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If evolution is correct and I think we can skip debate on this, then the chicken is results of mutations from a previous lineage of animals… Those mutations ha

If evolution is correct and I think we can skip debate on this, then the chicken is results of mutations from a previous lineage of animals… Those mutations happen at/inside the egg. At some point… little by little, two animals have an offspring that isn’t exactly like them. The chicken egg came before the chicken that laid it. Some other animal laid it. And likewise the egg existed before the chicken inside it developed. In no scenario that I can steelman does the chicken ever come first.

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feupan 5y ago
Amen. Another way to put it is that a chicken was once an egg, so even if "the chicken came first," that chicken was once an egg.
- SamBam 5y ago
  A chicken wasn't once an egg. A chicken was once a fertilized egg cell, but an "egg" is the vessel that contains the zygote [1], and was created entirely by the mother (i.e. it is not a result of fertilization). So a chicken was once in an egg. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg
  - feupan 5y ago
    We’re not saying “what came first? The chicken or the zygote?” Consider the context before trying to correct people. You’re just being pedantic for no reason.
    - SamBam 5y ago
      Huh? No, I'm saying something very specific that you may have missed. Many people in this thread are using the word "egg" in the same way as a female mammal releases an "egg" in estrus, i.e. the cell which will become an organism once fertilized. Hence the discussion elsewhere of how the mutation has already happened in this cell. For instance, besides this thread, another person said "resulting in the very first chicken ever. Which of course started out as an egg. I'm saying that a bird "egg", from the Wikipedia link, is not the gamete cell but rather simply the container, created by the mother. So statements such as "[the chicken] started out as an egg" or "a chicken was once an egg" (your statement) are simply incorrect, just as saying "a human baby was once a uterus" is wrong. It's not pedantic "for no reason" (at least any more than the rest of this by-definition pedantic discussion is).
jeffparsons 5y ago
Let me try to steel-man it, then: the "egg" may be taken to refer to the "eggs laid by chickens", in which case there necessarily was a chicken before the first chicken-laid egg. And that's the best I can do. But it's silly, because that interpretation of the question has an extremely obvious answer, which implies that this is _not_ the intended meaning of the question -- if the structure of the question contains the required answer, then you wouldn't bother asking that question at all. So we're right back at of course the bloody egg came first. Anyone else want to take a shot?
- Ekaros 5y ago
  Now, to make it more messy. Are we talking about Chicken egg or Chicken's egg? That is an egg which from chicken came from or egg produced by a chicken? In first case, chicken egg came from non-chicken, in later case only chicken can produce one...

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feupan 5y ago

Amen. Another way to put it is that a chicken was once an egg, so even if "the chicken came first," that chicken was once an egg.

SamBam 5y ago
A chicken wasn't once an egg. A chicken was once a fertilized egg cell, but an "egg" is the vessel that contains the zygote [1], and was created entirely by the mother (i.e. it is not a result of fertilization). So a chicken was once in an egg. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg
- feupan 5y ago
  We’re not saying “what came first? The chicken or the zygote?” Consider the context before trying to correct people. You’re just being pedantic for no reason.
  - SamBam 5y ago
    Huh? No, I'm saying something very specific that you may have missed. Many people in this thread are using the word "egg" in the same way as a female mammal releases an "egg" in estrus, i.e. the cell which will become an organism once fertilized. Hence the discussion elsewhere of how the mutation has already happened in this cell. For instance, besides this thread, another person said "resulting in the very first chicken ever. Which of course started out as an egg. I'm saying that a bird "egg", from the Wikipedia link, is not the gamete cell but rather simply the container, created by the mother. So statements such as "[the chicken] started out as an egg" or "a chicken was once an egg" (your statement) are simply incorrect, just as saying "a human baby was once a uterus" is wrong. It's not pedantic "for no reason" (at least any more than the rest of this by-definition pedantic discussion is).

jeffparsons 5y ago

Let me try to steel-man it, then: the "egg" may be taken to refer to the "eggs laid by chickens", in which case there necessarily was a chicken before the first chicken-laid egg. And that's the best I can do. But it's silly, because that interpretation of the question has an extremely obvious answer, which implies that this is _not_ the intended meaning of the question -- if the structure of the question contains the required answer, then you wouldn't bother asking that question at all. So we're right back at of course the bloody egg came first. Anyone else want to take a shot?

Ekaros 5y ago
Now, to make it more messy. Are we talking about Chicken egg or Chicken's egg? That is an egg which from chicken came from or egg produced by a chicken? In first case, chicken egg came from non-chicken, in later case only chicken can produce one...