Saturday, 26 February 2011

Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road? (information from webpage)

Why did the chicken cross the road? Why!!?? How I know why the chicken cross the road? I cannot read their mind…I also do not understand their language.. Can anyone of you tell me the reason? For me, I will answer because the chicken want to cross the road? This is the common answer.The question "Why did the chicken cross the road" is invalid. It is invalid because "why" assumes that the chicken had some reason for taking the action "cross the road". This, in turn, assumes that the chicken has the concept of "road"; after all, if the chicken doesn't know that the road is there, then the chicken did not - from the chicken point of view - cross the road, and consequently it is meaningless to ask for its motivations for doing so. Since chicken is an animal, it is unlikely that it has the concept of road in the same sense than humans do. Why would a flying bird need roads?
Q: Why did the chicken run across the road?
A: There was a car coming.
Q: Why did the chicken cross the road halfway?
A: She wanted to lay it on the line.
Q: Why did the chicken cross the road?
A: She wanted to stretch her legs.
Q: Why did the chicken cross the road?
A: To prove to the possum it could actually be done!
 The cause of the chicken's crossing of the road was the action of a particularly strong gust of wind in that direction. This provides an adequate explanation for the phenomenon and answers the question "Why did the chicken cross the road?" without imputing sentience or intentionality to the chicken's actions. The standard answer to the question: "To get to the other side. To understand 'the other side' the chicken must have knowledge of some object with two sides, understand that it is on one side of said object and desire to cross the object to reach the other side. Implied in this answer is that there is no further motivation other than getting to "the other side" and hence we cannot suggest that the answer simply left off the fact that there was a pile of grain on the other side which is the 'real' reason the chicken crossed the road.  "Why did the chicken cross the road?" with the statement "To get to the other side" all without in the least requiring that the chicken understand roads in the sense that we as humans understand roads.

1 comment:

  1. Which one is your idea then? The white print or the black? You can always give your own opinion or add to what the rest has been saying about why the chicken cross the road. Personally, I don't think the chicken knew that it's crossing a road in the first place. Probably, it saw a clearing and walked or dashed across depending on how confident it felt about not being harassed by anyone or anything along the way.

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