It’s a really really stupid question. The egg obviously came first.
I always thought that this was a dumb question! The chicken had to come first for a couple of reasons.
# 1- God created animals, even before man, WHOLE animals.
# 2- An egg would not hatch just lying around, it would need warmth and care from a hen or other creature.
So, the chicken HAD to come first!
As a software engineer it always makes me laugh when I hear people quote “The computer model says that [...]”
The computer is giving the exact output it was programmed to give.
If you let me at the code for a little while I can make it give the exact opposite answer.
But what if eggs were brought to earth by space aliens?
“I think the egg came first. A chicken is not defined by the type of egg it lays. (A horse is a horse even if it gives birth to a mule.) But an egg is defined by the kind of creature it contains. (An egg that contains a robin is a ‘robin’ egg, no matter what laid it.) Therefore, if you believe in evolution, at some point a creature which was almost a chicken laid an egg that contained a chicken, and as an egg is defined by the kind of creature it contains, the egg came first.”
— Marilyn vos Savant in her book, Ask Marilyn
Of course, if you don’t think evolution is true, the question is essentially meaningless.
Close on the heels of the reasearch study that produced these amazing findings will be another government funded research study to determine why the chicken crossed the road.