The chicken or the egg causality dilemma is commonly stated as "which came first, thechicken or theegg?" To ancient philosophers, the question about the first chicken or egg also evoked the questions of how life and the universe in general began.[1]
From a modern scientific perspective, the chicken egg came first because the genetic recombination that produced the first "chicken" (though that may be an arbitrary definition in a breeding population undergoing speciation) occurred in germ-line cells in a non-chicken ancestor. Another literal answer is that "the egg" in general came first, because egg-laying species pre-date the existence of chickens.
Cultural references to the chicken and egg intend to point out the futility of identifying the first case of a circular cause and consequence. Themetaphorical view sets a metaphysical ground to the dilemma. 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?"
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