Books, Arts & Manners

Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, by Edward O. Wilson (Knopf, 352 pp., $35)

I OFFER the following recollection strictly in a spirit of modesty: Four decades before I first encountered the word in the title of Edward O. Wilson’s new book, I had discovered consilience—or, anyway, noticed it at work. Professor Wilson of Harvard—famed biologist, twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and author of the acclaimed book The Ants—chose the word for his title because “its rarity has preserved its precision.” Using the nineteenth-century philosopher William Whewell as his source, Wilson defines consilience as “a ‘jumping together’ of knowledge by the linking of facts and fact-based theory across disciplines to create a common groundwork of explanation.” He seeks consilience of knowledge. The consilience I had noticed was in nature.

GS

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Gerald L. Schroeder

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Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge, by Edward O. Wilson (Knopf, 352 pp., $35)

I OFFER the following recollection strictly in a spirit of modesty: Four decades before I first encountered the word in the title of Edward O. Wilson’s new book, I had discovered consilience—or, anyway, noticed it at work. Professor Wilson of Harvard—famed biologist, twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and author of the acclaimed book The Ants—chose the word for his title because “its rarity has preserved its precision.” Using the nineteenth-century philosopher William Whewell as his source, Wilson defines consilience as “a ‘jumping together’ of knowledge by the linking of facts and fact-based theory across disciplines to create a common groundwork of explanation.” He seeks consilience of knowledge. The consilience I had noticed was in nature.