The Third Thing, D H Lawrence; David Suzuki: The Whole is Greater than the Sum of the Parts

The Third Thing 

Water is H20, hydrogen two parts, oxygen one,

But there is also a third thing, that makes it water

And nobody knows what that is.

The atom locks up two energies

But it is a third thing present which makes it an atom.


D.H. Lawrence


A passage from the personal foreword  by David Suzuki to Wisdom of the Elders, by Peter Knudtson and David Suzuki, 1992:

"While science yields powerful insights into isolated fragments of the world, the sum total of these insights is a disconnected, inadequate description of the whole. Ironically, scientists today are faced with the devastating possibility that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts."