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Sex in vertebrates

By Young Aus Skeptic Admin

01
Mar. 09


Sex is pretty awesome, lets face it. And for the first vertebrates I am sure it was also fairly radical.

(Actual historical event recorded from 380 million years ago.)

One placoderm to another:-

Fish 1: Wtf are we doing?!?!

Fish 2: I dunno but it feels fskin’ great!!

etc..

John Long of Museum Victoria has recently published a paper in Nature detailing a new discovery he has made. Placoderm fish were the dominant form of vertebrates in existence during the Middle Palaeozoic era and more specifically, the Devonian. A fossil has been found that shows a placoderm, Materpiscis attenboroughi, carrying an embryo connected by an umbilical cord as well as another specimen carrying three embryos, Austroptyctodus gardineri. These fossils were uncovered at the famous Gogo formation where Dr John Long has made other previous discoveries.

So this means that sexual intercourse as we know it in vertebrates probably developed right here in the land of Oz. Go us!

You can learn more on episode 7 of the Pseudo-​​Scientists podcast when we interview John Long about his new discovery and his books!

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 1st, 2009 at 12:49 pm and is filed under Education, Science, The Pseudo Scientists. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Sex in vertebrates”

  1. 1
    NaonTiotami says:
    March 1st, 2009 at 7:27 pm

    The Novellatron and co. talked about this on the latest episode of the Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe podcast (episode 188). Much hilarity ensued, of course.

    This is a very interesting find, and nothing brings the general public closer to science than a sex-​​related science news item. Oh yeah.

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