Slate takes a break from endless political analysis to tackle a biological question: Can humans have sex with other animals and produce offspring?
The answer: "Probably not."
Um, "probably"? Oh dear.
Still, a man-cow hybrid, for example, doesn't seem too likely. (Top-rated talk-show host "Mancow" notwithstanding.)
Nature has built in some firewalls, including "pre-zygotic reproductive isolating mechanisms" -- things that prevent fertilization in the first place. And another is ""post-zygotic reproductive isolating mechanisms," which stop a fetus from developing and being born.
The story adds:
