The hierarchy of relations, from the molecular structure of carbon to the equilibrium of the species and ecological whole, will perhaps be the leading idea of the future.

III. His father was a doctor and his mother Alicia Adelaïde Montgomery (1863–1945) was a French-Irish composer and music teacher. His works attribute significant weight to the impact of Confucianism and Taoism on the pace of Chinese scientific discovery and emphasizes what it describes as the "diffusionist" approach of Chinese science as opposed to a perceived independent inventiveness in the western world.

He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1941 and as a fellow of the British Academy in 1971. Noel Joseph Terence Montgomery Needham CH FRSFBA (9 December 1900 – 24 March 1995) also known as Li Yuese (simplified Chinese: 李约瑟; traditional Chinese: 李約瑟; pinyin: Lǐ Yuēsè: Wade-Giles: Li Yüeh-Sê) was a British scientist historian and sinologist known for his scientific research and writing on the history of Chinese science. In 1992 the Queen conferred on him the Companionship of Honour and the Royal Society noted he was the only living person to hold these three titles.