What's older the egg or the chicken ?

[Baron Vlad Felix]

What's older the egg or the chicken ?:hmmm:

[Adhamh Ashashi]

There is no definite answer. What could be the answer is that slowly but surely some form of animal evolved into what we call the "chicken". And for all we know the "chicken " could still be evolving.

So the answer would be Evolution.

[Ishoss]

Cell---> Water Thing---> Land thing--->Chicken---Chicken laying egg.

I s'pose

[Cluny the Scourge]

Cell---> Water Thing---> Land thing--->Chicken---Chicken laying egg.

I s'pose

The "chicken" came from an egg itself. The first chicken egg. Or do you think that the chicken evolved by rearing up out of a mucillaginous pool of primordial slime or something?

[gambit]

The "chicken" came from an egg itself. The first chicken egg. Or do you think that the chicken evolved by rearing up out of a mucillaginous pool of primordial slime or something?

Yes.

The question is too simplified once you realize it's not just chicken vs. egg.

Something came before the egg, some animal that will evolve into the chicken laid the egg and it came from an egg that came from some other animal and so on and so forth, until you hit bacteria I suppose.

[Cluny the Scourge]

Yes.

The question is too simplified once you realize it's not just chicken vs. egg.

Something came before the egg, some animal that will evolve into the chicken laid the egg and it came from an egg that came from some other animal and so on and so forth, until you hit bacteria I suppose.

Exactly. And something came before the egg - some animal that will evolve into the chicken, but which was not a chicken though probably very similar, but which yet laid the first chicken-egg by the processses of natural mutation. That chicken-egg is the egg posed in the question. Therefore the answer is simply "Egg". It is indeed that simple.

[Cluny the Scourge]

Whichever animal in the ancestral line of all chickens first evolved the necessary final mutation in their genotype to be sufficiently like what we today would call a chicken, having the DNA sufficiently like a modern chicken's to qualify in that category, was the first ever chicken. And that chicken hatched from an egg laid by a chicken-like animal similar to a chicken but, upon closer inspection of its DNA you would find subtle differences sufficently strong to rule it out from that category. In other words, the first chicken hatched from an egg, which was the first chicken egg.

In other words, the egg came first.

There's nothing mystical or paradoxical about it - it's just sense.

[AqD]

What's older the egg or the chicken ?:hmmm:

What's a chickren and what's an egg?
________
real estate for sale Pattaya

[finsternis]

Well birds came from dinosaurs. So I guess the dinosaur was first, then a mutated dinosaur (with feathers and stuff), then a more mutated one, then a mutated egg, and then something similar to a chicken (probably a giant chicken since back then birds where really big. Over time they got smaller).

[Kiljaden]

Well chicken is a more or less arbitrary definition for a certain allegorical meme image we conjure in our minds. The fact is that all "chickens" as we would label them across the world are of many different species and subspecies that none of us could conclusively define which is THE chicken. Not only that but within species and subspecies, and even individual popluations there is significant genetic diversity. Even every single generation is separate and different from their parent generation, but the mutations and changes that happen are usually so insignificant or neutral that we don't even notice it unless it's fatal.

So define the specific genome that is "chicken" and then you can maybe find your "chicken". Until then, I'll stick with genetics and a sound understanding of speciation.

[finsternis]

Well chicken is a more or less arbitrary definition for a certain allegorical meme image we conjure in our minds. The fact is that all "chickens" as we would label them across the world are of many different species and subspecies that none of us could conclusively define which is THE chicken. Not only that but within species and subspecies, and even individual popluations there is significant genetic diversity. Even every single generation is separate and different from their parent generation, but the mutations and changes that happen are usually so insignificant or neutral that we don't even notice it unless it's fatal.

So define the specific genome that is "chicken" and then you can maybe find your "chicken". Until then, I'll stick with genetics and a sound understanding of speciation.

You just had to, didn't you.

[Kiljaden]

You just had to, didn't you.

Yeah

Might as well be accurate in our intellectual endeavors If the purpose is to argue circularly about something rather meaningless, then I /exit this thread, lol.

[dwringer]

Cluny's right, it's the egg ;p

[MaximiIian]

What's older the egg or the chicken ?:hmmm:

Oh, you mean "Which came first, the Chicken or the Egg?"

The answer is the egg. Prior to a chicken being born, the chicken's direct ancestor had to have laid an egg. In fact, the vast majority of animals have laid and do lay eggs, regardless of the chicken's existence.

[Bokks]

Well, the answer to this question is simple: the egg is always older than the chicken, after all the chicken hatched from the egg, making the cells from the chicken ever so much younger than the cells that comprise the egg!
If you asked "what came first, the chicken or the egg", then it'd require some thought!

