want to learn to play something. which would come quicker and should a person take lessons or can you teach yourself.

Whichever instrument you like best is the easiest.

Whether you should take lessons or not is entirely up to you, although it never hurts to take a few lessons. Some people can teach themselves more easily than others.
Maybe it would be an idea to take just a few lessons for both piano and guitar and then decide which instrument you want to stick with?

In my experience, the guitar is easier. I'll tell you why. The piano has those black keys. So when you play a song, you have to be aware of when/how you play them black keys. SO, If you learn the song in the key of C, but somebody wants to play it in E, you'll have to have a good understanding of how to move the whole song down 4 steps.

On a guitar, moving a whole song down 4 steps is pretty easy - you're just moving your hands down the guitar neck a little farther.

BUT, as far as, "which instrument can I pick up, and be playing something unhorrible quickly?" the piano will get you making music faster I think. But like I said, once you get past the initial steps of learning to make chords, the guitar would probably be easier.

Most importantly though, like Erikd said, which one do you like more? Which one do you think you'll WANT to go mess around with whenever you have a spare moment? Which instrument do you follow when you listen to songs on the radio? That will have a lot to do with it. If it's something you really like/want to play, you'll be more likely to stick with it.

Good luck! you wont regret either choice! You'll be able to tell folks, "I'm a musician" and they just BOW DOWN and throw money and underwear at you.

Have to agree that in the initial stages Piano is ergonomically easier to get a sound out of.But once things start getting more technical i think guitar is more "logical", kind off like a bar graph, compared to a draw of knifes and forks,(and spoons!). I reckon that if you can get through the intitial stages of piano tuition, you're gonna have a more theoretical knowledge of music and find other instruments easier to pick up. Much of a muchness, rock pianists don't use their left hand that much (Bass), whereas a classical pianist has a lot more work. A classical guitarist has more advanced techniques with picking, gee, i don't know, s'pose give something a try before you die wondering
Personally, being a guitarist , i love to muck around with keyboards and find them 'fun', as they are surprisingly easy to play moderately good sounding tunes.

I play both and depends on what you will play.
Piano is much easier to play fast licks when you solo, It's easier too to play chords, if you say to me 5 complicated chords with tensions i can visualise them much easier on the piano than on guitar, i can play any chord on piano it is very easy, but for me it's very hard to move from one chord to another, adn to tranpose tracks too. But guitar is more easy to do basic chords, cause you can use barre chords, to play rhythm on keys are more dificult, but to play chord melodies is more easy on keys. So, to resume, I don't know the answer, i play beter the guitar because i praticed more. But what they said before is right, when you start you may think keyboard is easy, but then after some time, you change your mind.

piano is easier. guitar makes my fingers hurt too much to keep playing it for long periods of time.

Mmm different strokes for different folks

During my whole span of high school instead of partying i sepnt most of my time teaching myself Piano
Piano is pretty easy, the only thing difficult is memerizing terms ,
but both instruments are basically the same,
guitar you just need a guitar sheet, no need to read music

But i think you should learn basic music notation just to be able to right melodies down easier

its funny cause i write all my guitar solos on the piano, or a keyboard that mimicks a guitar
than after its written
i just play it on my strat, with a little improsisation

Guitar and piano are over rated everybody's playing them

find something exotic like a native american flute
or norwegian pipes...
beautiful sounding instruments pretty easy to play

Or learn Bass, agood bass player is always appreciated
my 2 cents lol