Which Came first: The Chicken or the Egg? Objectively Answered.

[dream_weaver]

If context and definition of terms are specified, is there always a "right or wrong" answer?

The chicken/egg question is a metaphor for the question of how did life, or often (incorrectly, I think) applied to the universe, originate.

This was the essence of my later question to you which you answered:

Assuming I follow you correctly, my answer is yes.

Either at the genetic level or even by an *action* of human volition, a definition can be defined. (ie a finite identification can be established as a basis for answering a particular question)

Fair enough. That may address the issue at the abiogenesis level, Are there metaphysical interactions which are anticedent to the emergence of life? Are those metaphysical interactions preceded by other metaphysical interactions?

This was essentially what I was asking you here. If we attribute the chicken/egg to abiogensis, there are still metaphysical interactions which are anticedent to the emergence of life.

Is that to say that a.) there is no right answer or b.) we do not have the necessary knowledge/data/information to determine the right answer?

Can we not determine every possible answer to the specific question?

a.) chicken

b.) egg

c.) neither

In an existence which is eternal made up of a plethora of actions as diverse as the existents that cause them, is this enough to identify what the regress of interactions is delimited by?

Or: Is there enough information to delimit the regress of the metaphysical interactions which are preceded by other metaphysical interactions, etc.?

[Grames]

Is that to say that a.) there is no right answer or b.) we do not have the necessary knowledge/data/information to determine the right answer?

Can we not determine every possible answer to the specific question?

a.) chicken

b.) egg

c.) neither

The answer is c.) neither. The question is invalid.

Does day cause the night, or does night cause the day? Which came first? Defining day and night precisely is of no help whatsoever for that question. The epistemological problem behind this question was that no one could know the question was invalid until and unless they first knew the Earth was round, and rotated, and accepted the heliocentric theory, which still left a mystery until Newton and gravitational theory appeared.

The tangerine case is trivial. If their color is dead center between two categories then neither category is right and neither is wrong. Do whatever you want with them, you literally cannot go wrong.

The chicken and egg problem is not fundamentally a classification problem, it is a causation problem. It is possible and even necessary to classify things without knowing how they came to be, or what makes them be that way. Like the day and night problem the question dissolves when the common root cause of both the chicken and the egg is discovered scientifically. There is an important lesson there in the limitations of philosophy. (edit: or perhaps I should write, the limitations of rationalizing.)

Edited November 20, 2011 by Grames

[freestyle]

The answer is c.) neither. The question is invalid.

The question, i.) as asked, or ii.) what you have in your mind as the "metaphor" it represents?

The tangerine case is trivial. If their color is dead center between two categories then neither category is right and neither is wrong. Do whatever you want with them, you literally cannot go wrong.

You could identify it as a unique unit. (i.e. a new color name)

The chicken and egg problem is not fundamentally a classification problem, it is a causation problem. It is possible and even necessary to classify things without knowing how they came to be, or what makes them be that way. Like the day and night problem the question dissolves when the common root cause of both the chicken and the egg is discovered scientifically. There is an important lesson there in the limitations of philosophy. (edit: or perhaps I should write, the limitations of rationalizing.)

I still think you're avoiding defining the terms of the question to evaluate it. A question proposed with an a/b alternative begs an answer, even if that answer is none of the above. Given the context, one of those 3 answers will apply.

Why can't I ask you specifically what you mean by "the egg"? Asking me to ignore the specific and literal meaning of the sentence itself removes necessary context and would seem to have us consider a floating abstraction as opposed to a concept.

[Grames]

Why can't I ask you specifically what you mean by "the egg"? Asking me to ignore the specific and literal meaning of the sentence itself removes necessary context and would seem to have us consider a floating abstraction as opposed to a concept.

Because the error is in the method. It is not the case that every question proposed with an a/b alternative begs an answer. The very act of posing the question drops context, or worse it assumes there is no further context to be discovered.

