A. Wayne Wymore: Engineer

“If all the theories pertinent to systems engineering could be discussed within a common framework by means of a standard set of nomenclature and definitions, many separate courses might not be required.”

A. Wayne Wymore

Source: A Mathematical Theory of Systems Engineering (1967), p. vi; cited in: Jack Murph Pollin (1969) Theoretical Foundations for Analysis of Teleological Systems. p. 63.

“In the minds of many writers systems engineering is synonomous with component selection and interface design; that is, the systems engineer does not design hardware but decides what types of existing hardware shall be coupled and how they shall be coupled. Complete agreement that this function is the essence of systems engineering will not be found here, for, besides the very important function of systems engineering in systems analysis, there is the role played by systems engineering in providing boundary conditions for hardware design.”

A. Wayne Wymore

Source: A Mathematical Theory of Systems Engineering (1967), p. 193.

“In the folklore of systems engineering, there are sayings, “If it isn't testable, it isn't a requirement,” and, “If it is not quantifiable, it is not testable.” I had always tended to subscribe to the particle of wisdom in these sayings. One of the many lessons that I learned from the CATIE experience, however, was that systems engineering had to be able to deal directly and purposively with what are usually considered to be strictly qualitative (unquantifiable) aspect of systems, such as quality of life, for example. The agricultural practices of these small farmers in Central America is such a large part of their lives that to change any part of their agricultural practices might be seen as diminishing their quality of life - even with respect to the color of the beans that the new practices might require. But even if we cannot deal directly with quality of life or user friendliness or enmity/sympathy, we can identify quantifiable figures of merit relating to these qualitative aspects and if we find enough figures of merit and combine them suitably, we might eventually obtain agreement that we have captured the essence of the qualitative aspect, at least as far as this particular set of stakeholders is concerned.”

A. Wayne Wymore

Systems Movement: Autobiographical Retrospectives (2004)

Life , Wisdom , Color , Learning

“[In the year 1957] I have just returned from an exciting meeting of the American Society for Engineering Education where I heard a paper on the new discipline of systems engineering. It is no longer sufficient for engineers merely to design boxes such as computers with the expectation that they would become components of larger, more complex systems. That is wasteful because frequently the box component is a bad fit in the system and has to be redesigned or worse, can lead to system failure. We must learn how to design large-scale, complex systems from the top down so that the specification for each component is derivable from the requirements for the overall system. We must also take a much larger view of systems. We must design the man-machine interfaces and even the system-society interfaces. Systems engineers must be trained for the design of large-scale, complex, man-machine-social systems.”

A. Wayne Wymore

Systems Movement: Autobiographical Retrospectives (2004)

Education , Failure , Learning , Training

“Only if mathematical rigor is adhered to, can systems problems be dealt with effectively, and so it is that the systems engineer must, at least, develop an appreciation for mathematical rigor if not also considerable mathematical competence.”

A. Wayne Wymore

Source: A Mathematical Theory of Systems Engineering (1967), p. 3.

Mathematics , Problem