A genderless world

[Scarlet Knight]

I would have guessed it started when groups got big enough to generalize.

"We shall gather the females in the center & the males on the perimeter."
"Why?"
"Because the males are bigger and stronger."
"What about Grog? She's bigger than half the men."
"No, keep her with the women, in case anyone breaks the perimeter..."

 

[The Infamous Scamola]

Gender has always existed, and always will.

Hell, even animals have gender roles and such, so I'm assuming there never was a time in which men and women were just "people".

If he was using a ghetto sig in all his posts a Mod probably asked him to stop using it.

I don't know why, but I laughed.

 

[Antlers]

Yes, of course their instincts told them to have sex with those other people (as I stated in the OP). But how would they have known that there were males and females?

As opposed to just other people? I still don't get it. Animals know that there are 2 genders.

 

[Xvito]

Here's the problem:

You're teachers are idiots who told you that men and women don't exist, and there's only "people." As a result of this, you have come to believe that there must have been a point in time when people didn't differentiate based on sex.

In reality, animals (even fucking SPIDERS) do it, so there is no reason to believe that humans haven't always done it. Hell, the ancestors of modern humans (like a chimpanzee, but not) did it.

Hope this clears things up.

Most of my teachers may have been idiots, however this thread was my own doing and shouldn't really be blamed on them...

It was merely a thought.

Also, what makes you think that there weren't times when spiders didn't differentiate based on sex?

 

[sgtshock]

Y'know, everyone eats food nowadays. But there had to have been a time when we didn't know what food was. People would just eat rocks, or dirt, or nothing at all. Then something happened, and we started only eating things like meat and fruits. Is it good that we did this? Maybe we should go back to how it was.

...what? It makes just as much sense as his argument.

 

[Sulu]

]Most of my teachers may have been idiots, however this thread was my own doing and shouldn't really be blamed on them...

It was merely a thought.

Also, what makes you think that there weren't times when spiders didn't differentiate based on sex?

Hang on a tick! So you are saying that spiders at one stage did not have the instinct for reproduction? The most basic of all instincts? When you evolve from an organism that uses mitosis to reproduce (cells) you start making gametes through miosis, now these gametes must meet the oposite sex gametes, a spider will always have known that the ones standing over there are what his gametes must touch. This can be done through feromones, sight or behaviour. This is of course generalising that all creatures on the planet that use a distinct male/female reproduction technique, some still divide themselves and some are in fact both sexes rolled into one - although these are single celled.

Now its been a while since I did A level biology but that is basically how it works.

I've thought of a different way to answer your question; Times when spiders wouldn't have differentiate via sex would have been earlier down their evolutionary pathway and they wouldn't be called spiders as they would be a completely different species.

 

[ThreeWords]

But... I don't understand your question. Male animals have sex with female animals. Gender DID always exist, just because it wasn't given a name.

This. Instinct drives to procreation with the opposite gender, and humans have always been able to tell. Whether or not we had the words/brains to talk about/consider the idea is another matter

 

[Xvito]

]Most of my teachers may have been idiots, however this thread was my own doing and shouldn't really be blamed on them...

It was merely a thought.

Also, what makes you think that there weren't times when spiders didn't differentiate based on sex?

Hang on a tick! So you are saying that spiders at one stage did not have the instinct for reproduction? The most basic of all instincts? When you evolve from an organism that uses mitosis to reproduce (cells) you start making gametes through miosis, now these gametes must meet the oposite sex gametes, a spider will always have known that the ones standing over there are what his gametes must touch. This can be done through feromones, sight or behaviour. This is of course generalising that all creatures on the planet that use a distinct male/female reproduction technique, some still divide themselves and some are in fact both sexes rolled into one - although these are single celled.

Now its been a while since I did A level biology but that is basically how it works.

I've thought of a different way to answer your question; Times when spiders wouldn't have differentiate via sex would have been earlier down their evolutionary pathway and they wouldn't be called spiders as they would be a completely different species.

I'm not saying that they didn't know how to reproduce! Why is nobody listening to me!? What I'm saying is that maybe they had sex with others of the same species without differentiating themselves from the opposite gender.

 

[Antlers]

I'm not saying that they didn't know how to reproduce! Why is nobody listening to me!? What I'm saying is that maybe they had sex with others of the same species without differentiating themselves from the opposite gender.

It doesn't matter how many times I read it. I just don't get it. Maybe a man had sex with a woman but didn't bother acknowledging she was a woman? Just another human?

 

[Internet Kraken]

]Most of my teachers may have been idiots, however this thread was my own doing and shouldn't really be blamed on them...

It was merely a thought.

Also, what makes you think that there weren't times when spiders didn't differentiate based on sex?

