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IT MAY NOT have been love as we know it, but around 385 million years ago, our very distant ancestors — armoured fish called placoderms — developed the art of intercourse.
So suggest a team of evolutionary scientists, who point to the fossil of a placoderm species blessed with the name of Microbrachius dicki.
Measuring about eight centimetres (four inches) in length, M. dicki lived in habitats in modern-day Scotland — where the first specimen was found in 1888 — and in Estonia and China.
Placoderms have previously been found to be the most primitive jawed animal — the earliest known vertebrate forerunner of humans.
But they now have an even more honoured place in the book of life.
Microbrachius is the first known species to copulate in order to carry out internal fertilisation, according to a paper published today in the journal Nature.
Male fish had bony, L-shaped genital limbs called claspers which transferred sperm into the female, a more effective way of reproduction compared to spawning in the water, the study says.
The females, for their part, developed small, paired bones with which they locked the male organs in place in order to copulate.
“Little arms”
“‘Microbrachius’ means little arms, but scientists have been baffled for centuries by what these bony paired arms were actually there for,” said John Long, a professor of palaeontology at Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia.
We’ve solved this great mystery because they were there for mating, so that the male could position his claspers into the female genital area.
Until now, it was thought internal fertilisation occurred much later in the evolutionary tale of vertebrates.
Covered with thick, bony plates covering the head and trunk, placoderms ruled the world’s oceans, rivers and lakes for around 70 million years.
They were then were wiped out around 360 million years ago in a mysterious mass extinction.
For decades, they were deemed by many palaeontologists to be a curiosity — an evolutionary branch that failed.
But work by Long and others found them to be far more important.
The critters handed on features such as jaws, teeth and paired limbs that are seen today in reptiles, birds and mammals, including humans.
If the new study is right, the “claspers,” over hundreds of millions of years, evolved into the penis.
Microbrachius’ copulatory skill was uncovered last year when Long stumbled across a fossil in a collection at the University of Technology in Tallinn, Estonia.
Males and females probably had sex side by side, with their bony jointed genitals locked together, according to the new investigation.
“This enabled the males to manoeuvre their genital organs into the right position for mating,” Long said.
The position looked, well, rather weird, he admitted.
With their arms interlocked, these fish looked more like they are square-dancing the do-se-do rather than mating.
There is very little justification for entering into these public-private partnerships where the private company end up recouping their initial investment many times over within just a few years. They represent a poor deal for the State in terms of lost revenue. Surely borrowing the money would be more cost-effective?
@Sean: no brown envelopes that way
@Sean: Have a look at who’s invested in those private companies, that’s the reason right there. We’re being scammed.
@Sean: and have you evidence that they are recouping their investment ‘many times over’? The truth might surprise you.
@Aileen Lawlor: I’m not the one who made the claim. Let them produce the evidence.
All tolls charges should be scraped, we pay enough Taxes.
@Jimmy Pea: yes, let’s scrape those taxes.
Surely the revenue from the already paid for East link will cover a percentage of the proposed hike.
@The Bolt: Its been paid for many, many times over by now. That hike would be nice to get a ministers kids some PS5′s.
Every single penny of profit from tolls going into accounts setup and based in The Isle of Man as there would be absolute uproar if everyone was able to see the huge profits being made!
A classic case of the government upping prices with a flimsy excuse and without a backup plan for the public, forcing them to pay.
Clondalkin to Blanchardstown will take you 15-20 minutes by car on the M50, but well over an hour if you take public transport merely because there’s no direct route. Between 2 of the largest areas outside the M50 and 10k away from each other.
The toll bridges have been paid for many times over, and maintaining the roads isn’t going to be an arduous task with the heap of money currently being raked in.
“May”?? How about tell Eamonn Ryan to sort it out.
@Will Roche: he’d turn it into a bicycle lane
@Will Roche: Eamon told TII to do it
@Jonny Spuds: you’d be quicker getting from Bray to the Airport on the M50 on your bicycle most days…
There is no realistic and economic reason for an increase. Costs have not risen, there is no competition and they are already making huge profits. In fact the opposite should be the case, they should be handing money back to the government coffers
@BadBob: The contracts these PPP have is if the tolls don’t get a set amount of vehicles, passing through the government pay the PPP companies the difference.
But if the companies make a profit, the government doesn’t get a bean.
@BadBob: Are you living in the same country where prices are rising. I presume you mean none of the workers are getting paid any more since the last toll increase and on your planet, there is no construction/road maintenance inflation. I want to live where your fuel costs to move all this man and material does not exist. What world has competition for toll gate revenue- we already have different toll road operators. Maybe your world has no extra traffic congestion, car use and naturally road maintenance overheads. The cash for the eastlink already goes to DCC. The westlink funds pay the not insignificant ripoff price paid to take it public.
They don’t want to give with one hand and take with the other yet that’s what they have been doing for years so why stop now!
Why don’t the government call for fuel price reduction. Diesel in many areas €1.99 ltr yet I happened to get diesel at €1.80 ltr. Cost reduction not getting passed on and gouging by large forecourt operators going on
The result of the out-source-everything ideology of current parties in power. As with all other utilities, we are expected to pay for the cost of supply plus a hefty profit for one or other of the in crowd. When is the GE?
Only justification for M50 charge would be if they where actually building a secound level for more cars and a light rail system.
Can somebody in RTE please find the LLS interview in which Gay Byrne specifically asked (the week of the East Link Toll launch) how long we’d be paying. He was told that as soon as the cost of the bridge was paid (estimates suggested no more than ten years), the toll payment would be scrapped. That was a hell of a lot longer than ten years ago.
@Ernie Gallagher: Dublin City Council said they need the money so voted to retain the toll
Ye right.
Everyone who uses the road should pay, not just at a point you cross. If it goes to upgrading / maintaining the roads then put a 20c toll and relevant increase per vehicle, so at every bridge and capture all users, with a cap at the current price.
Ridiculous you only pay to use at a point. Get off before and drive around.
Can’t believe this government just keep hiking up prices and try to put a good face on it saying it’s. Ot the right time, like they are doing something positive by not letting hike happen just now.
Idiots.
@Rafa Condron: What the f. We have already paid for these roads and bridges you talk about. We are paying for their upkeep with every wage packet. This is about tolls from private companies making massive profits already and trying to make more…. Bull when they say it’s for increased upgrades, etc. That’s only a percentage of the money they make
@Rafa Condron: It’d cost you more to drive around.
We are all part of the rich man’s game of chess!! And we ain’t winning!
They’ll “call for them to be scrapped” and then they’ll say they tried when nobody listens
We are all part of the rich man’s chess game! And we ain’t winning!
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