A challenge to the scientific world...

[agyat_theunknown]

Who or what controls gender parity?

Despite many efforts of choosing pre-birth genders (or even killing), the male-female ratio of the world is very close to 1.

Any answers?

[Hehe]

Who or what controls gender parity?

Despite many efforts of choosing pre-birth genders (or even killing), the male-female ratio of the world is very close to 1.

Any answers?

Its all about genetics. Males produce 50% "male" sperms and 50% "female" sperms, so it is the male that determines the sex of the child but it is a 50-50 chance. Now unless you are 100% sure that you are being inseminated with a male only sperm, there is no way you can decide the sex of your child. There are old-wives tales telling saying that if a man do certain thing and eat certain foods that it will decide the outcome of the sex of the child, but there is no scientific evidence as far as i know of.

Genetics: In laymens terms

There are 23 PAIRS of chromosomes in the human cell. The 23rd paired chromosome contains an X (female) chromatid and a Y (male) chromatid if you are a male and two X chromatids if you are a female.

XX = Female

XY = Male

Now males produce sperm cells in the following way:

1) All male cells are XY

2) In the testis a single cell undergoes MITOSIS and divide to form 2 XY cells

3) These 2 XY cells undergo MEIOSIS and divide to form 4 cells that have 23 chromasomes with a single chromatid. Therefore the identity of these 4 cells are: X, X and Y, Y

4) 1 of these four sperm cells will combine with en egg (All eggs are X) to form either an XX (female)or XY (male) embryo.

So unless you devize a way to separate the X and Y spermatids from each other, it will always be a 50-50 "endevour".

Unless off course you live in United Arab Emirates which has 186 males for every 100 woman. Where are all the woman??? Check this site, seems like the females go in hiding in some middle east countries. (Saudi Arabia 116:100, Qatar 173:100, Oman 136:1)

http://www.geohive.com/global/geo.php?xml=...&xsl=pop_gender

Edited January 25, 2006 by Hehe

[AK Raven]

There is a bit of evidence that XX carrying sperm, and female embryos have a higher rate of survivability, than XY sperm and male embryos. This would lead to a slightly higher percentage of female births, which may be counteracted by come societies engaging in practices to encourage male birth, or female infanticide. Favoring higher percentages of females could well contribute to success as a species.

[+Link of Hyrule]

I've always thought there was a higher percentage of women in the world......

[BurnSide]

You are correct PA in a sense. Of course in some parts of the world it's quite the contrary. In China men outnumber women 20 to 1. But that's not because of genetics of course. Overall it is about 105.5 men to every 108 women.

When you only have two choices though, there will be one that is higher than the other. It's just 50/50 really.

[Hehe]

You are correct PA in a sense. Of course in some parts of the world it's quite the contrary. In China men outnumber women 20 to 1. But that's not because of genetics of course. Overall it is about 105.5 men to every 108 women.

When you only have two choices though, there will be one that is higher than the other. It's just 50/50 really.

20 to 1 in China . In China, Hong Kong and Macao there are less men than women but overall China has 106 men for every 100 women.

http://www.geohive.com/global/geo.php?xml=...&xsl=pop_gender

Says world population has 101 men for every 100 women. Weird if you look at how many males die during times of conflict.

United Arab Emirates is the most "unbalanced" country with 186 men for every 100 women.

In some Middle eastern countries men might find it hard to find women, heck i would also strap a bomb to my chest and shout allah!! out of frustration.

Edited January 26, 2006 by Hehe

[agyat_theunknown]

Its all about genetics. Males produce 50% "male" sperms and 50% "female" sperms, so it is the male that determines the sex of the child but it is a 50-50 chance.

Still not a reasonable answer! Only I will have to rephrase the question -

Who or what controls - "Males produce 50% "male" sperms and 50% "female" sperms."?

Note - Some couples have only girl child. Some couples have only boy child. (And yes, this can termed as a 'genetic problem'. But, still the question holds....

