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International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics

2nd Edition, as published by Charles François 2004 Presented by the Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science Vienna for public access.

About

The International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics was first edited and published by the system scientist Charles François in 1997. The online version that is provided here was based on the 2nd edition in 2004. It was uploaded and gifted to the center by ASC president Michael Lissack in 2019; the BCSSS purchased the rights for the re-publication of this volume in 200?. In 2018, the original editor expressed his wish to pass on the stewardship over the maintenance and further development of the encyclopedia to the Bertalanffy Center. In the future, the BCSSS seeks to further develop the encyclopedia by open collaboration within the systems sciences. Until the center has found and been able to implement an adequate technical solution for this, the static website is made accessible for the benefit of public scholarship and education.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Y Z

GENERAL SYSTEMS THEORY: Some axioms (C.W. CHURCHMAN) (1963) 1)3)

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According to CHURCHMAN: "The intent of the axioms is to state two things:

1) that systems are complexes that can be designed and evaluated, and

2) that the adjective "general" in the phrase "general systems theory" modifies systems, as well as theory" (1963, p.173).

Hereafter, the nine axioms of CHURCHMAN are given:

"1. Systems are designed and developed" This statement implies that systems are man-designed, which seems seriously restrict and one would say, unduly so, the possible uses of systemic models, as applied to various kinds of non designed concrete systems.

"2. Systems are component designed".

Confirming the first axiom, CHURCHMAN states: "The designer conceives a design as consisting of a set of subproblems, the solution to each subproblem leading to a component of the larger system "(Ibid).

"3. The components of systems are also systems", This could be called the "matrioshka postulate", However, just as the "matrioshka"(or fractals!), it should end somewhere and somehow.

"4. A system is closed if its evaluation does not depend on the design of its environment within a specific class of environments". Being this a tall order, CHURCHMAN adds: "Usually the designer does not attempt to account for all possible environmental changes. If he does, then we have the following:

"5. A General system is a system that is closed and … remains closed for all possible environments". We obviously pass here from the model based on a concrete situation to a totally abstract one."

CHURCHMAN'S four last axioms are avowedly philosophical and most generally debatable:

"6. There exists one and only one general system (Monism)".

"7. The general system is optimal (optimism)"(!) CHURCHMAN states thereafter the following quite idealistic belief: "The most general task of system design is to approximate a general system".

"8. General system theory is the methodology of searching for the general system".

This statement should be compared with BLAUBERG's et al opinions about General Systems as theory or methodology.

"9. The search becomes more difficult with time and is never completed (realism)".

Categories

  • 1) General information
  • 2) Methodology or model
  • 3) Epistemology, ontology and semantics
  • 4) Human sciences
  • 5) Discipline oriented

Publisher

Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science(2020).

To cite this page, please use the following information:

Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science (2020). Title of the entry. In Charles François (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics (2). Retrieved from www.systemspedia.org/[full/url]

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