Friday, August 21, 2009

Chicken or the egg

Everyone knows about this paradox. But can modern science give exact answer? After several discussions with friends, I decided to write this post with a precise scientific answer to this question with taking into account the theory of evolution and the different interpretations of the question :)
So, the answer depends on the exact formulation of the problem. The options are:

Which came first, the chicken or any egg?

In terms of general analysis of the language, the phrase "which came first, the chicken or the egg" can be interpreted as a more general case, like, "Which came first, the chicken or any egg" because what kind of egg is not specified in the original question. In this case, the egg came first, because egg came long time before the chicken, for example, fish or dinosaurs had egg.

Which came first, the chicken or chicken’s egg?

This formulation is most likely with the simple people point of view, because means that if we are talking about a chicken, egg should be a chicken’s egg. Because chicken’s egg can lay only chicken, in these terms, the chicken was first. I.e. at first it was some kind of animal, but not a chicken that laid an egg, and from this egg as a result of mutation and evolution was born a chicken, which laid the first egg.

Which came first, any living creature or any egg?

If we consider this statement, the correct answer is living creature, because some bacteria appeared first. And they were not bred with eggs, and then later appeared the creature (or animal) that began to multiply with eggs.
Some wikipedia materials were used to prepare this post
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_or_the_egg