[Glacies]

Still not a reasonable answer! Only I will have to rephrase the question -

Who or what controls - "Males produce 50% "male" sperms and 50% "female" sperms."?

Note - Some couples have only girl child. Some couples have only boy child. (And yes, this can termed as a 'genetic problem'. But, still the question holds....

I'm going to have to side with popular opinion here (a practise I hate doing) and state genetics and evolution, as explained to me by my prof, life is a lazy thing, once we figure out how to do something accurately, we leave it at that, we don't want to expend much energy doing more on something we have allready learned to do. in this case, through evolutionary developments, this ratio fit the best for the propagation of our species, and we just stuck with it biologically since. of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

[Hehe]

Still not a reasonable answer! Only I will have to rephrase the question -

Who or what controls - "Males produce 50% "male" sperms and 50% "female" sperms."?

Note - Some couples have only girl child. Some couples have only boy child. (And yes, this can termed as a 'genetic problem'. But, still the question holds....

More like a "Gentic problem of chance". Ever flipped a coin and ended with heads 5 times in a row. Same with those poor couples who have 5 cosecutive children of same sex.

Check up on some biology sites to describe mitosis, meiosis and especially spermatogenesis.

I'm going to have to side with popular opinion here (a practise I hate doing) and state genetics and evolution, as explained to me by my prof, life is a lazy thing, once we figure out how to do something accurately, we leave it at that, we don't want to expend much energy doing more on something we have allready learned to do. in this case, through evolutionary developments, this ratio fit the best for the propagation of our species, and we just stuck with it biologically since. of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

That prof likes to genralize too much. Actually a better ratio for sperm production would be would be 70:30 female sperms. More female more babies, guess evolution screwed up there.

[BurnSide]

20 to 1 in China . In China, Hong Kong and Macao there are less men than women but overall China has 106 men for every 100 women.

http://www.geohive.com/global/geo.php?xml=...&xsl=pop_gender

Says world population has 101 men for every 100 women. Weird if you look at how many males die during times of conflict.

I'm sorry, that was actually supposed to be 120 men to every 100 women, not sure how that happened.

It depends fully on your source. Your source says 101 men for every 100 women, my same source says 105 men to every 108 women.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5953508

[Guardsman Bass]

Since there is roughly a 50/50 chance that a child will be genetically "male" or "female", the balance tends to be around even, which makes sense. Too much disparity on either side would make a society unstable, especially if there were too many males to females.

[agyat_theunknown]

To get an explanation, the probability theory was framed, so that the query can be put to rest...

But, there are so much out there to get a reasonable explanation for....

[GIDEON MAGE]

It is in our history. Let's go back to matriarchal-matrilineal hunter-gather times, shall we? Babies emerge from women's bodies, so fathership was not provable until modern times with hla testing. Mankind would not have thrivved in its infancy if women did not live longer, and slightly predominate. We men have always been a little extraneous, since one man can easily fertilize many women, if necessary. So it was the male human chosen to protect the tribe, and die if necessary. The women not only ruled, they reared children and did the gathering of vegetable products. Later, in village times, there were individualized trades, which men took over, since only a few were needed to defend the village. The men took over, and, in order to subjugate women for all time, male-dominated theologies were developed, and women reduced from resident goddesses incarnate into childbearing/housekeeping slaves.The Garden of Eden story, for instance, highlights the idea that women were a later development, rather than the other way around. Far back on evolutionary history, aanimal creatures were first asexual, then bisexual, then female, then male and female. This was long before even the earliest mammals, although there are vertebrates as high as fish that can change gender occasionally. Male swordtails (those medium-sized orange fish in your tank?) occasionally become female in the absence of female fish, and vice-versa. In later Xian times, it only got worse-anyone seen the new based on C.S. Lewis's blatent Xian propaganda for little children? Witches, etc.? By the way, sex can be determined by semen electropheresis. The male and female speerm travel at different speeds, and carry a different electrical charge. There are still parts of the world where a percentage of female children are drowned at birth, ssince they can't wwork or be warriors.