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Mythology’s Hybrids: Human Imagination or Alien Genetics? Part One

Various mythological beasties, associated with the polytheistic gods include a generic type commonly referred to as hybrids, but which I term the ‘half-and-halves’. That is to say, these mythological beasties are a composite of two (sometimes more) distinct life forms. There are the half-and-halves that are half human–half animal, and the half-and-halves that are half animal–half some other form of animal. My premise is 1) these half-and-halves weren’t mythological; neither were the gods. The gods were really extraterrestrials, and the half-and-halves among the end products of ET’s genetic engineering experiments.

There are many puzzling features in mythology, if taken as purely mythology, regarding the so-called gods. I say so-called because to my way of interpreting things, the gods weren’t mythological but flesh-and-blood extraterrestrials with advanced technology, especially in the field of bioengineering or genetic engineering. A puzzling feature regarding the ‘gods’ and related tales, or even tails, are the half-and-halves (my phrase – you probably won’t find it lasted in any index in any mythology text). But these half-and-halves, for example there were the Centaurs, Cupid (or Eros), the Harpies, Mermaids or Mermen, the Minotaur, Satyrs, Sirens, the Sphinx, the Chimera, Dragons, the Gryphon (or Griffin – alt spelling), the Hydra, Pegasus and the Questing Beast, are just scratching the surface of the sum total of those represented in our ancient mythologies.

The interesting point is that these hybrids are universal within that collective mythology. That is, they appear across all cultures; all geographies. Anytime something supposedly mythological, is represented everywhere, it’s time to sit up and take closer notice that things might not be quite as mythological as things first appear.

Hybrids are nothing new, even to the ancients, for they can be dated to at least 30,000 BCE. There’s this small statue of a lion-man found in the Cave of Hohlenstein-Stadel, Germany.

Where’s the body-on-the-slab-in-the-lab evidence? With no fossil evidence of any such hybrids, perhaps this is where mythology overrides reality. Perhaps it is just a natural pondering to wonder ‘what if’ human abilities could be combined with some other animal’s abilities; or what a composite of one animal’s body parts attached to another animal’s body parts might achieve.

But then again, maybe that’s not the case.

Now clearly, a lot of people, our ancestors, went to a lot of valuable time and effort to create or depict in often quite considerable detail all over the world, the who’s who, and what’s what, in tens of thousands of paintings, literature, statues, figurines, murals, monuments, carvings, pictograms, hieroglyphs, etc. to what we (their descendents) would call nonsense – purely imaginary entities. But I maintain our ancestors would not go to extraordinary lengths to devote precious resources into making images of beings they knew to be imaginary. Translated, they believed with all their hearts and souls that these beasties, globally numbering in the multi-hundreds, whether ‘gods’ in various combinations or lesser mortals (human-animal) or purely animal-animal forms, really existed. Multiply that by more multi-hundreds of ‘normal’ mythological characters that have been honored with thousands of monuments, and well there’s apparently a whole ancient expensive and often backbreaking industry devoted to what again, we superior modern descendents of theirs, believe to be nothing at all.

As an exact parallel, ‘modern’ human have built and erected all manner of monuments, memorials and statutes to really real historical people. Many are on display in all manner of public parks for the pigeons to rest their weary wings on.

Then again, in our modern era, nobody designs and builds cathedrals just to provide work for the construction industry, but rather because the relevant powers-that-be, the instigators and designers and fundraisers of cathedrals firmly believe there is a being who deserves such monuments to be built in his honor. Now the fact that being probably doesn’t exist, at least as a supernatural creator deity, but rather just one of many of an advanced race of extraterrestrials is irrelevant. You build the cathedral because you believe that being exists – full stop. Atheists don’t build cathedrals. Okay, our smart-as-we-are ancestors believed the half-and-halves really existed.

Now that we’ve seen some of the puzzling anatomical features associated with the half-and-halves, beasties that are composites of two or more terrestrial life forms, here’s a hard as solid rock case study that not only illustrates time and effort but might highlight why human imagination is not at work. There’s a very large life-size statue from ancient Assyria housed in the British Museum of a winged, human-headed bull (probably representing Shedu or Lamassu). That would be odd enough, but in this statue of a bull with wings and a human head, you find that the bull is depicted with five legs (please note I can count up to five!). Now, if you were to design from scratch a mythological beastie, one thing I’m pretty convinced of is that you would NOT give it five legs! So, I ask instead, is this statue a representation of one of the ‘gods’ genetic experiments?

