Quotations and Literature Forum

Which came first,
was is it a Chicken or an Egg ???

Its an age old question asked to kids.Have you guys got any answers to this one.

_________________
Ishrat Noor Khan

The rooster preceded the hen and the hen preceded the egg. The omelet came along a great many years later. I like my egglets sunnyside up.

You'll find a good blurb on it here
http://www.word-detective.com/howcome/chickenoregg.html

The egg would have to have come first since no chicken ever came into existence without first having been in an egg, but many eggs have existed without having been in a chicken. What we call a chicken didn't just pop into being from an egg, rather the chicken evolved from foul that we wouldn't call a chicken, by a long succession of selective choices by mankind to produce what we have today.

Walt Haskins

_________________
There are thousands of original comments about contemporary USA found at: commentsusa.com

Thanks for the replies.
But still how can we have an egg, without a chicken?
Or vice versa.

_________________
Ishrat Noor Khan

It seems as though I didn't make myself clear in my earlier reply. What we now call a chicken is a product of selective reproduction. We didn't just suddenly get a chicken but evolved it over thousands of years. At some point, what you now call a chicken would have come from a female fowl that you would not have called a chicken. This is why the egg must precede the existence of a chicken.

Since no chicken ever came from anything other than an egg, while the egg, which comes from other animals than a chicken, the egg must have existed before the chicken.

The problem in your grasping this point is a problem that everyone has in bisecting a continuum. Anytime a continuum is bisected, the point of division is always arbitrary.

Since evolution, either natural or manmade is a continuum, it will always be arbitrary at what point you say the female foul was a non-chicken and the offspring is a chicken.

Walt Haskins

_________________
There are thousands of original comments about contemporary USA found at: commentsusa.com

Thanks alot for the explanation.
This used to puzzle me all round.
Thank Goddness I never had Biology to study.
Thanks alot for the reply.

_________________
Ishrat Noor Khan

I think it's a philosophic question, chicken can procreate an egg, and egg can incubate a chicken, both is relative, if egg come first, where the egg come from? if we assume the egg is turn into from a stone, so, where the stone come from? analogy like that, finally, we find it's no answer.
it's just we will give a name for everything that easy for us to recognise in our lives.

Well cityangelho,
Its really interesting reading the views that people have about Something.
Some serious, Some not.
You got it right.
Its a philosophic question

_________________
Ishrat Noor Khan

A chicken and an egg are lying in bed. The chicken is smoking a cigarette with a satisfied smile on its face. The egg is frowning and looking very frustrated.
The egg mutters, to no one in particular, "Well, I guess we answered THAT question!"

It has, I believe, been often remarked, that a hen is only an egg's way of making another egg.
Samuel Taylor

Congrats Guys.
I hope NO one else is confused anymore.

_________________
Ishrat Noor Khan

The egg came first. As was previously mentioned, fowl (not foul) were laying eggs long before what we construe as a "chicken" even existed. However, even longer before that, the lumbering oviparous behemoths that strutted the plains of Pangea were laying their goodly eggs across the continent.

The only thing left to do now is to figure out why not to count our eggs before they hatch... it's not like it will take long to recount the living chicks at the conclusion of the journey, and it's good to have a preliminary check.

_________________

to address the literal aspect, it depends on what you belive.

If you belive darwin was pretty much right, and we all evolved from pond scum, than something that wasnt quite a chicken had a mutant egg, which turned out to be achicken. so darwin says the egg.

if you belive the bible is right, and that god created the heavens and the earths, etc. than the chicken came first, because he created all animals on the 5th? day. so god says the chicken.

_________________
Why do we kill people, who kill people, to show that killing people is wrong?

True but does anyone seriuosly believe in Creationism anymore (except in backwaters where it is all that is tought, like some places in Asia, USA or Africa)

_________________
"The Truth may be out there but the lies are in your head"
"I tend to think if God wanted us to believe in him he'd exist."