I share a quote with my students from Harvard research professor, E.O. Wilson, often called the “father of sociobiology.” He says this about the leaders of the future:
“We are drowning in information, while starving for wisdom. The world henceforth will be run by synthesizers, people able to put together the right information at the right time, think critically about it, and make important choices wisely.”
Synthesizers will run the world!
Combining information into coherence–or synthesizing–represents one of the most important tasks before us. Teachers in the humanities model how to put together “the right information at the right time” in a way that offers wisdom, critical thinking, and important choices.
I remind my students that this is our great work; this is why we read and think and write: we are synthesizing timely data for a world desperate for wisdom.