This is yet another excellent question, submitted by Marty, who has been struggling with this question his entire adult life.  The Coggins Institute for Advanced Studies (CIFAS) assures Marty that he has come to the right place for an answer to one of life's great mysteries.

First CIFAS must clarify the question.  Readers are referred to CIFAS answer on “How can the average golfer break 80?” to understand the concept of the “understood word.“ Understanding this concept, the reader will “understand” the implied wording of this question to be “Which came first, the chicken or the (chicken) egg?”   This is obvious because the question of whether the chicken came before say, dinosaur eggs, or fish eggs is complete nonsense, and CIFAS does not tolerate nonsense.  Having clarified this point, CIFAS will proceed to the answer.

The answer to this question is of course:  the chicken. CIFAS will now step the reader through the irrefutable logic that gets to this answer. 

CIFAS in-depth research reveals four prevailing theories on the existence of life on earth:

        1.    Creationism
        2.    Evolution
        3.    Intelligent design
        4.    Space aliens bringing living things to                earth in a UFA (Unidentified Flying                    Ark)

CIFAS will explore the answer to this question vis-à-vis each of these theories.

1.    Creationism:  The chicken came first.  This is clear from re-reading the biblical creation story, which states that God created “every living creature that moveth,… and every winged fowl after his kind.”  It does not state that he created winged fowls to go hatch the eggs he had created the previous day.  In fact, there is no mention of eggs in the creation story at all. Plus if the egg had come first, who would sit on it to hatch it?  Certainly not the baby chick that is inside the egg.    Therefore CIFAS concludes, and so must the reader, that God created Adam Rooster and Eve Hen, and eggs were laid after that.  End of discussion.

2.    Evolution:  The amoeba came first.  Wait, the reader must be thinking, has CIFAS veered from the original question.  CIFAS responds that CIFAS will not be constrained in its answers.  (Remember CIFAS is a think tank.) Over billions of years, the amoeba evolved into fish and dinosaurs and snakes and….eventually to the elevated life form called “the chicken,” which is revered in Voodoo circles.  But you may be wondering, if the chicken first came from a chicken egg, what animal laid the first chicken egg?  If it was a chicken, then where did that chicken come from?  And if it was not a chicken, exactly what animal was capable of laying a chicken egg?  CIFAS thinks it is safe to say that a dinosaur did not lay a chicken egg, nor did a fish, nor did a sea turtle.   The only rational answer therefore, is that the chicken “evolved” inside a lizard egg, and when it hatched there was a little lizard with feathers, and humans decided to call it a chicken.  So the chicken came first.  Proof of this lies in the fact that if you cook and eat a lizard, you will find that it tastes just like chicken.  Try it.

3.    Intelligent design:  Proponents of this theory are asked to just look at the chicken.  Enough said.

4.    Space aliens bringing living things to earth in a UFA (Unidentified Flying Ark):  This theory is widely accepted by people who have been abducted by space aliens and subjected to exploratory surgery in UFAs.  This theory posits that one day some space aliens were bored and decided to have some fun.  So they put two animals of every species they had on their planet on a UFA, along with some human beings, and brought them to earth.  They released all these animals on earth just to “see what would happen.”  Now these aliens periodically come back to earth, abduct some of these living beings, and perform medical tests on them to see what is happening.  This is a hoot for the aliens, but is not so much fun for the living beings, especially the humans, who are terrified at being abducted.  But CIFAS veers from the point, which is again that the chicken came first. Similar to the reasoning in the creation story, if the aliens had only brought chicken eggs, who would have sat on them to hatch them?

In summary, the reader can plainly see that in three of the prevailing theories, the chicken had to come first.  The other prevailing theory - intelligent design - is utter nonsense, and as stated above, CIFAS does not tolerate nonsense.

CIFAS is glad that CIFAS could clarify this for some of our more confused readers.