Chicken? Egg? None of the above?
Beyond the standard chicken-and-egg positions on the origin of life (i.e., ploynucleotides-first vs. proteins-first), there is now fast emerging a lipids-first position (cf. the work of Pier Luigi Luisi and coworkers). For more on the fat-first position and its potential to revolutionize origin-of-life studies, see O. Mouritsen, Life — As a Matter of Fat: The Emerging Science of Lipidomics (Springer: 2005). Question: What is the natural route to lipid membranes in the absence of other cellular machinery?