[RationalBiker]

Is that to say that a.) there is no right answer or b.) we do not have the necessary knowledge/data/information to determine the right answer?

The latter.

[freestyle]

The latter.

So that adds a fourth possibility.

A.) Chicken

B.) Egg

C.) Neither

D.) Unknown

But, even within a specified context, there is no right answer?

Is this the position being forwarded here?

[RationalBiker]

Is this the position being forwarded here?

It would seem that what I thought I was clarifying is not the same as the position being put forth by others so I'm not speaking for anyone else at this point. However, to answer your question about what I wrote, I'm not saying there is no right answer, I'm saying that the right answer may still be missed even if people are using mutually agreeable terms and definitions because they may lack some necessary data. They may think they've deduced the right answer though.

That said, I agree with Grames' assessment that the question is problematic to begin with.

[freestyle]

Because the error is in the method. It is not the case that every question proposed with an a/b alternative begs an answer. The very act of posing the question drops context, or worse it assumes there is no further context to be discovered.

Can you correct the error?

What I'm doing is correcting the error by suggesting that the terms (and their underlying concepts) can be determined by objective criteria.

"What these doctrines [The "borderline case" straw man] do demonstrate is the failure to grasp the cognitive role of concepts -- i.e., the fact that the requirements of cognition determine the objective criteria of concept-formation. The conceptual classification of newly discovered existents depends on the nature and extent of their differences from and similarities to the previously known existents." IOE pg. 72-73

In re-reading this section, it appears a few of you here are suggesting that objective criteria is not possible and that any act of classification cannot be scientific (i.e. would be arbitrary).

[dream_weaver]

The conceptual classification of chickens and chicken eggs already exist. The nature and extent of their differences from and similarities to other existents can continue to be expounded upon.

Would the simultaneous discovery of both the "first chicken" and the "first chicken egg" significantly alter that? Would the known methods of establishing their antiquity enable you to answer the question?

Edited November 22, 2011 by dream_weaver

[freestyle]

The conceptual classification of chickens and chicken eggs already exist. The nature and extent of their differences from and similarities to other existents can continue to be expounded upon.

Agreed. Concepts are open ended.

Would the simultaneous discovery of both the "first chicken" and the "first chicken egg" significantly alter that?

No.

Would the known methods of establishing their antiquity enable you to answer the question?

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by this last question. My position is that the question is answerable. The answer is simply dependent on the given context.

[dream_weaver]

Would the known methods of establishing their antiquity enable you to answer the question?

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by this last question. My position is that the question is answerable. The answer is simply dependent on the given context.

Let's suggest that the actual demonstrable "first chicken" and "first chicken egg" were simultaneously discovered.

Would carbon dating, or other methods of ascertaining their antiquity be accurate enough to provide the answer that one preceded the other? Could it be shown that the discovered "first chicken egg" was not laid by the discovered "first chicken" (setting aside the dilemma of what laid the egg)? Could it be demonstrated that the specimens discovered where indeed the "firsts", and not just the earliest demonstrable units? While the answer is "simply dependent on the given context", is it possible to establish the objective context necessary to answer that particular question, given our current understanding?

edited to add

Edited November 22, 2011 by dream_weaver

[DonAthos]

I think I agree with freestyle (he can correct if I'm wrong on this).

Whatever it is we mean by "chicken" -- I guess that thing which clucks and whatnot -- there was certainly a first. And if by "egg" we mean that thing which held our OG chicken, then the egg came first; if by "egg" we mean that egg which was laid by a chicken, then the chicken came first.

Once we are asking a specific question -- the meaning of our terms clearly defined in our mind -- there's bound to be a specific answer. It isn't a sexy answer, and it doesn't really mesh with what's intended by those who pose this question in the first place. I think that the question is typically asked to play up apparently paradoxical implications of cause and effect. "To have a chicken, you need an egg... but to have an egg, you need a chicken... but to have a chicken, you... o dilemma!"

