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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"… the potential energy flow into heat necessary for a process" (1971, p.187).

This somewhat surprising but quite universal systemic generalization of the concept of cost by H. ODUM is in perfect accordance with the 2nd law of thermodynamics, which controls all cosmic (and human) activities.

The practical lack of a systemic concept of cost is one of the most serious hidden problem of our time, since long term or indirect costs remain hidden due to ignorance or malicious concealment.

Even ODUM proposal should be extended, since any process is part of a system's activity, which in turn takes place in an environment whose correct and complete description, and evaluation is seldom considered.

An excellent example is the "cost" of oil, a non-renewable resource. Is it the cost of its discovery, extraction, transport and refining ? Or should it include the enviromental costs of its use ? Or should it take in account the very difficulty to calculate costs of its replacement as a non-renewable resource?

For the concept of benefit per unit cost, see Foraging theory.

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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