Humans have somatic cells and sex cells. Somatic cells (all cells in the organism except for sex-cells) are diploid (have 46 chromosomes) and sex cells (spermatozoids and egg-cells/ovum) are haploid (have 23 chromosomes). Sex cells create a new organism when one spermatozoid joins with one egg-cell. The newborn cell (zygote) consists of 46 chromosomes (23 chromosomes from each sex-cell) and a whole organism develops from it. So, sex-cells contain 23 chromosomes because if they had 46 chromosomes the newborn cell(zygote) would have 92 chromosomes(46 46), which is not-normal (tetraploid). Finally, sharing chromosomes from both a mother and a father ensures the originality of the offspring, which is a combination of the two.
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