In the article entitled “Back from Chaos”in by E.O. Wilson in 1998, by the use of the term
“chaos” he refers to different kind of ongoing
conflicts, contradictions in splitting
relationship among different spheres of
academia and philosophies such as pure sciences, social sciences and the humanities. In order to address such conflicts and
contradiction he says Wilson (1998: 41)
points to an “ongoing fragmentation of knowledge and resulting chaos in
philosophy.” He believes that there is a lack of communication between discrete
academic disciplines such as science and humanities with their own way of
interpretations standards. As a result, there is lot of chaos in philosophy,. Wilson
holds that these fragmentations “are not reflections of the real world but artifacts of scholarship.” Wilson
uses the term “consilience” or the unity
of knowledge, from the Victorian philosopher of science, William referring that “consilience” is the key
to unification of these chaos in philosophy in
past few centuries. Wilson takes an
even broader view of consilience. He is convinced that there is inherent unity and objectivity of
all knowledge. Thus, consilience would help in linking theories,
facts and knowledge across disciplines to create a common platform for
explanation. Wilson also believes that in the gathering of specialists across disciplines, they can reach to an agreement on “a common body of abstract principles”
with trust in consilience as the foundation of natural sciences and its
branches and also among social sciences to reduce the chaos in their
philosophies. Wilson believes that
intellectual unity can be created by extending the method of reductionism,
widely used in the natural sciences, to all areas of knowledge.
When Wilson states that science is the engine of Enlightenment, he may be meaning that the natural sciences in the past has provided the methods to acquire reliable knowledge about the world of which we are a part of. Rather than a mere act of faith taken on authority, the naturalist’s intellectual convictions about the forces governing the material universe are inspired by this scientific progress. And the successes of the naturalistic worldview go beyond mere intellectual achievements. The extension of theoretical knowledge made possible by modern scientific investigation has been endlessly and creatively applied in the development of new technologies, a medium for social cooperation. These advances have given human beings unprecedented power in predicting, controlling, and protecting nature, all in the service of our flourishing on Earth.
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