LINDSAY@TL-20B.ARPA (11/02/85)
From: LINDSAY@TL-20B.ARPA If the idea of a monosexual society amuses you, then you should read "Virgin Planet" (Poul Anderson, 1959). Our hero (a male) finds a planet which was accidently colonized. The all-female castaways luckily had the technology to cause virgin births (and in 1959, frozen sperm hadn't been thought of). Naturally, the castaways started a hereditary priesthood to maintain that technology. The story line is a bit sexist (and a bit simple). What interested me was the society, composed entirely of identical twins. Everyone was (of course) exactly the same as one of the 100 original castaways. One village was populated by a single type (which disliked all the other types). Other villages had a rigid caste structure, based on the fact that everyone's aptitudes were known from birth. --- As for WHY we have two sexes, I recommend some of the recent popular works on evolution. The concensus seems to be that it is in the interests of women to keep around the silly things "whose only talents are to fight and to make noise". Enjoy, Don Lindsay -------