BCSSS

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.

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MODELING (Systemic) 2)

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G. KLIR explains the status of systems modeling as follows: "What does it mean to construct a system that is a model of something else? First, it means that a system, when considered on its own, is not a model. It becomes a model only in a relationship to another system, which usually is referred to as an original. Furthermore, this relation is not arbitrary, but it must be a homomorphic relation".

"A homomorphic relation (or homomorphism) between two systems is contingent upon a function from relevant entities of one system (the original) onto the corresponding entities of the other system (the modeling system), under which the relation among the entities is preserved. If the function, which is called a homomorphic function, is bijective, the relation is preserved completely (we say that the two systems are isomorphic); otherwise it is preserved only in a simplified form" (1991, p.77).

A perfect isomorphism is conceivable only between two (or more) models.

KLIR also states: "Systems models are constructed for the purposes of explanation, prediction, and sometimes, retrodiction" (p.83).

He also distinguishes between:

1) the postulational approach, in which "… a hypothetical generative system or an epistemological higher system is postulated… (as) a result of the scientist's background knowledge, experience, insight, intuition and the like. It is a frame for a specific type of deductive reasoning" (p.83) and

2) the discovery approach which is data-driven: "That is, models are derived by processes that discover patterns in data and utilize them for making inductive inferences" (p.84).

KLIR adds: "Neither of the two extremes (and idealized) approaches is actually ever used in its pure form in praxis" (p.84).

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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