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Can a creature evolve to reproduce by exchanging the genetic code of two individuals without having any biological sex?

So anything with male, female, both or a third sex is excluded.

If it is possible, how would it work and what are the pro et contra of this reproductive ability compared to other methods like hermaphroditism and meiosis?

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  • $\begingroup$ Isogamy. $\endgroup$
    – AlexP
    Feb 11, 2020 at 12:03

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In fact, bacteria, which lack sexual characteristics, already do what you're describing. It's called horizontal gene transfer. Basically, living members of the population swap DNA with their neighbors. It's actually a pretty common activity, and helps mutations spread more quickly through asexually reproducing species.

That being said, typically smaller and simpler segments of DNA are swapped between members. True sexual reproduction transmits far more information, achieves a much greater amount of genetic diversity, and is more practical for organisms that don't reproduce every few hours.

The process could, potentially, work in macroorganisms, but complex organisms have literally billions more base pairs than the prokaryotes that commonly engage in this sharing. To share enough DNA to boost phenotypic diversity, DNA would have to be carefully packaged and transferred, likely in chromosome-like structures. Organisms would have to develop specialized external genetic transfer structures, and pretty soon you'd be back to sexual reproduction.

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Soil fungus reproduce this way, they can share DNA across the cell membrane. Imagine this, two fungus grow in a forest a mile apart. Eventually they meet up and share DNA, (fingerlike tendrils extend and touch like that Sistene chapel painting of God extending his finger to Adam). The fungus continues to grow until it meets a fungus from another part of the forest, they share DNA and so on. You will eventually end up with something like Armillaria solidipes, which is the largest organism in the world, measuring nearly 4 miles across.

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  • $\begingroup$ Hi Adam Douglas! Welcome to Worldbuilding.SE. This is a really good answer, and I look forward to other answers by you. I was wondering if you could add some paragraphs to your answer? The information in it is really useful, but the formatting (or lack thereof) makes it slightly hard to see what you are trying to say. $\endgroup$ Feb 11, 2020 at 3:16
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Most earthworm species are hermaphrodites, and thus have no sexes. Each worm has both spermatheca and testes, but... these organs are not actually associated with any sex (as in gender). Earthworms reproduce sexually.

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  • $\begingroup$ That's not what hermaphrodite is, Earthworms have sex, They just had both. They're not asexual by any means. $\endgroup$ Feb 14, 2023 at 5:46
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    $\begingroup$ I specifically said "Earthworms reproduce sexually". That means that they have sex and are not asexual. $\endgroup$
    – cowlinator
    Mar 2, 2023 at 22:40
  • $\begingroup$ Read the question then "anything with male, female, both or a third sex is excluded." $\endgroup$ Mar 6, 2023 at 23:01
  • $\begingroup$ And you said they have no sex, you can't reproduce sexual without a sex or both in the case of earthworms. $\endgroup$ Mar 6, 2023 at 23:07

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