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

ERGODIC PROBLEM 1)2)

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The difficulty to determine the nature of the behavior of a system depending of various iII-defined variables.

According to J.S. GRIFFITH this problem appears: "… when the long-term time average of a property of a dynamical system is equal to the average of that property over the phase space of the system" (1965, p.92).

While this is a problem that originates in classical mechanics, it becomes more and more important for complex systems, particularly those not very strongly integrated, as populations for instance. It is now clear that it has a close relation to networks behavior and to deterministic chaos, in accordance with H. POINCARÉ first inklings, when he considered the 3-bodies problem.

A basic character of networks is the presence of various simultaneous initially unconnected conditions, i.e. the basis for chaotic behavior.

All determinisms do not disappear in chaos and return of former states is always possible. However the "long-term" condition is of basic importance, because the reappearance of some specific state may need a very long span of time when the original conditions are numerous and out of phase on a considerable scale. Consequently, it may be very difficult to establish the ergodic character of a system's behavior.

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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