COMPLICATED VERSUS COMPLEX 1)2)
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T.F.H. Allen writes: "Complexity needs to be parsed into two parts:
1) Complicatedness, and
2) Complexity of organization
"In hierarchical terms, complicated systems are strongly horizontally differenciated to make a flat hierarchy. Such systems exhibit complicated behavior
"As systems differentiate horizontally, they tend to differentiate vertically also, developing new levels of organization by an elaboration of organization"(1998, p. 5)
Good examples of this process are the emergence of a social phase in the amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum, or the present globalization process in the man-planet system.
Allen adds: "In contrast to horizontal differentiation, increased vertical differentiation makes system behavior simpler by collapsing degrees of freedom, against the constraints coming from the upper levels"(Ibid)
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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