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

NONLINEARITY 1)2)

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Characteristic of a relation in which the variable is multiplied or divided by coefficients themselves variable.

"What comes out of a nonlinear equation isn't proportional to what goes in; unlike linear equations, they may contain feedbacks and thresholds and other features that can yield complicated results "(C. ZIMMER, 2000, p.84)

Some examples are: exponential, or logistic, or asymptotic growth, cyclical variations and chaotic behavior.

According to F. BAILLY, F. GAILL and R. MOSSERS, "Nonlinearity corresponds to the growing complexification process associated with iteration, as in morphogenetic complexification. A mere linear iteration would be purely additive and unable to account for a progressive, structural and functional complexification."(1991, p.58).

Any iteration, in order to lead to complexity, must go with the creation of specific links, i.e. restricted ones in relation to all the potentially possible ones, but still not merely additive.

L. DOUGLAS KIEL observes: "(their) sensivity to initial conditions means that nonlinear systems are historical systems. Furthermore, nonlinear systems are a result of both determinism and chance. While the history of the system determines its evolution, the element of chance, ranging from the nature of external shocks to changing internal dynamics, plays an essential role in the evolution of the system" (1992, p.34).

This formulation seems somewhat ambiguous.

It should be clearer to say that, in the history of any system, pure determinism is perceived as having reigned until the present moment, because the system reached its present state through one and only one line of transformations, while more or less chaotic determinism becomes dominant into its future.

Moreover, while the term "evolution" is very frequently applied to the adaptive transformations of systems, this use is questionable: Individual systems do not undergo evolution, but merely some occasional mutation, which becomes immediately fixed (if not lethal and if transmitted).

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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