Talk:Female

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Female was the collaboration of the week for the week starting on 5 February 2006.

For details on improvements made to the article, see history of past collaborations.

Contents

[edit] Male and Female

I am struck by the assymmetry between this page and male...perhaps female should also be a disambig page on that model? But I'm not feeling quite that bold today.--Sharkford 19:01, 2004 Sep 28 (UTC)

Yeah, well? Build up some endurance then, you wussy ;) Although I don't understand what's so troublin' with those articles havin' to be SIMILIAR just'cuz their polarized opposites of each-other...and as'fer'e disaumbigation...well, hate to tell ya, BRO, but I HATE'RAT IDEA..'cuz wha? Cuz'shwela! It fit's better as a seperate article, perhaps 'gender', leadin' to'rem - 'rese gender's.--OleMurder 16:48, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Determining femininity

Since this article state this: "It should be noted that there is no single genetic mechanism behind femaleness in different species, thus it is defined in terms of outer forms, not genetically."

...Maybe results for new scientific should be somehow included in this article? See also:

Chromosome study shows male and female genetic differences:

"We now know that 25 per cent of the X chromosome - some 200 to 300 genes - can be uniquely expressed in one sex relative to the other. In essence, therefore, there is not one human genome, but two - male and female," Professor Willard said."

But I'm no biologist or anyone else having very much insight into definition questions etc, so I'm not going to touch this for now. I felt these are quite important scientific breakthroughs though.--Jugalator 20:33, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Extraterrestrial joke

One more thing, what the heck is the part about extraterrestrials doing here? Is female extraterrestrials definitely called "women" and must be mentioned here, or is it some kind of weird joke in an encyclopedia?--Jugalator 20:35, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps the wikipedia really is malecheuvenistic? Cone-spir-acy, con-spire-acy!--OleMurder 20:48, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Chromosomes

I removed the following:

Female is actually the the "default" sex for a developing organism: unless the male chromosome is present, the organism will develop as a female. In humans, most females' sex chromosomes are XX, whereas those of a male are XY, "Y" being the male chromosome.

The mistakes are too complex to change easily.

  • "Default" sex can also be interpreted hormonally. It's a complex issue even in mammals, and it doesn't generalize at all.
  • XX/XY chromosome determination is mammalian. In birds, males are homochromosomal (ZZ, if I remember correctly, and females are ZW), in fruit flies, males have one X and females have two, and in many organisms there is no chromosomal sex determination. Even in mammals, it is not the chromosome, but rather the genes it contains, and one theory is that because full sex expression involves several genes, the X and Y differentiated as a result of selection against crossing over.

An article about chromosomal sex determination might be worthwhile, and it could be linked from this article.--Curtis Clark 00:33, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

On the other hand, "Usually all females of a species have certain chromosomes present or missing that make them female." is clearly wrong, except possibly in one specific interpretation. It all hinges on the word "usually". According to biomass, organisms are usually plants, where sex chromosomes are so rare as to warrant publications. In terms of higher taxa, organisms are usually protists, again with few cases of sex chromosomes. In the case of species, organisms are usually beetles, and if beetles have the same sex determination as fruit flies (I don't know), then perhaps the statement could be true. And I did look up sex-determination system, which deals with sex chromosomes. --Curtis Clark 01:43, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Okay, let's clear up the facts on this page so no one adds incorrect information to the actual article. Note that the below apply only to animals because gender distinctions in plants are nearly impossible to draw except in a very limited number of species and all but impossible outside of the plant and animal kingdoms.

  • Female is the "default" sex for humans and other mammals. Until hormones begin acting to cause "maleness" during early embryological development, all embryos are morphologically female. Whether that actually makes them female is debatable, but it is true that the penis develops from an infolding that could be considered a "proto-vagina", if you will. I honestly don't know how the determination of sex works in development in non-mammals.
  • While mammals use the XX-XY system for sex determination, this is not by any means the dominant system for gender determination. Birds use ZZ(male)-ZW(female). Most insects use X(male)-XX(female). Male bees and ants in most species are haploid while their female and asexual counterparts are diploid. In the mammal Tympanoctomys barrerae, or red viscacha rat, the system is XXXY(male)-XXXX(female) because the entire species is tetraploid instead of diploid. In short, XX-XY is a naive and narrow definition of maleness and femaleness that only applies to (most) mammals.

Hope that clears things up. —Cuiviénen (Cuivië) 01:53, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] No mention of Humans

How about some mention of humans? Like maybe something about how human females are generally called women?

It seems to me that's well-covered in the "See also", with links to full articles on the subjects.--Curtis Clark 15:27, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Encyclopedia:Female

First listed in most wanted stubs, this article's scope is not wide enough. See "What links here" :

Etc, etc, etc...

(950 links; Also, I cant't tell the order links are listed with.)

May I suggest a "See also" section to the most prominent subjects ? --DLL 10:22, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
Please see my comment on The male's talk-page.--Curtis Clark 17:39, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Something still amiss in the description of bird chromosomes. I think it should be that male birds are homochromosomal (?), since they have identical sex chromosomes, right? Csari 13:18, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Fixed.--Curtis Clark 17:41, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "sexual identities" template

I think this is extraordinarily POV for an article about females among all organisms, since it is clearly meant to be about humans only (although parts of it are perhaps applicable to other mammals). If it were an article on sexual identity, I'd have no objection at all, but the template dominates Female by its size, and makes the article even more human-centric.--Curtis Clark 04:37, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Not all females are mammals

I think the section on Mammalian female belongs in Mammal, not here. Unless I hear any objections, I'll move in in a few days.--Curtis Clark 04:46, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

If your're going to have a section on female mammals then you would have to have one on every phylum where the organisms can be females. So it's best not to have a mammalian section. As a bio major, I know all too well that not every female organism is mammalian. Darthgriz98 04:51, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I never said that every female was mammalian. I just was pointing out the things that make mammalian females unique. --Luigifan 12:18, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
There are things that make Ascomycota females unique, too. Should we mention them here or in Ascomycota?--Curtis Clark 20:34, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Mention them here. I don't have a clue what you're talking about. --Luigifan 20:46, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
That's why I provided a wikilink.--Curtis Clark 22:27, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Electronics

Why isn't there mention that device connectors (that plug into sockets) are referrred to as 'male', and the receptacles are labelled 'female'? Mr.bonus 23:59, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

See Female (disambiguation). Bennyboyz3000 08:06, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Symbol

I find in older (19th century) journals different symbols for female. Sometimes the current symbol is used upside down; more often, the male symbol is used but opinting in the opposite direction ("southwest" instead of "northeast". Clearly the present convention is not as old as it appears. But I am unable to find good info about the history of the symbols; the sources I come up with read as if the current symbols have been used alsways, which is clearly wrong. Dysmorodrepanis 22:45, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I believe Linnaeus used symbols the same as the modern ones in his works from the 18th C. I wonder if the 19th C. variations aren't the result of the typesetter not having the right sort and substituting.--Curtis Clark 00:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../f/e/m/Talk%7EFemale_c737.html"