So, in that way, I find freestyle's answer satisfactory. The question is meant to be unanswerable (like others of its kind: "irresistible force vs. immovable object"; "tree falls in the forest"; "one hand clapping"; etc.), but clarity in one's terms results in questions getting answered.

[mdegges]

The question is really, "Where did the first chicken come from?" We know that chickens come from eggs, so something must have laid the first chicken egg We also know that this thing that laid the first chicken could not have been a chicken itself (because chickens hatch from eggs). So what laid the first chicken egg? The only reasonable answer can be taken from an evolutionary standpoint.

"Since DNA can be modified only before birth, a mutation must have taken place at conception or within an egg such that an animal similar to a chicken, but not a chicken, laid the first chicken egg.The modern chicken was believed to have descended from another closely related species of birds, the red jungelfowl, but recently discovered genetic evidence suggests that the modern domestic chicken is a hybrid descendant of both the red junglefowl and the grey jungelfowl. Assuming the evidence bears out, a hybrid is a compelling scenario that the chicken egg came before the chicken. This implies that the egg existed long before the chicken, but that the chicken egg did not exist until an arbitrary threshold was crossed that differentiates a modern chicken from its ancestors."

[Grames]

...

The question was intended to be unanswerable. It truly was unanswerable without a background context of genetics and evolution. With that context the question dissolves into irrelevance because the unit of change over time is not individual birds but genes.

If the red and grey junglefowl can interbreed, and the modern chicken can interbreed with both of those junglefowl, then does this really answer the question since these are all variations of the same species? Is the question about chickens as a species or as subspecies?

The leads straight into the problem of defining a species. The Species Problem article has a philosophical section on nominalism and realism. The Objectivist approach is neither nominalism nor realism.

[mdegges]

The question was intended to be unanswerable. It truly was unanswerable without a background context of genetics and evolution. With that context the question dissolves into irrelevance because the unit of change over time is not individual birds but genes.

If the red and grey junglefowl can interbreed, and the modern chicken can interbreed with both of those junglefowl, then does this really answer the question since these are all variations of the same species? Is the question about chickens as a species or as subspecies?

The leads straight into the problem of defining a species. The Species Problem article has a philosophical section on nominalism and realism. The Objectivist approach is neither nominalism nor realism.

Thanks for sharing that link. It's funny that schools of philosophy are arguing over the definition of species. It's pretty common and well-known (at least in academic research) that the defining feature of 'species' is that its individuals can interbreed. This is also noted in the link under the 'criteria' section. I would say the larger 'unknown' definition is the question of what defines life. This is especially important now that there's a huge focus on AI and bioengineering.

But back to the chicken and the egg scenario: Since the chicken can interbreed with the junglefowl, it's a subspecies. This still means that there was a defining moment in history where the first chicken egg was actually laid, with noticeable genetic variations from its parents. It doesn't seem like there is a philosophical question here at all, now that we can literally study the origin of life. If you want to get into things before that, ie how "life" was first created, abiogenesis is the field that deals with those issues.

[freestyle]

From the Wikipedia article : [[To better understand its metaphorical meaning, the question could be reformulated as: "Which came first, X that can't come without Y, or Y that can't come without X?"]]

I need to think about this more, but it would appear that, taken metaphorically, the *form* of the question itself is a contradiction. It asks to divide an interdependent concept.

I can probably say that better later, but the "xy" alternate form of the question was kind of what I was looking for...

And I still say that it CAN be answered. Just define X and Y first. :-)

[Eiuol]

And I still say that it CAN be answered. Just define X and Y first. :-)

You couldn't just define X and Y first, because that isn't necessarily connected to anything in reality. Your definition would need to be formulated based upon some observations. If you really need to know which came first, you need to answer why you need to know. Presumably, it's to understand how new animal species come about. Animal species are a conceptual distinction, so for this question, figuring out how chickens came about in the first place requires evolutionary science. Then you will be able define your terms effectively. Without that knowledge base, the definitions you provided are arbitrary. Answerable, yes, but answers don't have to come immediately.