Now before pursuing that tack, we’re all aware of the various plants and animals we’ve artificially selected for via breeding pairs of organisms that have the sorts of characteristics we desire such as leading to faster horses; disease resistant wheat, cuter puppy dogs, etc. Sometimes we interfere at the cellular level to increase the pace of the changes we want. We’ve all heard of genetically modified food or genetically modified organisms; of DNA from one species being spliced onto the DNA of another species. We’ve heard of harvesting animal tissues and organs for transplantation into humans. We’ve come into the era of the designer baby, or at least prospective parents undergo genetic counselling and testing before having children. Having children is no longer hit or miss and take your chances. And it won’t be long before babies will be made-to-order if the parents so wish.

Now imagine the genetic tricks a highly advanced, if somewhat amoral race of ET’s were to use terrestrial stock to further their genetic research and agenda. Even several hundred, far less thousands of years in advance technologically of us could produce the half-and-halves of our mythologies.

To be continued...

johnprytz 7 Dec 31
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6 comments

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Okay, let's run with this. Can you give us a couple of your sources that you draw upon describing mythical beasts?

What would be the authoritative text as there are quite a few fanciful books in the public domain and then the New Age collection is some fantasy to the mix. For example what would be a primary text to consider rather than the rehashes that circular reference with each other. It’s important to get a firm foundation for research or you can end up anywhere! I know Herodotus cites a few examples of half human, half animal creatures but the Herodotus texts are dubious on most accounts presented in the writings.

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Jnei Level 8 Dec 31, 2018
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You have the makings of an interesting but worn out Science Fiction trope. Unfortunately, the ancient civilizations of mundane old Earth did a better job of it.

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I've often thought about this. Are humans the result of them finally getting it right? If dinosaurs existed then why did all of them have to expire and free humanity from eventual extinction via the food chain?

@IAJO163 -- No, I'm afraid the human species may be the result of them throwing up their tentacles in frustration and disgust upon realizing they were on the wrong course. If you lend any credence to this nonsense, I suggest you study evolutionary genetics to get a better grip.

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It looks like some interesting discussion points there but a bit too long for many people to explore. Are you able to summarise?

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Wide-spread belief doesn't count as proof of existence. For example, the Earth is not flat.

An alternative theory might be wide-spread (and perhaps unwitting) use of psychedelic edibles. People might have interpreted these experiences as religious revelation.

It's a tantalizing theory, but one would not expect the extraterrestrials to be so fastidious about clean-up, if these fantastic beasts were seen by so many.

Psychedelic edibles. I like that. But remember, only one or two people with great story telling skills would be enough of a source for a whole village to believe in griffoens, dragons and five-headed snakes.

@Spinliesel Let's not forget that there was no modern medicine. Physical and mental illnesses were not controlled. Humans lived in a world of superstition, and when several people in your sphere of influence have mental illnesses, the fantastic things they say and believe and recount wholeheartedly are very convincing, especially when you have no other alternative means of looking at the world and good information is unavailable.

@Gwendolyn2018 I've had experience with mental illness in my family, and I have to say it is absolutely nothing like it is depicted in fiction or in movies. It is extremely easy to find yourself believing something you are being told because it is mostly mundane and it doesn't even occur to you that this trustworthy person you know and love would lie to you. It's when the mundane thing they are telling you swerves into the impossible or improbable in a way that is obvious to you, but completely normal to them...or when their perceptions move into the completely fantastical. If they have "insight" that something is wrong with their perceptions, you can talk them out of them. If they have no insight, it doesn't matter what you say. It can be extremely scary. I've come to believe the reason it isn't depicted realistically in movies/fiction is because it is so disturbing...and not at all entertaining...and at a certain point not that interesting (the "plot" of their story goes no where, as it isn't real). When my dad went off his lithium, he saw aliens, vampires, zombies, bodies on the floor (that were only towels or clothes), etc.. Although I couldn't always convince him that it wasn't real, I could talk him out of taking any of it seriously. Later he briefly went back on the lithium, and then he saw babies, angels, fluffy animals, etc. I couldn't really convince him they weren't there, but even taking those hallucinations seriously wasn't dangerous. Eventually he went off again, wouldn't go to the doctor, and eventually stabilized. Now he's just angry all the time and loves Fox News and Trump.

@Gwendolyn2018 I'm the caregiver for my ageing parents. Mom has Parkinson's and has had various hallucinations over the years, mostly due to med changes. But she still has one where she says the floor is vibrating. This is either caused by the Parkinson's, the Parkinson's meds, or a compression fracture in her back. For whatever reason, I can't convince her it isn't real. She will say a big truck must be driving by (I tell her there is no truck), or plane must be flying over (I tell her there is no plane). The other day she started saying the floor in front of her chair was vibrating again. I assured her it was not, and asked her what it is she thinks could possibly be vibrating in the floor under her chair. She said, "Maybe a fan?" There is no fan, certainly not in the floor, downstairs, anywhere. The other day she called me into the bathroom and told me to "stand right there. Can't you feel that?" Once again I had to say no, there is nothing there. (Again, not a riveting story that would ever make it into fiction.)

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