- In Surah 51:49, the Qu'ran claims that Allah made everything in pairs. However, we know that there are several species of plants, animals, and monerons which reproduce asexually through parthenogenesis, and which have only one gender, or really no gender at all.
Reproduction in plants can be either sexual or asexual. So what about a flower that has both male and female organs, doesn't self-fertilization take place in it? The answer is that in such cases it is almost impossible for self-fertilization to take place. The flowers have adapted against that in many ways, which prevented them from doing that.
For example, the stigma will be covered with wax; pollen produced by the anther of the same flower cannot dissolve it while pollen of a completely different flower from the same species can do that. Other ways include having the stigma higher than the anther or having the anther in a group away from the stigma, which is in the middle.
Some plants produce seeds out of which a root and stem grow. Plant tissues are either primary or secondary; with the secondary being either vascular cambium or cortical; the former is either xylem or phloem while cortical tissues are either primary or secondary with the later being either cork or phelloderm. All of this is exemplifying pairing.
Roots could either be primary or secondary; ground or aerial, fixing plants or for storing food. Stems also contain the cortex and the pith and they carry leaves. The leaf is made up of a blade (lamina) and a petiole. Dicot leaves are either simple or compound. Compound leaves are 2 types; pinnates with the blades carried on both sides of the petiole or they can be palmate with all of them hanging at the tip of the petiole. Each blade has two surfaces in which stomata are found. Each stoma is surrounded by 2 guard cells.
Green plants manufacture from simple compounds complex ones, examples of which are Carbohydrates, fats, proteins, and hormones. Auxins are plant hormones that elongate the stem. They also help fruits mature, cambium to grow and cells to be specialized. Here they are stimulatory. However, auxins do have inhibitory roles; they prevent lateral buds from growing. Plant hormones, therefore exemplify pairing.
Animals on the other hand are either symmetrical or asymmetrical. Symmetry is either bilateral or non-bilateral like radial or spherical. Animals could be unicellular which reproduce either sexually or asexually. Sexual reproduction involves a male and a female. Reproduction then is either sexual or asexual in animals as well as in plants.
Asexual reproduction could be in the form of fission whereby the body divides into two organisms. This form of reproduction implies numerical replication of DNA. DNA constitutes the major portion of the chromosome. DNA itself is composed of the two complimentary strands. Pairing is clear here. DNA is the origin of life because it is capable of making identical copies of itself and also because it contains definite information on the characteristics of the living organism. Here lies the origin of life and pairing is very clear in it. DNA itself is of two strands, each coming from one parent. DNA is negatively charged but covered with a positively charged protein. The two stands are attached together by chemical bonds between four nitrogen bases that exist in pairs: C and G, and A and T.
Honey bee is another example of said to be reproduction by natural parthenogenesis. The male bees – also known as drones – have only one function in the hive. Does anyone know what it is? When the queen bee first hatches, she has to be fertilised so that she can lay fertilised eggs that hatch into female worker bees. The worker bees are the ones that do all the work. It is the male drone bee that must fertilise the queen.
So after a day or two, the virgin queen flies out of the hive and high, high up into the sky, at least 20 metres or so, closely followed by all the drone bees. The drone bees have big eyes and big strong wings that enable them to fly after the queen. Now there are only a few hundred drones (compared with thousands of their sisters) and only five or six will be able to locate the queen and fly high enough to mate with her. Once they have mated with her, they fall back to earth, dead.
Once the queen has been mated she will be fertilised for the rest of her life and will never need mating again. All the remaining drone bees will fly back to the hive with the queen where they will live out the rest of their short life – which is only about four weeks – or until they get kicked out in early winter time. So, still there is a need for pairs.