Hang on a tick! So you are saying that spiders at one stage did not have the instinct for reproduction? The most basic of all instincts? When you evolve from an organism that uses mitosis to reproduce (cells) you start making gametes through miosis, now these gametes must meet the oposite sex gametes, a spider will always have known that the ones standing over there are what his gametes must touch. This can be done through feromones, sight or behaviour. This is of course generalising that all creatures on the planet that use a distinct male/female reproduction technique, some still divide themselves and some are in fact both sexes rolled into one - although these are single celled.

Now its been a while since I did A level biology but that is basically how it works.

I've thought of a different way to answer your question; Times when spiders wouldn't have differentiate via sex would have been earlier down their evolutionary pathway and they wouldn't be called spiders as they would be a completely different species.

I'm not saying that they didn't know how to reproduce! Why is nobody listening to me!? What I'm saying is that maybe they had sex with others of the same species without differentiating themselves from the opposite gender.

Highly unlikely. Why would you even think that happened?

 

[Xvito]

I'm not saying that they didn't know how to reproduce! Why is nobody listening to me!? What I'm saying is that maybe they had sex with others of the same species without differentiating themselves from the opposite gender.

It doesn't matter how many times I read it. I just don't get it. Maybe a man had sex with a woman but didn't bother acknowledging she was a woman? Just another human?

Yes, that's right. That's what I was wondering.

Highly unlikely. Why would you even think that happened?

Because I've never really understood why we separate people. I mean, I understand why, I just think that it's stupid. And somewhere arose a small glimpse of hope that maybe, just maybe it hadn't always been this way.

In the very least I think that the separation of men and women in today's society is worth a discussion, there are some very obvious flaws in keeping things like changing-rooms separate for men and women. For example: what if a person is gay? Maybe then, they would feel weird, being separated from the women for no reason...

And yes, that was slightly off-topic.

 

[Da pyro man 999]

Its instinct, they programed with it

 

[DarkRyter]

We know about genders instinctually.

 

[The_Echo]

It happened when we developed language. Before then we didn't really need to discern between male an female, I'd assume.

And at that time it was just people having sexual intercourse with other people, and not women having sexual intercourse with men, or men having sexual intercourse with other men.

What about women and other women? If you're going to include both sides, you may as well cover every base.

 

[Hikikomori Ookami]

It probably started as soon as we developed language, however the roles of men and women have changed over the years, but some of the oldest statues ever found (dating to the preious Ice-Age) were fertility statues of the female from.

Incidentally I cannot help but wonder what a genderless world would be like now, there must be planets somewhere that have single-gender species.

Hell, we have single/both gender species already. There isn't a long list of hermaphrodite's, but it works for them. Not sure how it would work for humanity though, except maybe how they used it in The Left Hand of Darkness

 

[Cargando]

It probably started as soon as we developed language, however the roles of men and women have changed over the years, but some of the oldest statues ever found (dating to the preious Ice-Age) were fertility statues of the female from.

Incidentally I cannot help but wonder what a genderless world would be like now, there must be planets somewhere that have single-gender species.

Hell, we have single/both gender species already. There isn't a long list of hermaphrodite's, but it works for them. Not sure how it would work for humanity though, except maybe how they used it in The Left Hand of Darkness

When I said single-gender, I was more referring to the psychology of it, rather than the anatomy.

 

[GrinningManiac]

This reminds me of a funny story I have

In science class, we were told to pop on the computers and find the most interesting "Accidental discovery" a la Penacillin and suchlike.

My turn to show my results, guess what I put?

"170 Billion years ago (I can't remember the real time), Sexual Reproduction is "invented" by diverging bacterium"

/scienceclass

 

[Sulu]

Well you don't see lions mating with the wrong sex. It is because mating with a creature of the same sex does not follow the rules of self preservation and species survival. The animals would have no reason to mate other than to pass on their genes, therefore a male having sex with another male is worthless as there are no genes to pass on.
There are only like two species on the planet that use sex for pleasure as well as its proper function, Humans (modern day) and Dolphins (dolphins like to partake in a good round of gang rape so they aren't the nicest of species )

If you are asking whether it is possible that a creature mated with something of the same sex then I would say it is possible. The creature may be confused and not realise that it is wasting it's time, much like a horny dog humping a pillow/leg!

 

[ValentineBlacker]

I think it might be better to talk about gender in today's society without comparing it to what people may or may not have done in the past, or what's 'natural' for an animal, mammal, or primate to do. Just because something is or is not 'natural' or 'instinctive' doesn't make it the right or wrong thing to do, and even if everyone used to do things a certain way, that doesn't mean it would be good to go back to it.

 

[Hikikomori Ookami]

In that case, I think it's possible that future generations could see that but it would take a lot of effort on both sides. That seems like the goal of a lot of societies today, however gender stereotypes are slowing the process. Seriously though, how many males or females actually fit into their stereotype?