I have an .so file which I pulled from an Android APK (Not my app, so I don't have access to the source, just the library)
I want to use this shared object on my 32 bit Ubuntu machine, and call some functions from it (Preferably with Python) . Is it possible to convert an Android .so to a Linux .so?
Or is there any simple solution to accessing the functions in the .so without resorting to a hefty virtual machine or something?
Thanks
Most likely not. It's very probably the Android you pull it from is running on the ARM architecture, and therefore the .so library was compiled for that architecture. 
Unless your desktop machine is also on the ARM architecture (it's most likely x86 and it would have to be specific such as ARMv7) the .so binary will be incompatible on your desktop.
Depending on what the .so library actually is, you may be able to grab the source code and compile it for your x86 machine.
Disclaimer: Even if you obtain a library compiled for the same architecture as your desktop (from x86 phone), there is no guarantee it will work. It may rely on other libraries provided only by Android, and this may be the start of a very deep rabbit hole.
How to use Android shared library in Ubuntu