sentence to point attention towards plants (or, really, any example that you and Peter think is a good idea). I'd rather that the stereotypical fourteen-year-old boy, upon encountering the word hermaphrodite in the first paragraph was nudged towards thinking "Oh, right, that drawing of pistils and stamens we had to do in biology class" instead of "The guys at school were telling a funny story last week".

The end of that paragraph currently says just "An organism that produces both types of gamete is hermaphrodite." I think some slight addition, like "such as most plants", would help. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:55, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with that. I suggest changing "An organism that produces both types of gamete is hermaphrodite." to "Organisms that produce both types of gametes, such as most flowering plants, are hermaphrodite or monoecious." That should be covered by citation 3.

I don't like the wording of the next sentence - "In non-hermaphroditic species, . ." I suggest changing it to "In dioecious species, . ." or "In species with separate sexes, ."Plantsurfer 00:30, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps "In species with separate sexes (dioecious)..."? That way people learn the word, but also know we're talking about. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:49, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

While I'm all for covering plants, alternation of generations (and exactly where plant gametes are being produced) wasn't something I understood until college. Hermaphoditism in gastropods and worms was something I understood in high school. Plantdrew (talk) 03:06, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I agree with Plantdrew. Yes, it's good to cover plants. However, doing so accurately in one or two sentences is very difficult because of alternation of generations and the overwhelming dominance of the sporophyte generation in vascular plants. For animals and bryophytes the statement "An organism that produces both types of gametes is hermaphrodite" is correct (but it's monoicy not monoecy in bryophytes). Maybe "A hermaphrodite organism is one that produces both types of gametes, either directly as in animals or indirectly as in vascular plants" without mentioning monoecious? Peter coxhead (talk) 07:50, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I think you are overthinking it. The sentence I offered above specified flowering plants. I don't think it is necessary to cover the entirety of sexual complexity in plants, merely to provide an example that covers the overwhelming majority.Plantsurfer 12:01, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Consider the definitions in The Kew Plant Glossary. On p. 54, "hermaphrodite, bisexual plant with stamens and pistil in the same flower", and on p. 20 "bisexual, having both sexes in the same flower, or in the same inflorescence." The point is that applied to flowering plants, hermaphrodite does not mean 'producing both kinds of gamete', it means, in lay language, 'having both stamens and pistils in the same flower' or more technically 'having both sexes of gametophyte in the same flower'. Confusing gametophytes with gametes leads to the error of calling pollen sperm. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:20, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, Heslop-Harrison (1972) emphasised that sexuality is a gametophytic property, but control of the determination of the sex of gametophytes in heterosporous plants is exerted by the sporophyte. JH-H says "Customarily, monomorphic, monoclinous species are termed hermaphrodite, and monomorphic species with diclinous flowers, monoecious." He also says "Flowers either contain both stamens and carpels, in which case they are termed monoclinous or hermaphrodite*, or stamens or carpels alone, in which case they are said to be diclinous (sporophyte is dioecious) or unisexual." Stace 4th edition prefers to use the term bisexual instead of hermaphrodite.

If necessary the complexities of land plant sexuality can be dissected at length in the body of an appropriate article. I don't think this is the one, and I definitely don't think the lead of Sex is the right place to air these concerns either. There is a clear, sourceable precedent for the use of the term 'hermaphrodite' to describe the sexuality of bisexual angiosperms, and I really don't think that is likely on its own to lead to the misconception that pollen=sperm.

Plantsurfer 14:27, 13 February 2024‎ (UTC)

@Peter coxhead and @Plantdrew, is it factually true that hermaphroditism is seen in:

• most (i.e., not all)
• flowering plants (i.e., not other kinds of plants)?

If alternating generations happens in less than 50% of flowering plants, that would not make the statement about "most flowering plants" be incorrect. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:53, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Alternation of generations occurs in ALL vascular plants. In fact it is true for all land plants and many algae.

