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

BOOLEAN NETWORK 2)

"A system of binary variables, each with two possible states of activity (on and off), coupled to one another such that the activity of each element is governed by the prior activity of some elements according to a Boolean switching function" (St. KAUFFMAN, 1993, p.182).

St. KAUFFMAN writes: "In a Boolean network, each variable is regulated by others that serve as inputs. The dynamic behavior of each variable – that is, whether it will be on or off at the next moment – is governed by a logical switching rule called a Boolean function" (see above) "The function specifies the activity of a variable in response to all possible combinations of activities in the input variables… One can calculate how many Boolean functions could conceivably apply to any binary element in a network. If a binary element has K inputs, then there are 2 possible combinations of inputs it could receive. For each combination, either an active or inactive result must be specified. Therefore, there are 2 to the 2 power possible Boolean switching rules for that element" (1991, p.67)

Many, if not all social interrelations in the most general sense seem to be amenable to network modelling in the Boolean sense as for example: neural nets in the brain, nets in connection machines, social interactions in groups and, possibly in the future networks of robots (see for example R. BROOKS, 1991)

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]


We thank the following partners for making the open access of this volume possible: