The Persistent Chimera
Some of us might have more familiarity with the idea of a chimera than others. Thought to have originated from the Greeks around 750–850 BC, the idea has quietly permeated our shared culture. My connection to the concept is through depictions in video games and animes where a powerful creature is strewn together using parts from lions, snakes, goats, and other animals. The creature is depicted as an abomination of science and religion and must be vanquished. Those who created the chimera disrupt the natural order and are crucified as evil and unnatural. Indeed in the original myth, a great hero named Bellerophon slays the evil chimera with the aid of Pegasus.
Chimerism isn’t just confined to the supernatural and mythical, but occurs in real life, rarely- in a way. Genetic chimerism occurs when an individual organism is composed of two different genotypes, such as the possession of two different blood types or sexual organs. The phenomenon occurs when two fertilized eggs are merged. This event can give rise to some fascinating individuals, such as flowers and cats with two different colors that bisect the organism.
Now, let us extended the idea of chimerism beyond these two specific cases, the one of myth and the one of reality. Chimerism can be connected to the idea of the combination of two or more distinct identities, ideas, and phenomenon. For example, those comprised of multiple races could be considered chimeras, possessing lineage from Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Those who have immigrated with their own language to new cultures where they are forced to merge their former life with their new one. The superposition of fact and fiction. The inter-twinning of past, present and future. The concept of diversity in thought, peoples, and realities.
These chimeras might make some uncomfortable. Differences in reality? Having fact and fiction stand side-by-side? Historically and even now, the idea of the merging of two races would be a troubling thought. The concept of merging things which do not go together has caused immense suffering for organisms of the Earth.
Where this discomfort comes from is a mystery. Perhaps it is genetically inherent to all organisms. Perhaps it derives from social norms of certain creatures. Regardless of our qualms about it, chaos and entropy are constantly driving reality into a type of chimerism. Ideas, matter, and culture are constantly being combined in new ways distinct from their individual constituents. As hard as we may try to purify, isolate, and classify objects, peoples, and natural phenomenon, chaos will ensure that our efforts will be vanquished.
Instead of fighting chaos and vanquishing the chimera, it is a freeing idea that we accept such oddities. That we try to understand and learn from chimeras. We can nurture and combine diverse viewpoints, organisms, and cultures. As Aristotle states, “The whole is something beside the parts.” The path forward will be a chimera of every other path forward. A diverse future of excitement, wonder, and chaos. Embrace it.
