They have always know about asexual reproduction...parthenogenesis is usually a form of reproduction that occurs under environmental stresses...example in hot weather more males may develop. Lower forms of life utilize this more, but higher forms have unusual twists in their sexual development.
Asexual is weaker and will lead to more mutations since there is not an exchange in genetic material. That is why sexual reproduction occurred and has flourished here on earth.
The terminology is a little loose, virgin conception would be more correct usually. It did not say the shark if it ever had sex before.
Virgin birth is a coined word. It can happen in humans, if there is no penetration and sperm get close the the vagina, it is possible for one sperm out of six million to swim up to the uterus and into the correct fallopian tube. Not very likely though.
I do not believe that Christ was a little zygote that was not placed into Mary's uterus. I have always seen the conception of Christ as spiritual substance that appeared and formed into a sperm or simply entered the egg directly. It is the only way an Y chromosome could have put there so the child would be male. Christ was made of flesh of man, and it was promised to Eve that her seed would be used.
God has mirrored the complexities of sexual reproduction in all of his creation. There is such a wide and extremely interesting variation. There are seven layers to sexual development....it is way too complex to discuss right now.
Beloved