Anime Alchemy

The first thought that pops in my head when I think of "alchemist" is that anime show, "Full Metal Alchemist." One of my best friends was a huge fan. Anyway, the beginning of each episode had this quote: "Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only truth."
I looked up some definitions of alchemy online, and got the basic meanings- it's a philosophy aimed toward transmutation of the base metals into gold, curing disease, prolonging life, or a medieval chemical science, a power/process of transforming something common into something special or an inexplicable or mysterious transmuting.
I enjoyed Zach Smith's take on alchemy, much more than these web definitions. He said, "But now that I think about it maybe the stories are an alchemical experiment. All of them take place in modern settings but seem to have a mystical quality that supersedes everything else. As the author of the quote above says Gonzalez is blending the past and the present into something new and original." This goes along with the anime, because they're both saying the same thing- they're both rules. The first states that you can't create something out of nothing. I guess that's a basic scientific thing (I think). Like energy- you can only convert it or transform it into another form of itself. Maybe. I'm not a scientist. But the literary side says the same thing. You take what's there- the past and present, and try to blend the two to make something "original" or new, but really it's all the same thing with a different name attached. Water is water, regardless of its form. The themes in literature, regardless of what you blend in it, how you present it and whatever, it always feels like the same thing. Not to be negative, but when people express a fondness for our reading materials, because they related to the themes and to each other, I wonder why. How could you expect anything less, when we're looking for those connections and when all of literature relates to one another in some way. I don't know. I'm tired.