The classic

[lonelybooknerd]

If nobody else has one, then lets see what ya'll think of this:

It's a time tested paradox that philosophers before Socrates have been struggling with:

Which came first? the chichen or the egg?

And please try to come up with a solution thats you yourself came up with. Don't just repete Darwin or some other preestablished dogma. unless, of course, its for citation perposes.

I'll let a few of you tell me what you think first (so that way I don't somehow influence the results) then I'll come back share with you my oppinion on the subject.

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

Well, eggs have been around ages before chickens came
into existence, so, at least evolutionarily, the "egg" came
first.

Of course, you can always revise the question to "which came
first, the chicken, or the chicken egg?"

[lonelybooknerd]

That's pretty good. but it does have a flaw: How would you you support that view against a confirmed creationists?

I mean a nerd is not symnonamous with an atheist. I myself believe that some sort of entinty had a say in the way things are today.

So I'm afraid it's a good possibility that there's someone out there who could shoot down what you said and back up their claim with some very covincing proofs.

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

lonelybooknerd wrote: That's pretty good. but it does have a flaw: How would you you support that view against a confirmed creationists?

The same logic applied to a literal interpretation of Genesis also
holds true, I believe. According to the text I've read, God created
the animals on the fifth day, first making "life that moves in the oceans
lakes and rivers" and THEN filling the sky with birds. Unless there is
some rare, aquatic chicken I am unfamiliar with, that means that
the egg-bearing life in the ocean STILL preceded the chicken.

Of course, you could invoke cowardly sea life, thereby using a play
on words to reduce the question back to its original form.

Okay, I've just gone and re-read a few different text versions, and
I suppose one could argue that until God said "be fruitful and multiply"
that only adult creatures existed, so that the adult chicken existed
before sea life eggs existed, however, before you point that out,
consider that in a literal interpretation, the adult life created would
have been created in its present form, and in many species, the
female already carries all the oocytes (eggs) she will ever have
in her life even before adulthood, so my initial logic still holds. As
soon as female sea life existed, even in adult form, there were eggs.

[lonelybooknerd]

before this conversation can go any further i must ask you what your definition of an egg is

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

I think a standard definition of an egg is the single-celled
female gamete.

Depending on how strict or broad you want to go, this can include
immature "eggs" (oocytes), mature "eggs" (ova) and recently
fertilized "eggs" (zygotes), or can be limited to only the stage
where the ovum is ready to be fertilized, and not include the
oocyte which has not yet matured, or the zygote, because both
the male and female gametes have already joined.

You posed the question; why don't you choose the definition
you want? What do you consider an egg?

Alternatively, feel free to re-phrase the question, as in, do
you really want to get at the heart of the question, "which comes
first -- the means of reproducing something, or the very something
being reproduced?" And then, of course, we can bicker about
whether the chicken is the egg's way of making more eggs, or vice
versa, as well as what the answer might be.

[lonelybooknerd]

You still haven't suffishintly answerd what exactly an egg is. because in order find out wheather or not it came first we have to figure out exactly what it is.

so please tell me, in one sentence and in your own words, what you believe an egg to be.

then we can move on to what a chicken is. becouse, as you know, a chicken today isn't anything like the chickens from even two thousend years ago

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

lonelybooknerd wrote: so please tell me, in one sentence and in your own words, what you believe an egg to be.

An egg is a female gamete.

Do I need to explain the definitions of "female" or "gamete"?
Or "is"?

lonelybooknerd wrote: then we can move on to what a chicken is. becouse, as you know, a chicken today isn't anything like the chickens from even two thousend years ago


Well, there is the saying that "you shouldn't count your chickens
before they hatch." So, according to that, we can infer that a
chicken is something that can, but should not be, counted before
hatching.

(yes, that bit was a joke)

[lonelybooknerd]

That's closer, but still not quite what I'm looking for.

I think we're not actually looking for whether or not the egg came first. I think the question is really asking; which came first: the creater or the created.

It might, at first glance, appear obvious the the creater had to of came before the created. the situation gets more complicated when you take into account that at one point even the creater had to of been created.

hopefully now that this idea is out in the open our debate will uncover the truth a little more rappedly

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

lonelybooknerd wrote: which came first: the creater or the created.

They come into existence simultaneously.

The "creator" is not a creator until having created something, and
the "created" does not exist until it exists, obviously.

Therefore, at the instant of creation, the created comes to be, and
the one who had not been a creator becomes a creator.
Happens simultaneously, neither comes first.

Of course, you can rephrase again, to ask: "which comes first, the
being who could create something, or the something it could create?"

[lonelybooknerd]

I think what i was getting at was how you rephrased the question:

Quote: "which came first, the being who could create something, or the something it could create?"

I believe you misunderstood my use of creater and created as pronouns for "the being who could create something" and "the somthing it could create" respectively

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

lonelybooknerd wrote: I believe you misunderstood my use of creater and created as pronouns for "the being who could create something" and "the somthing it could create" respectively

I did not misunderstand. You were imprecise.

[lonelybooknerd]

Ether way, please answer the question.

[iswallowedabug (deleted)]

I think this question, even rephrased, is still best answered by
saying neither can exist first; they depend on each other
for their existence. So they come into being
simultaneously.

What's your answer to your own question?

[lonelybooknerd]

I'll tell you what i think soon enough, but first your going to have to explain your logic.

It's a commenly accepted philisophical truth that somthing can only come from something else. So, if two things were to cause each others existence then they would have to start out as only a fraction of what they would eventually become. Then they would work each other up to their current state. Even then there would have to of been something that started the ball rolling because there can't be 0 of anything and instently 0.0001 of something apears.

Am I undestanding your logic correctlly?