Giving us the ability to reconcile opposites, integrate multiple dimensions and directions, and position ourselves at various levels in a holarchy or create new nodes in a network depending on what is at stake.

We need to be able to combine and see coexist (Edgar Morin - La voie):
Unity/ Diversity
Localization/globalization
Growth/degrowth
Development/envelopment
Conservation/transformation


Here is an abstract of ‘Small is Beautiful – a study of economics as if people mattered’ by economist E.F. Schumacher that touch upon divergent problems, reductionism and metaphysics. Schumacher was also a great proponent of "smallness in bigness" which is quite up to date:

…’It is easy enough to see that all through our lives we are faced with the task of reconciling opposites which, in logical thought, cannot be reconciled. […]

G.N.M Tyrell has put forward the terms ‘divergent’ and ‘convergent’ to distinguish problems which cannot be solved by logical reasoning from those which can. […] Convergent problems are man’s most useful invention; they do not, as such, exist in reality, but are created by a process of abstraction. When they have been solved, the solution can be written down and passed onto others, who can apply it without needing to reproduce the mental effort necessary to find it. […] Divergent problems, as it were, force man to strain himself to a level above himself; they demand, and thus provide the supply of, forces from a higher level, thus bringing love, beauty, goodness and truth into our lives. It is only with the help of these higher forces that the opposites can be reconciled in the living situation.

The physical sciences and mathematics (as practiced today) are concerned exclusively with convergent problems. That is why they can progress cumulatively, and each generation can begin just where their forbears left off. The price, however, is a heavy one. Dealing exclusively with convergent problems does not lead into life but away from it.
[…]

The true problem of living – in politics, economics, education, marriage etc. – are always problems of overcoming or reconciling opposites. They are divergent problems and have no solution in the ordinary sense of the word. They demand of man not merely the employment of reasoning powers but the commitment of his own personality. Naturally, spurious solutions, by way of a clever formula, are always being put forward; but they never work for long, because they invariably neglect one of the two opposites and thus lose the very quality of human life. In economics, the solution offered may provide for freedom but not for planning, or vice versa. In industrial organization, it may provide for leadership without democracy or, again, for democracy without leadership.

Education cannot help us as long as it accords no place to metaphysics. Whether the subjects taught are subjects of science or of the humanities, if the teaching does not lead to a clarification of metaphysics, that is to say, of our fundamental convictions, it cannot educate a man and, consequently, cannot be of real value to society. […] The problems of education are merely reflections of the deepest problems of our age. They cannot be solved by organization, administration, or the expenditure of money, even though the importance of all this is not denied. We are suffering from a metaphysical disease, and the cure must therefore by metaphysical. Education, or discourse, which fails to clarify our central convictions, is mere training or indulgence. For it is our central convictions that are in disorder, and, as long as the present anti-metaphysical temper persists, the disorder will grow worse. Education, far from ranking as man’s greatest resource, will then be an agent of destruction, in accordance with the principle corruptio optimi pessima*."

Quoted from
‘Small is Beautiful – a study of economics as if people mattered’ by E.F. Schumacher