Ervin László: System

“Cultures are, in the final analysis, value-guided systems.”

Ervin László

Source: The systems view of the world (1996), p. 75.

“There is nothing supernatural about the process of self-organization to states of higher entropy; it is a general property of systems, regardless of their materials and origin. It does not violate the Second Law of thermodynamics since the decrease in entropy within an open system is always offset by the increase of entropy in its surroundings.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 44.

Law

“The classical worldview was atomistic and individualistic; it viewed objects as separate from their environments and people as separate from each other and from their surroundings. The systems view perceives connections and communications between people, and between people and nature, and emphasizes community and integrity in both the natural and the human world.”

Ervin László

Source: The systems view of the world (1996), p. 11.

People , World , Communication , Nature

“Yet while they exist, regardless of how long, each system has a specific structure made up of certain maintained relationships among its parts, and manifests irreducible characteristics of its own.”

Ervin László

Variant: Each system has a speciﬁc structure made up of certain maintained relationships among its parts, and manifests irreducible characteristics of its own.
Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 12.

Parting

“A new level of organization means a simplification of system function, and of the corresponding system structure, it also means the initiation of a process of progressive structural and functional complexification.”

Ervin László

Source: Evolution: the general theory (1996), p. 28.

“When the classical worldview was applied to social science, the dominant notions turned out to be struggle for survival, the profit of the individual, with at best an assumed automatic coincidence of individual and societal good (through Adam Smith's "invisible hand"). When the systemic vision inspires the theories of social science, the values of competition are mitigated by those of cooperation, and the emphasis on individualistic work ethos is tempered with a tolerance of diversity and of experimentation with institutions and practices that foster man-man and man- nature adaptation and harmony.”

Ervin László

Source: The systems view of the world (1996), p. 12.

Nature , Science

“The natural philosophy of the new developments in the sciences is a systems philosophy. When properly articulated, it can give us both factual and normative knowledge. Exploring such knowledge and applying it in determining our future is an opportunity we cannot afford to miss. For if we do not, another chapter of terrestrial evolution will come to an end, and its unique experiment with rational consciousness will be written off as a failure.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 120.

Failure , Nature , Knowledge , Science

“In sum, the processes of evolution create initially comparatively simple dynamical systems on particular levels of organisation. The processes then lead to the progressive complexification of the existing systems and, ultimately, to the creation of simpler systems on the next higher organisational level, where complexification begins anew. Thus evolution moves from the simpler to the more complex, and from the lower to the higher level of organisation”

Ervin László

Laszlo (1991) The Age of Bifurcation: Understanding the Changing World. Philadelphia: Gordon & Breach. p. 112; As cited in: K.L. Dennis (2003, p. 69).

“The description of the evolutionary trajectory of dynamical systems as irreversible, periodically chaotic, and strongly nonlinear fits certain features of the historical development of human societies. But the description of evolutionary processes, whether in nature or in history, has additional elements. These elements include such factors as the convergence of existing systems on progressively higher organizational levels, the increasingly efficient exploitation by systems of the sources of free energy in their environment, and the complexification of systems structure in states progressively further removed from thermodynamic equilibrium.
General evolution theory, based on the integration of the relevant tenets of general system theory, cybernetics, information and communication theory, chaos theory, dynamical systems theory, and nonequilibrium thermodynamics, can convey a sound understanding of the laws and dynamics that govern the evolution of complex systems in the various realms of investigation…. The basic notions of this new discipline can be developed to give an adequate account of the dynamical evolution of human societies as well. Such an account could furnish the basis of a system of knowledge better able to orient human beings and societies in their rapidly changing milieu.”

Ervin László

E. Laszlo et al. (1993) pp. xvii- xix; as cited in: Alexander Laszlo and Stanley Krippner (1992) " Systems Theories: Their Origins, Foundations, and Development http://archive.syntonyquest.org/elcTree/resourcesPDFs/SystemsTheory.pdf" In: J.S. Jordan (Ed.), Systems Theories and A Priori Aspects of Perception. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science, 1998. Ch. 3, pp. 47-74.

Law , History , Communication , Understanding

“The worldview of the classical sciences conceptualized nature as a giant machine composed of intricate but replaceable machine-like parts. The new systems sciences look at nature as an organism endowed with irreplaceable elements and an innate but non-deterministic purpose for choice, for flow, for spontaneity.”

