Many of us were teased in childhood with the question of which came first, the chicken or the egg. As presented, the puzzle had only two possible answers, neither of which was satisfactory.
For ancient philosophers, however, the question was not a simple brain teaser. It tended to force the issue of how the universe was created. Aristotle was the first person known to tackle the issue. In his History of Animals he writes:
“If there was a first man, he must have been born without father or mother - which is repugnant to nature. For there cannot have been a first egg to give rise to birds, nor can there have been a first bird that gave rise to eggs, for a bird comes from an egg.”
Plutarch noticed the gravity of the question: “Whether the Hen or the Egg Came first shook the great and weighty problem (whether the world had a beginning).”
In the fifth century, the Roman scholar, Macrobius, wrote that people “jest about what you suppose to be a triviality, in asking whether the hen came first from the egg or the egg from the hen, but the point should be regarded as one of importance.”
And by the way, none of our chickens has ever crossed a road.
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