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.

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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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GLUE 1)4)

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A general metaphor covering "a range of related verbs such as adhere, attach, bind, bond, cohere, combine, connect, fuse, join, liase, link, paste, tie and weld "(R. Paton, 1999, p. 153)

These verbs describe various types of interrelations in more or less integrated or lose systems.

All describe processes with their corresponding flows of materials and informations.

"Glue" is apt as a metaphor because while the flows among elements are either permanent or intermittent, or recursive, they imply specific interactions.

Strongly organized systems are those very strongly "glued", as for example living beings wherein the parts cannot remain functional in their own way when cut out of the system.

Social systems or computer networks, for instance, are less strongly "glued "as their parts can somehow maintain their own functionality when separated.

In this paper Paton describes a variety of glues corresponding to different contexts and functions. He explores the relations of the concept with those of pattern, limit and co-limit and its more general meaning in categorical terms.

He also observes that glue relations can be binary or multiple in relation to a single element. There may thus be distinct modes of adhesion, attachment, etc.

(This is already clear at the chemical level for instance)

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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