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

STABILITY CONDITIONS 1)

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Stability being a basic need for complex dynamical systems, a good understanding of stability conditions is very important.

Systems may resist destabilization in different ways:

1/ By the use of internal devices as for example:

- regulators and controls which adapt the system to the environmental variations (in a more or less statistical way)

- redundancy, which may allow one component or subsystem to replace another one, not able to function correctly

- variety, which offers to the system the possibility to select a specific response within a number of possible ones.

2/ By some pre-adaptation to a definite environment specially favourable:

- By avoiding excessive specialization in order to be able to adapt itself to different types of environments

- By acquiring the capacity to modify the environment in a way better suited to its needs.

All these conditions aim at the maintenance of the identity and permanence of the system. In the case of giant fluctuations and dissipative structuration, stability is irretrievably lost, but may be recovered for the benefit of the newly structured system which will possibly replace the former one.

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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