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.

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

OBSERVABILITY (Constraints on) 3)

M. NOWAKOWSKA states (1986, p.52-4) as follows the observability problem: "The phenomenon to be observed is assumed to be described in terms of n attributes, say y1,… yn. To determine the state of the phenomenon at any given time, one needs to know the values of all components.

"The constraints on observability may be of three types. Firstly, it is quite common that values of a given variable can be known only up to some precision" (p.52).

Practically this is always the case. For this reason, as noted by this author, it is generally necessary to use statistics. But in this case, it is implicitly admitted that a mean between observations of many similar states of many similar phenomena can validly be used.

"Another kind of restriction on observability is of conditional character: it is typified by a constraint that, if yi assumes a value in some range, then one cannot observe the value of variable yj… In practice such situation occurs when some values (usually the extreme ones) cannot be observed at all, or prevent observations of some other variable or variables" (p.53).

"Finally, the third type of constraint concerns joint observability; it is typified by the situation where yi and yj may each be observed, but not jointly" (p.53).

This is basically the indeterminacy (or uncertainty) problem, very basic at quanta level.

"Of course, all three kinds of constraints may operate at the same time in a given phenomenon" (Ibid).

The use of the concept of "state of the phenomenon" clearly shows the fundamental ambiguity of any observation, that is always trying to "solidify" a dynamic succesion of events into a sequence of static states (sorry for the pleonasm!).

In synthesis, even leaving aside physiological limitations, we are always trapped within our mental dichotomy between time and space.

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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