Oh, you mean "Which came first, the Chicken or the Egg?"

The answer is the egg. Prior to a chicken being born, the chicken's direct ancestor had to have laid an egg. In fact, the vast majority of animals have laid and do lay eggs, regardless of the chicken's existence.

Ah shucks, you caught that first!
Even so, I'd say that the chicken came first. For the egg to come first, then it would require something that was not a chicken to lay a chicken egg. Now, I can easily see a chicken coming out of an egg of a close relative/ancestor, but it isn't until the chicken itself lays an egg that a chicken is born to a chicken.
Even if a chicken should come out of the egg in question, it is not a chicken egg unless a chicken laid it. If not, then it's something elses egg that from-which a chicken as we know it was born. For it to be a real chicken egg a chicken would have to lay it.

Haha! This question has been Robertsized (c)! Take that, Vizzini!

[dwringer]

Actually I'm pretty sure that if a chicken comes out of it, it's a chicken egg. Despite what laid it.




Like cloning, say you hatch a cloned sheep out of a cow. It's not a cow egg in utero, it's still a sheep egg. Genetically I guess it's technically neither... but it's still an egg.. which comes before the sheep

[Bokks]

Actually I'm pretty sure that if a chicken comes out of it, it's a chicken egg. Despite what laid it.




Like cloning, say you hatch a cloned sheep out of a cow. It's not a cow egg in utero, it's still a sheep egg. Genetically I guess it's technically neither... but it's still an egg.. which comes before the sheep

Ah, true true. but for all we know the first chicken came out of a red egg. Well... actually red eggs exist... kinda red-brown... okay, let's say a blue egg. Or green. Ew... no, blue. Anyway, the point is that a chickens egg is white... or the red-brownie color. Not blue, in any case. So it isn't until the chicken lays a white--or red--egg that it is a chicken egg.

Mostly, though, it's about principle. A chicken lays a chicken egg. That is simply fact. And for however long it takes for it to hatch, it is a chicken egg due to the fact that it was laid by a chicken. If, however, a dodo is born from it, it doesn't change the fact that it was a chicken egg, it was just a chicken egg that a dodo bird freakishly hatched from.

Same principle. (After all, who are we to know the first chicken wasn't born from a dodo egg?)

[Cluny the Scourge]

Ah, true true. but for all we know the first chicken came out of a red egg. Well... actually red eggs exist... kinda red-brown... okay, let's say a blue egg. Or green. Ew... no, blue. Anyway, the point is that a chickens egg is white... or the red-brownie color. Not blue, in any case. So it isn't until the chicken lays a white--or red--egg that it is a chicken egg.

Mostly, though, it's about principle. A chicken lays a chicken egg. That is simply fact. And for however long it takes for it to hatch, it is a chicken egg due to the fact that it was laid by a chicken. If, however, a dodo is born from it, it doesn't change the fact that it was a chicken egg, it was just a chicken egg that a dodo bird freakishly hatched from.

Same principle. (After all, who are we to know the first chicken wasn't born from a dodo egg?)

A chicken-egg, as opposed to any other kind of egg, is defined not by the animal it emerged FROM, but the animal that gestates WITHIN it - it is the moment of fertilisation within the egg, after all, that produces the slightly-mutated embryo. The egg is what matters, not the mother.

[dwringer]

Good points


But since the egg never lives past a few months, I think the question of "what's older" can only invariably be answered by "the chicken" [I never noticed that wording until just now, heh]

[Bokks]

Good points


But since the egg never lives past a few months, I think the question of "what's older" can only invariably be answered by "the chicken" [I never noticed that wording until just now, heh]

Thanks!

... Kind of an unrelated thing, but my mom once had a hardboiled egg that she painted for an Easter shindig, but was so happy of how it came out that she saved it. Years later... and I mean years... after having forgotten it for a long time, she found it and when she picked it up, heard and felt a hard, round thing rolling inside an empty-yet completely unharmed-egg shell. Finally opening it for the first time ever, she was shocked to discover that the yolk had marblized into a ... well, a marble. (I guess it would have lithified into a marble... or whatever) Anyway, it lasted for a lot longer than any chicken I've heard of! Sadly... she lost it before I was born... so I've never seen it. (Someday I shall make one... unfortunately I like eating hard boiled eggs too much.)

Even then, though, back to a painfully literal debate () the egg would still be older than the chicken, since the chicken was born from it. (Even if it isn't a chicken egg, it's older than the chicken is!)