Dr. Judson: Summary

Dr. Tatiana is an educated sex expert of all species who uses this book to describe and explain how vastly different sex is from one organism to another. In this first section of the book, Dr. Tatiana focuses on how men and women want “different things from each other, and from life” (Judson 4). This section is concentrated on how in most species girls are wanton and strumpet. We assume that men go around philandering while women are chaste, well, Dr. Tatiana teaches us the opposite. Women amongst species sleep around because they desire the best male fit to pass on his finest genes to her offspring; they say that promiscuous females have more and healthier children. If their partner is good looking, healthy, skillful, etc., their child will

Failure to keep up with their partner’s appetite when they are in heat will result in cheating. It seems outrageous that animals smaller than humans (i.e. birds) are capable of doing this when realistically it’s impossible for humans to have sex hundreds of times in a day with a sperm count that does not even come close to theirs. Essentially, due to promiscuity and the hostile environment female reproductive tracts provide for sperm, the males who can produce the most sperm have a greater chance at fertilizing a female’s eggs. However, sometimes more sperm is not the answer, bigger sperm is. In a few species, they produce lesser amounts of sperm but they are much larger and stronger than small sperm produced by the millions. Bigger sperm can make its way through the female reproductive tract quicker and technically “push” other smaller sperm away. To add on, female’s choose their partners based on looks (ugly and wimpy does not win) , skills, fighting techniques, quality characteristics, and what gifts they provide. Cheaper gifts risk the punishment of not copulating for long, and if the male can’t produce anything for the female they are rejected.

To conclude, the foremost important details of this section is that females amongst organisms are not as innocent as we assumed

This organism is recognized as Philodina roseola (known as Miss Philodina in the chapter), a half-millimeter long creature which has been reproducing asexually for 85 million years. In the book, this character stars on a parody version of Jerry Springer or Dr. Phil the TV show with Dr. Tatiana as the host and Miss Philodina as the guest. Miss Philodina’s capabilities have risen questions for scientists all over because they cannot agree on what sex is actually for since this creature doesn’t need it at all. Mammals can clone sometimes when an embryo splits during development, we call it “twins.” During this debate, some organisms were dictating that if organisms do not have sex to procreate then they will go extinct. Brilliantly Miss Philodina brings up how dinosaurs used to have “rampant sex” (224) and they still went extinct. Another organism from the audience brings up how asexuals will eventually die of genetic diseases because they cannot adapt to the environment or get rid of genetic diseases/mutations. She explains how some mutations have no effect and scientists only look at bad mutations. Dr. Tatiana disagrees stating that when a mutation has an effect, they usually do harm, not help. All in all, although there is no clear answer, all we know is that sex is needed to stay healthy. It is essential to our life so we can have gene