what came first the chicken or the egg?

[AzurePhoenix]

In that particular case... wouldn't it depend whether or not the first chicken farmer abducted a fowl, or simply stole eggs that he kept for himself?

Actually neither, it would depend on when they began actively breeding together particular brids to get a particular result.

 

"This one lays bigger eggs, let's breed her and her offspring from now on, but this one doesn't so we'll just eat her now"

 

Unless there's some biological definition that separates chickens from red jungle fowl, those first selectively-bred eggs would be the first domesticated jungle fowl, and thus the first chickens. And of course, that would have likely happened independently a few times with different "farmers".

[lucaspa]

I've always thought the "thing" that layed the first chicken egg was not *quite* a chicken itself, therefore the egg came first. Maybe not always, but before this article came out in May, at least.

 

This would work if there was a clear demarcation in evolution. But there isn't. What this is saying is that, in a transition of 1,000 generations from the species before chicken to chicken, we can know that at generation 800 it is definitely species chicken.

 

But you can't do that. The beginning of the sequence and the end of the sequence during speciation are clear. But there is no magic line that you can draw in the middle to say this is the generation that you have the first chicken.

 

" In an evolutionary continuum, change occurs more or less gradually through time. At the early and late ends of such change, everyone agrees that different names are justified, but when one form slowly transforms into another without break, the point where the change of name is to be applied is a completely arbitrary matter imposed by the namers for their convenience only - it is not something compelled by the data." C. Loring Bruce, "Humans in time and space." In Scientists Confront Creationism, edited by LR Godfrey, 1983, pp. 254-255.

[lucaspa]

I was reading the part of the article that says:

 

 

 

I thought that part of the article was very funny...

 

Do kangaroos even lay eggs?

 

No. They are marsupials. They have live birth, but the young are so underdeveloped that they crawl into the mother's pouch -- which contains a nipple -- to suckle and finish developing.

[zyncod]

Well, as much time as this debate has wasted, it has at least served to make one thing clear. A fertilized chicken egg is not in any way the same thing as a full grown chicken.

 

Do we all see the subtext?

[AzurePhoenix]

Well, as much time as this debate has wasted, it has at least served to make one thing clear. A fertilized chicken egg is not in any way the same thing as a full grown chicken.

if you think something like that will ever be clear, stop by an abortion or stem-cell thread sometime

[zyncod]

Oh, I know, but I can dream, right?

[gcol]

There never will be an answer to the specific question as worded, because "the" chicken and "the" egg presumes one specific instance of each, so one might ask, which particular chicken and which particular egg? If this is not specified, there can be no answer.

 

Now if the question concerned a chicken and an egg in general terms, the question is reasonably debatable.

 

The riddle only becomes insoluble in terms of the wording either cunningly or carelessly used.