Yes, 71% of Dicot species and 73% of monocot species are hermaphrodite. Only ~3% of monocots and 4% of dicots are dioecious.

Nothing I have said so far implies that hermaphroditism does not exist in other kinds of plants. Plantsurfer 18:58, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I had somehow formed the misimpression that hemaphroditism (=this individual plant produces both gametes) and alternating generations (this individual plant produces one, and its offspring will produce the other?) were mutually exclusive states. I see that I need to go read the article on this subject. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:11, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing|WhatamIdoing Alternation of generations does not carry any implication that an individual plant produces only one type of gamete. Many plants (all of which have alternating generations) produce both types of gamete, not necessarily simultaneously. The alternation bit is about what happens when the mature sporophyte produces spores by meiosis - the spores are haploid and develop by repeated mitosis into a multicellular haploid gametophyte, (something unknown in animals), the function of which is, as the name implies, to produce gametes.Plantsurfer 19:28, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

WAID, sporophytes don't produce gametes directly, but (in flowering plants) do "host" gametophytes. Your misimpression gets at why I suggested not giving plants as an example of hermaphrodites for the lead. The majority of flatworms and annelid species are hermaphroditic and those can be given as examples in the lead without going into alternation of generations in plants. (I'd also suggested gastropods, but it appears that the majority of gastropod species aren't hermaphroditic (although some gastropod clades are almost exclusively hermaphroditic)). Plantdrew (talk) 20:01, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

About the plural vs singular (this diff): I think that using the singular tends to detract from the idea of hermaphroditism being normal. It's "that one weird individual" (did you see the photos of the honeycreeper with bilateral gynandromorphism last week? [1]) instead of "yeah, that's just normal sexual development for a huge number of species". WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:37, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing: I think it needs to be absolutely clear that hermaphrodite applies in the first instance to individuals: each individual hermaphrodite can produce both eggs and sperm. Secondarily, a species can be described as hermaphroditic if every 'normal' member of the species is a hermaphrodite. That's why I prefer the singular there. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:17, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

I think the singular leads people to think about humans with unusual disorders of sex development, when we want them to be thinking about normal sexual development in non-mammalian species. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:41, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

References

First sentence

Generally, I think that editors spend too much time thinking about the first sentence, so if y'all think I'm overthinking this, just tell me. But I had an idea.

The first sentence is currently:

Sex is the trait that determines whether a sexually reproducing organism produces male or female gametes.

We could shorten it to say:

Sex is the trait that determines which type of gamete is produced by a sexually reproducing organism.

(The links to male and female could go where those words already exist in the third sentence of the first paragraph, i.e., "By convention, organisms that produce smaller, more mobile gametes (spermatozoa, sperm) are called male...".)

What do you think? Would this be an improvement at all? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:39, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I personally think the first sentence is fine as it right now.CycoMa1 (talk) 04:11, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

First reaction: no. Because it leaves open the impression that maybe there are other types; third gender gamete? Turner's gamete? CAIS gamete? Silliness, of course, because, we want to say amongst ourselves, duh, NO; but with all the misinformation and lack of knowledge around the whole topic and the sex/gender confusion lurking around the corner, do we want to open the door even a crack to more confusion? That said, I'm open to your reasoning; why do you think it would be an improvement? Mathglot (talk) 22:44, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

Agreed with Mathglot. I think the existing sentence is clearer, and from a purely stylistic perspective (which is admittedly pretty subjective) I don't see an advantage in changing it. Also, clarity in facts is more important anyway. Crossroads ^-talk- 22:48, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I think what irritates me about this is that we could also, with equal accuracy, write that "Fertility is the trait that determines whether a sexually reproducing organism produces male or female gametes". Pedantically speaking, fertility is about whether; sex is about which. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:00, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree with WhatamIdoing; the focus ought to be on what/which, rather than whether. Terrapinaz (talk) 11:16, 29 April 2024 (UTC)