If this is being caused by hormone mimics and not genes, does this mean that some of the girls have XY chromosomes?

It only takes 1 man to impregnate a whole village. Get rid of the rest, and watch crime disappear.

If the theory put forward in this article is correct, then wouldn't the fact that, "According to the scientists, these endocrine disruptors are accumulating in polar bears, whales and other animals high on the Arctic food chain in concentrations of 1 million times greater than their levels in plankton<" also lead to the disappearance of males of those species, as well as the males of any animals that might feed on them (through predation or scavenging)?

If so, then starvation and drowning will be only two in a list of factors which are driving the world's most magnificent animals into extinction.

I'm confused. Doesn't the sex determination come from the sperm, which comes from the male? If more females are being born, then that means the males are creating more X sperms than Y sperms.

Another possibility is that XY embryos are for some reason not as viable as XX embryos. Maybe this is where the estrogen-like chemicals are coming in.

Frankly, if the sex of a fetus is actually being changed (XY to XX) in the womb, then I'm officially really freaked out.

Isn't the sex of the child determined by the father's chromosomal contribution? (ie the variation in X or Y for the second chromosome comes from the sperm). So shouldn't the scientists be testing the levels of chemicals in *male* Innuit tissues?

scary story nevertheless.

To be revived in 1,000 years on an all female planet. I will be solely responsible for repopulation.

"Good! We don't need them.

It only takes 1 man to impregnate a whole village. Get rid of the rest, and watch crime disappear."

Yeah, and we'll be left with the emotional/social violence that some women wield so well. So, sleep tight, women, and don't let the gossip bugs bite.

Digs me.

For the comicbook inclined, I would recommend "Y - The last man", which has nothing to do with the Inuit but a lot with a female only Earth. Nuff said!

http://www.ourstolenfuture.org/

Before any of you gents think it'd be cool to be the "last male around for repopulation"...

...I'm guessing that you're probably accustomed to women from Europe, Asia, America, and so on. So with that picture firmly in mind...

now take a gander at a typical Inuit woman. I'm not gonna say anymore...

The good looking women kill the ugly ones first.

XX vs. XY only determines gonadal sex; everything after the gonad gets determined as "ovaries" or "testes" is hormonal.

So we're either looking at massive levels of sex-reversal (XY females), or the death of XY fetuses due to excess estrogen exposure. It's unclear.

Or due to something else - while I agree that environmental estrogens are the likely culprit, more data are needed to demonstrate them to be the cause.

Devoid of men, women would have to fend for themselves.

To protect them from neighboring female tribes and do the dirty hard labor, the women would have to stratify their society so the uglier ones become the lower class. Lesbian sex would be the norm of course, fun to be a fly on the wall for a guy.

The more difficult time is the transition period. some cultures would still have more boys who would grow up to be men to search out those areas of the planet where women are literally begging for male companionship.

Of course, over time, technology would develop to fix this hormonal problem. Then the most affluent males would be able to spread their genes throughout the world's population, as the less affluent would not be able to use or afford the antidote. Heck, they might not even be told about it.

Imagine a world where the one guy squirts onto a rock and hundreds of women line up to take a small sample of his sperm packet. In his spare time, he gets the pick of the women, sleeping with a different one as often as he can stand.

Can I sign up for this service?

1.The original reporter overstated scientists confidence in the causal link.

2.Pollutants would cause hormonal sex reversal not genetic.

3.We should keep our minds open to alternate explanations, and address the known problem of pollutant loads.

The bloger suggests scientist “BLAME’ these pollutants for gender imbalance “suggesting that hormone-mimicking chemicals ARE TRIGGERING sex changes” (emphasis added). Actual quotes of the scientists show they said the chemical concentrations were theoretically “capable” of sex reversal.

It has been shown than fish eggs spiked with pollutants can revert chromosomal male embryos to fully reproductively fit females, ie the chromosomes (genes) of a male but the reproductive organs of a female (Edmunds et al, 2000, Environmental Health Perspectives, v108). There are no studies I am aware of linking pollutants to chromosome reversal, and the few studies linking pollution and sperm counts (not sperm chromosomes) don’t link the chemicals in this discussion (PCBs and DDTs).

Other explanations for a gender imbalance include genetic heritage predisposed to it or a high miscarage rate amoung boys. Both explanations have multiple causes and factors (some of which might include pollutant exposure). It doesn’t sound like enough work has been done to show that hormone mimicking pollutants caused a gender change in these populations. Also in small populations the gender ratio can be quite out of balance at any one time because there are few births in a year. We already know that chemical pollution in the arctic and elsewhere is having a negative effect on humans and wildlife, that should be enough cause to reduce pollutant loads and persistence and toxicity of chemicals of commerce.

If a modern novel is more to your taste I'd recommend David Brin's "Glory Season".

The baby-girl boom is being blamed on the high levels of estrogen-mimicking, man-made chemicals in Inuit mothers' blood.

Why, exactly, are they theorizing this instead of theorizing that the estrogen-mimicking chemicals are causing men to produce more X-chromosome sperm than Y-chromosome sperm?

From Reuters, 'Fatherless' mouse created

April 22, 2004 - 9:44AM

Today's edition of the science journal Nature reports the birth of Kaguya, the daughter of two female mice and the first time a living mammal has been created from same sex parents.

From Fetboy to Brightstar65

Brightstar65, even if you were the last man on earth, women would still not want to have anything to do with you, and women would just figure out how to impregnate themselves without your PIG sperm.