The Prosaic Chimera

What is the prosaic chimera ? It is many things: the sum of all knowledge, the world and its machinations, ourselves to a great degree and also a spigot in the escutcheon of all philosophical thinking. It is in a word, paradox. The dictionary definition of the word 'chimera' is a hybrid, a grotesque monster, a fanciful conception. The world is all these things, but to temper our view of it I have preceded the description with 'prosaic', because I believe the world is a kind of oxymoron, an eternal paradox. We know that the earth is hurtling through space at a fantastic speed and yet it is perfectly still. You don't spill your tea do you ? Is that Rolls Royce or what ? Our planet has seemed to have attained perfection. Paradox pervades nearly everything.

The words prosaic and chimera then, are words of opposite meaning. My hypothesis is that the world is built on opposites. The world is dualistic and all branches of philosophical thought originate from the philosophy of dualism. In the end I believe they have to. I don't think the fact of dualism can be controverted. We have day, we have night, we have hot, we have cold, we have good, we have evil, we have male, we have female, and so the list goes on; it is the great yin and yang of life. Everything that exists has its opposite. The absolute to end all absolutes is probably that if there is nothing, which undoubtedly there is, though pernickety scientists would probably disagree, there has to be something for it to exist as nothing, so through relativity, we have the existence of matter and the world. There was nothing, so there had to be something.

Given that there are opposites in the world around us, what does the uniting of these opposites bring ? I believe it creates a third thing, as is symbolized by Solomon's Seal. The two triangles representing two opposites are superimposed one on top of another to create a third thing, in this case the Star of David. In the fusion of opposites we have the creation of something perfect. What is the third thing ? - this new creation . Is it God - a new human being, the world ? It is probably all these things, but they in turn have opposites. God has the devil, so does that mean when they come together they cancel each other out, or is it in fact a dynamic for creativity. When man and woman come together as opposites they create a new human being. Possibly we could say that in God and the Devil creating nothing together, maybe they in fact create everything; a myriad of diametrically opposed patterns.

I have already mentioned the paradox of the world hurtling through space at 65,000 miles per hour and yet appearing perfectly still. It seems ridiculous doesn't it ? : violent movement, no movement at all. The physical facts of the universe are astonishing, in many ways too astonishing to believe. This leads us to the question of reality. What is really Real. What in fact is illusion and what is reality ? We know the facts of the universe, that the world travels at 65,000 mph, and yet it would seem to be an illusion. Perhaps we should feel slightly sick. Nobody has travel sickness. Why do car journeys of 40 or 50 mph then have people reaching for the sick bag. It probably has something to do with perception. We are not aware of the movement of heavenly bodies so it does not affect us. We are aware only of the much more 'local' movement of the car. It is not so much the facts that concern reality, but the perceived facts. This is the crux of the matter, the fulcrum to understanding the nature of the world. Is reality illusion and illusion reality ? Are we again haunted by the prosaic chimera ? Maybe a lot of what we are is what we think we are. Do we indeed think things into existence ? Is reality something totally different ? Is what we experience something completely alien to the true nature of reality ? Possibly we invent our own reality. In thinking certain things exist, or are real, we are actually bringing them into being. This is a kind of reality, perhaps as real as anything we can call real. Reality and illusion are merely two sides of the same coin.

If what we can see with our eyes is 'real' we cannot deny the real beauty of the world. Nature above all is beautiful. The stars, the flowers, the rainbow, the soft summer rain is all a paean to beauty. How many times at the sea-shore as we look into the deep blue yonder have we felt surely there is something behind all of this ? When a child peers into a rock pool and discovers a shrimp and an anemone aren't we in awe ? The world is too magnificent, too wonderful, not to be inspired by something greater than man can comprehend. Have you not felt you were in the presence of God ? Is the sea a metaphor for God, the great life-giver from which all life on earth sprang ? Is nature an image or metaphor for God ? Pantheism is surely high in the cannon of explanations of divinity. The great diversity of the natural world, the flora and the fauna, is all a revelation of the divine. I don't think dying will bring you closer to God. You are in the presence of God now. When you are dead you are dead. When we are alive we can know God just by opening our eyes. I have been astounded by the greed of some religions that fail to see what the world is, it is our great chance to experience God. Thay want more, more all the time. The blind fools are not satisfied with the marvels of the world. They are just sinners if you ask me.

If we are looking for an answer to that age-old question 'Is there a God ?', my mind immediately focuses on the word 'chance'. Is it chance that the balance of the world is so perfectly right ? The tides, the weather, are all to a great extent perfectly controlled. There are ideal conditions for habitation in the world. The delicate balance, which could so easily be upset, hurtles through space at 65,000 mph. Most people would say that could not be down to chance. On the other hand there are always sceptics; their argument would be that there are billions of stars in the universe, and consequently billions of chances for a life planet like Earth to exist. Ther are so many chances for life to develop somewhere that it is not really surprising that somewhere 'by chance' a life planet has evolved. You could subscribe to either view. My theory is that it is both chance and design that the earth exists. God designed it by chance and by chance the world has design. Again our world has all the concomitants of a prosaic chimera.

Semantics, or finding philosophical meaning in the linguistic aspect of life brought me to examining the word 'God'. Quite blatently it is the word 'Dog' backwards. Pure spirit is the opposite of pure animalism. But then is there a link, are they opposites, or are they in fact linked opposites ? Are in fact all opposites linked ? Do things possess their opposite within them ? If you go to enough of an extreme, do all opposites blur ?, become the same thing ? What is true is that just as there is beauty in the world there is also ugliness, cruelty and war. For the good things there are also their counterparts in evil. But this brings us back to dualism, and although the God/Dog semantic idea may seem jejune, maybe it is just another aspect of the prosaic chimera.

I have often wondered if our microcosm of the world is all that matters - i.e. our little world and the few people around us, rather than the whole grand thing, on a world-wide scale. One idea which may have gravity is the idea of fragmented illusions. The totality of the world is not a reality; the particular world around the individual is reality. The world exists for each individual. In a way maybe there are a billion worlds - one for each person. Are we in fact creatures wearing eye apparatus and experiencing our lives as virtual reality. Well that is really just a metaphor for the truth that we are seeking, but is maybe worth considering ! Fragmented illusions seem more believable than total reality.

Reality and Illusion seem to be pertinent too when we consider concepts of time. Some people believe that there is no such thing as linear time, but that everything is happening simultaneously. The truth is probably that there is and there isn't linear time. Like everything in this double-visioned universe the concepts are split. There is one reality and there is another reality co-existing. The chimera is not so much prosaic, as verging on the edge of madness. If everything in the world is a paradox and everything is split is the world the mirror of madness ? Everything that exists in the world with its opposite number does and doesn't exist, is and isn't what it purports to be. The world may be mad, but given our hypothesis is also of course sane. In the end we can believe what we want to believe, but to follow through our hypothesis we should also not believe what we want to believe. This is where it starts not to matter about anything. Like in Ecclesiastes man should take it all with a pinch of salt. It is all vanity - just enjoy yourself !

In conclusion the chimera is like a peacock's plumage, a woman's multi-coloured scarf, or a terrazzo mosaic of intricate design: the fact that it is also prosaic is part of the world's truth - it is the enigma of the universal oxymoron !