May 3, 2025
Science

“Chicken of Egg or Egg of Chicken?” The scientific answer to end the debate

  • April 22, 2022
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There are some questions, they are asked in every discussion, everyone gives different answers and in the end it becomes inseparable. Do such questions occur to you? Yes,

There are some questions, they are asked in every discussion, everyone gives different answers and in the end it becomes inseparable. Do such questions occur to you? Yes, as you can see from the title. “Does the chicken come out of the egg or does the egg come out of the hen” We are looking for an answer. In fact, we will try to answer this question, which seems a paradox, by looking at it in the context of science.

The reason this question is talked about so much is because it is a very difficult question. Because for an egg you need a chicken. The chicken also comes out of the egg. For this reason, a paradox arises. Of course, if we approach this question from the framework of science, we can solve things in our mind much more easily. For that, we can dig deep into evolutionary biology and figure out which came first.

Which came first: egg or chicken?

First of all, it is possible to clarify this matter very easily. The egg was something that existed long before the chicken. As you know, not only chickens lay eggs. Many animals already lay eggs. Eggs, which are technically based on catching enough food for the embryo to survive and grow on their own in a shell, existed even as we moved into the dinosaur age. Yes, the T-Rex, whose gigantic size would have shaken the ground beneath our feet had it been alive, was also an egg-laying creature. From this point of view, the egg existed long before the chicken. Considering that the eggs of birds evolved 150 million years ago, we can see more clearly that the evolution of eggs cannot be compared to chickens.

We know that eggs are much older. However, let’s focus on the chicken-and-egg relationship without distracting our topic. Chickens exist in a period of time that is not that important compared to eggs. Actually chicken, a domestic animal, They arose because people chose the least aggressive wild birds and allowed them to breed. It is estimated that this process, which started about 10,000 years ago, occurred in several places at the same time.

Evolution from wild ancestors to chickens

If we look at the evolutionary process of the chicken, the wild ancestors are usually red forest birds It is thought to be a tropical bird that lives in the forests of Southeast Asia. In addition to this bird, other forest bird species are likely included in the genetic mix.

People started breeding the most domesticated red forest birds (Gallus gallus). As a result of this separation, red forest birds evolved into a new subspecies. As the new speciesgallus gallus domesticusIn other words, it was chicken.

After all, what do we say: Did the chicken come out of the egg?

Yes, it is certain that the chicken comes out of the egg. At one point, a creature almost chicken-like came to life in its genetic makeup. brought a small mutation to the egg. This egg also led to the emergence of the chicken we know. Of course, what we call “at some point” didn’t really happen at some point. Many small mutations came together and this happened over time.

A few years ago, a group of scientists discovered a protein needed to form the shell of a chicken egg. This protein was only found in chicken ovaries. This data led to the findings that the chicken came before the egg. Because yes, the first chicken may have come from an egg, but this egg was not from a chicken. That an egg belongs to a chicken a protein called OV-17 it was meant to be. This phenomenon was not found very convincing even by the scientists who discovered the protein. One of them described the question put to him as “Nice but pointless”.

Yes, the chicken came from the egg.

The OV-17 protein evolved as a result of a beneficial mutation in the ancestors of today’s chickens and was inherited in chickens. Dominant protein in chicken ancestors eggs with OV-17, then he brought forth the chickens we know today. This shows us that the first chicken was produced from a chicken egg produced by one of the chicken’s closest ancestors.

The philosophically discussed “Does the chicken come out of the egg or does the egg come out of the chicken?” We have tried to clarify the question scientifically. Looking at the result, we can clearly see that each chicken hatches from one egg. Although the investigation into whether this egg is a hen’s egg is still ongoing, the answer to our question will be “the hen that hatches from an egg”.

Source: 1, 2, 3, 4

Source: Web Tekno

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