Richard Taite

Clouds would be another example.

They have something called the emergent properties.

And some scientists felt very uneasy with the word emergence.

They even called it emergence emergence.

I heard one person, a very bright, wonderful writer, say the other day, emergence is just like waving your hand.

And it's what was the insulting term he used?

It's an insulting term.

I can't even remember what it was because I was so sad that a smart person like him would be so short-sighted.

You know, if you were looking for wetness,

And you were a classic journalist in this guy's case or scientist who reduces things to basic elements.

You'd say, well, water is wet.

Water is made of H2O molecules.

So I'm going to find the wetness in this H2O molecule.

Now I've isolated it.

Here I have this single H2O molecule.

Oh, I can't find it.

It must be in the hydrogen, the H. No, I guess it's in the oxygen, the O. No, it disappeared.

Water doesn't exist, it would say, something like that.

And the sad thing would be is that scientist who's reducing things to their fundamental elements would miss the fact that it's the relationality, the interaction of the elements, the water molecules, and in the interaction is arising, emerging in a synergetic way.

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.