The internet suggests typical human sperm production rate is 20 billion per month.
Typical human egg production rate is about 1 per 9 months if she gets pregnant, which is the case we care about.
This is a ratio of 180 billion to 1, the true quantitative difference between men and women, for the one difference between us that biologically, evolutionarily matters.
A sheet of paper is 0.1mm thick. 180 billion sheets of paper is ten-thousand miles tall, taller than the diameter of the earth.
Say a postage stamp is one square inch. 180 billion postage stamps would cover an area of 40 square miles.
180 billion teaspoons would fill 350 Olympic size swimming pools.
The mass of a paperclip is 1.4 grams. 180 billion paperclips would require 700 fully loaded Boing 747s to carry.
A 120 pound person jogging an 8-minute mile has a kinetic energy of about 300 joules. 180 billion times that energy was the Hiroshima atomic bomb.
In one month, a man produces enough sperm to theoretically impregnate every woman on earth. (Let this be a lesson to any aliens seeking to exterminate the human race by eliminating all men: if you were to overlook just one, gender balance could be restored in less than a year, if we had the technology.)
The point is, when it comes to sex and courtship, men and women are very, very, mind-bogglingly different creatures. I worry that the law, and other social structures, do not fully comprehend this difference. (Can any human mind actually comprehend a number this large?)
Update 2013: Xkcd energy density
> The point is, when it comes to sex and courtship, men and women are very, very, mind-bogglingly different creatures. I worry that the law, and other social structures, do not fully comprehend this difference.
ReplyDeleteI'm a bit disturbed by the suggestion that the law should be considering groups' evolutionary heritage, rather than a performing an objective ethical analysis of maximizing happiness (or minimizing suffering) for each person/group.
I think my disturbance is just because you were vague, though, rather than because you were actually hypothesizing some plan that involves inflicting a large amount of undesired sex or pregnancy on women because it's more in line with men's evolutionary past.
indeed i am vague. i do know know how, or even if, the law and social structures should change.
ReplyDeletealthough the letter of the law is written to require the same standards of behavior for men and women, we have juries, and each man and woman of a jury is free to judge according to his or her experience.