You, King Philip, and I: More Than Mere Kin

A thoughtful and refreshingly optimistic piece in the New York Times last week proposed that even as NATO comes under assault from the “let’s go it alone and build more bunkers” camp, Airbnb is busily building bridges. As a humanist, the notion appealed to me deeply that all we really need to get along is a chance to turn up at one another’s front doors. Everything we find there, beginning with the invitation to enter in the first place, whispers: we are all just a bit different, and so very much the same. That got me thinking, naturally, about King Philip.

As for you and me, maybe we know one another; maybe we don’t. If not, maybe we would like one another; maybe we wouldn’t. Maybe we would agree about nearly everything, or next to nothing. Either way, you and I, and King Philip, are more than mere kin; more intimate than just family.

Which King Philip? The one who came over for grass seed. You will no doubt recall him from middle school (or junior high school, in my case) biology. The mnemonic- “King Philip Came Over for Grass Seed”- was used to help us remember the hierarchical, phylogenetic cataloguing of all life: kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species.

Which brings us to my point, and the vague hope it might help us see past the divisions that threaten our shared destiny, and perhaps very existence. We are much more intimate than even our Airbnb transactions reveal. We are more than just family.

All animals are part of the same kingdom (King Philip’s kingdom, if you like). So we share the animalia kingdom with not just chimps and chinchillas, but with salmon and snakes, bacteria and butterflies, too.

Our phylum is the chordata, animals with a “notochord,” essentially some version of a rod supporting the back. The more familiar version of this is our own vertebral column, and many of our fellow chordata- but not all- are vertebrates. We still share our phylum with chimps and chinchillas, salmon and snakes; but the bacteria and butterflies reside elsewhere.

Our class is the mammalia, which self-evidently includes all mammals. We share this with chimps and chinchillas, lions, and tigers, and bears; but not with salmon and snakes.

Our order is primates. Chimps are still with us, but chinchillas and all the rest are now out.

And then comes our family, the Hominidae. Many members of our family, including Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and the Australopithecines- are extinct. There is debate about whether chimpanzees, bonobos, and gorillas belong with us here, or not. But it’s not all that important. My point is that we’ve already come to family- but you, King Philip, and I are two branches more intimate than that.

We are not merely members of the same genus, Homo, which also includes our extinct cousins of several varieties. We are members of the same species- Homo sapiens sapiens. Two branches, on the tree of life, more intimate than just family.

Does that, or Airbnb, really solve any of the world’s problems? I would love to think so, but probably not. But it sure does indicate we are all in this together; so very together.

What divides us is trivial, contrived, the stuff of facades and fleeting narratives. What binds us runs two layers deeper even than family. I’m hanging out down there with King Philip; we hope to see you.

-fin

David L. Katz