I think this story is actually pretty cool, but given that I found it in a post by Jonah Goldberg at The Corner, I will take the opportunity to mock him by baselessly assuming that his intent was to insinuate that maybe, possibly religious right knows a thing or two about immaculate conceptions that we in the reality-based world do not. Of course, such an insinuation--if indeed that was his point--would be totally inaccurate.
Though parthenogenesis is not an uncommon way for some fish to reproduce, I don't believe that sharks had ever been known to, well, make babies this way. But in humans, parthenogenesis--whereby a haploid cell duplicates itself to become a diploid-like cell--results in a big fat benign uterus tumor. This is unfortunate in that tumors are deeply unpleasant things, but probably good in that the anti-science right might attempt to use the shark story to buttress some of their arguments about biblical literalism, and end up looking really foolish as a result.
Parthenogenesis has been shown quite a few times in reptiles such as lizards and snakes. It was proven for the first time in Varanids, specifically in Komodo Dragons, last year. But who knows, maybe God enjoys planting his seed in animals too. Don't tell Sen Cornyn though.
Posted by: JK | May 29, 2007 at 10:14 PM
Adding ... There are some species of Whiptail lizard that reproduce exclusively by parthenogenesis to a point where males no longer exist which may be a mode of speciation.
Posted by: JK | May 29, 2007 at 10:22 PM
Sorry I should have put all my thoughts together into one comment, but your discussion of diploidy in parthenogenic animals and tumor cells was something that I had not thought of at all. It turns out that many (all?) parthenogenic animals are in fact polyploids. I would have to go back to notes from classes at Berkeley freshman year though to try and figure out why that might be.
Posted by: JK | May 29, 2007 at 10:28 PM