hermaphrodite

• WordNet 3.6
  • adj hermaphrodite of animal or plant; having both male female reproductive organs
  • n hermaphrodite one having both male and female sexual characteristics and organs; at birth an unambiguous assignment of male or female cannot be made
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• Interesting fact: Most snails are hermaphrodites, meaning they have both female and male reproductive organs
• • n Hermaphrodite (Biol) An individual which has the attributes of both male and female, or which unites in itself the two sexes; an animal or plant having the parts of generation of both sexes, as when a flower contains both the stamens and pistil within the same calyx, or on the same receptacle. In some cases reproduction may take place without the union of the distinct individuals. In the animal kingdom true hermaphrodites are found only among the invertebrates. See Illust. in Appendix, under Helminths.
  • a Hermaphrodite Including, or being of, both sexes; as, an hermaphrodite animal or flower.
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• • n hermaphrodite A human being in whom the sexual characteristics of both sexes are to some extent, really or apparently, combined; also, one of the higher animals which is similarly deformed. Such monstrosities are really of one sex or the other, but are generally imperfectly developed with respect to either. They are hence specifically called spurious hermaphrodites.
  • n hermaphrodite One of those lower animals which normally possess the parts of generation of both the male and the female, so that reproduction can take place without the union of two individuals. Such animals are called true hermaphrodites. They are those which have both an ovary and a testis, or a female and a male genital gland, in one and the same individual, as is very often the case among mollusks and worms. The essential organs of both sexes may exist simultaneously, or the animal may be male at one time and female at another; but in either case it is capable of self-impregnation.A variation of this case is seen in some animals, as earthworms, which are hermaphroditic yet copulate, each impregnating the other. True hermaphrodites occur only as an anomaly among vertebrates, but there are authentic instances of the development of a testis on one side of the body and an ovary on the other; and embryologically all sexual animals are hermaphrodites before the primitively similar genital gland has assumed the special characters of either sex.
  • n hermaphrodite In botany, a flower that contains both the stamen and the pistil perfectly developed, or the male and female organs of generation, within the same floral envelop or on the same receptacle. See perfect.
  • hermaphrodite Same as hermaphroditic.
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• • n Hermaphrodite hėr-maf′rod-īt an animal or a plant in which the two sexual characteristics are united: an abnormal individual in whom are united the properties of both sexes
  • adj Hermaphrodite uniting the distinctions of both sexes
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