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

NONLINEAR 2)

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Character of a system whose parameters do not vary in arithmetic proportion.

This nonlinear character is generally ignored in many models because assumed linearity enormously simplifies modeling and produces simple solutions.

J.W. FORRESTER observed: "There has been a reluctance to give up the linear mathematical procedures, with the result that models have been biased to fit the linear procedures at the expense of faithfulness in representing the real world"… and "Accepting nonlinearity tends to force a person out of the world of theorist into the world of the practitioner" (1973, p.104).

In effect, linear approximations become unreliable near nonlinear thresholds.

In A. McROBIE and M. THOMPSON words: "If we include the nonlinearities of the system in the analysis, then more than one steady-state solution is produced and the one on which the system settles will depend on its initial conditions" (1990, p.42).

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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