I’m not sure but Wikipedia says Although the question is typically used metaphorically, evolutionary biology provides literal answers, made possible by the Darwinian principle that species evolve over time, and thus that chickens had ancestors that were not chickens,[4] similar to a view expressed by the Greek philosopher Anaximander when addressing the paradox.[3] If the question refers to eggs in general, the egg came first. The first amniote egg—that is, a hard-shelled egg that could be laid on land, rather than remaining in water like the eggs of fish or amphibians—appeared around 312 million years ago.[5] In contrast, chickens are domesticated descendants of red junglefowland probably arose little more than eight thousand years ago, at most.[6] If the question refers to chicken eggs specifically, the answer is still the egg,[7] but the explanation is more complicated. The process by which the chicken arose through the interbreeding and domestication of multiple species of wild jungle fowl is poorly understood, and the point at which this evolving organism became a chicken is a somewhat arbitrary distinction. Whatever criteria one chooses, an animal nearly identical to the modern chicken (i.e., a proto-chicken) laid a fertilized egg that had DNA identical to the modern chicken (due to mutations in the mother's ovum, the father's sperm, or the fertilised zygote).[8][4][9][10] Put more simply by Neil deGrasse Tyson: "Which came first: the chicken or the egg? The egg—laid by a bird that was not a chicken."[11] It has been suggested that the actions of a protein found in modern chicken eggs may make the answer different. In the uterus, chickens produce ovocleidin-17 (OC-17), which causes the formation of the thickened calcium carbonate shell around their eggs. Because OC-17 is expressed by the hen and not the egg, the bird in which the protein first arose, though having hatched from a non-reinforced egg, would then have laid the first egg having such a reinforced shell: the chicken would have preceded this first 'modern' chicken egg.[9][10]However, the presence of OC-17 or a homolog in other species, such as turkeys,[12] and finches[13] suggests that such eggshell-reinforcing proteins are common to all birds,[14]and thus long predate the first chickens.
In other words we can look at it either way and still don't know. I have generally sided with the chicken first advocates but the nagging question that lingers is was the egg a chicken egg. After all it was laid by a creature that was not a chicken. The anomaly persists
Extended time in outer space can subtly alter a person's DNA. Which is why American astronaut Scott Kelly, who spent almost the entire year 2012 on the International Space Station, is technically no longer identical to his identical twin brother.
Was scrolling back through this thread and found this entry. And I'm wondering, did Mel Brooks know about this when he gave that name to the character of the governor in Blazing Saddles?