Ervin László

Source: The systems view of the world (1996), p. 10-11.

Nature , Science , Parting

“Progressively higher levels of organization are attained as catalytic cycles on one level interlock and form hypercycles: these are systems on a higher level of organization. Thus molecules emerge from a combination of chemically active atoms; protocells emerge from sequences of complex molecules; eukaryotic cells emerge among the prokaryotes; metazoa make their appearance among the protozoa and converge in still higher-level ecological and social systems.”

Ervin László

E. Laszlo (1994) Vision 2020: Reordering Chaos for Global Survival. Philadelphia: Gordon & Breach.

Appearance

“The notion of "system" has gained central importance in contemporary science, society and life. In many fields of endeavor, the necessity of a "systems approach" or "systems thinking" is emphasized, new professions called "systems engineering," "systems analysis" and the like have come into being, and there can be little doubt that this this concept marks a genuine, necessary, and consequential development in science and world-view.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. xvii.

Life , World , Thinking , Science

“In some regions, under especially favorable conditions, the level of organization reaches that of enormously heavy organic substances, such as protein molecules and nucleic acids. Now the basic building blocks are given for the constitution of self-replicating units of still higher organizational level: cells. These systems maintain a constant flow of substances through their structures, imposing on it a steady-state with specific parameters. The inputs and outputs may achieve coordination with analogous units in the surrounding medium, and we are on our way toward multicellular phenomena. The resulting structures — organisms — are likewise steady-state patterns imposed steady-state patterns imposed on a continuous flow… The organic systems themselves, define the supra-organic (ecological or social) community. Ultimately the strands of communication straddle the space-time region within which the primary systems have come together, and those of its layers which provide conditions favorable to such structuration become organized as systems in their own right. We reach the level of the global (ecological, and on earth also sociocultural) system.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 83.

Way , Communication , Time

“Systems philosophy first must find out the "nature of the beast" This is the question of what is meant by "system", and how systems are realized in reality in various levels of observation. In Laslo's terms, this is the methodology and theory of natural systems. Secondly, there is epistemology, i. e. the methodology and theory of cognitive systems.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. xix.

Question , Nature , Reality

“Systemicity is imposed as a set of rules binding the parts among themselves. But these rules do not constrain the parts to act in one way and one way only; they merely prescribe that certain types of functions are carried out in certain sequences. The parts have options; as long as a sufficient number of sufficiently qualified units carry out the prescribed tasks, the requirements of systemic determination are met.”

Ervin László

Source: The systems view of the world (1996), p. 85-86 as cited in: Sherryl Stalinski (2005, p. 23).

Way , Parting

“Opposed to atomism and behaviorism, the systems view of man links him again with the world he lives in, for he is seen as emerging in that world and reflecting its general character.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 79.

World , Behavior

“General systems theory is the scientific exploration of "wholes" and "wholeness" which, not so long ago, were considered metaphysical notions transcending the boundaries of science. Hierarchic structure, stability, teleology, differentiation, approach to and maintenance of steady states, goal-directedness — these are a few of such general system properties.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p.xviii.

Science

“The beginning of the twentieth century witnessed the breakdown of the mechanistic theory even within physics, the science where it was the most successful… Relativity took over in field physics, and the science of quantum theory in microphysics… In view of parallel developments in physics, chemistry, biology, sociology, and economics, many branches of the contemporary sciences became… ‘sciences of organized complexity’ — that is, systems sciences.”

Ervin László

Source: The systems view of the world (1996), p. 8 as cited in: Martha C. Beck (2013) "Contemporary Systems Sciences, Implications for the Nature and Value of Religion, the Five Principles of Pancasila, and the Five Pillars of Islam," Dialogue and Universalism-E Volume 4, Number 1/2013. p. 3 ( online http://www.emporia.edu/~cbrown/dnue/documents/vol04.no01.2013/Vol04.01.Beck.pdf).

Science , Success

“The systems view is the emerging contemporary view of organized complexity, one step beyond the Newtonian view of organized simplicity, and two steps beyond the classical world views of divinely ordered or imaginatively envisaged complexity.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 15.

World , Imagination

“Evolution may not “drive” toward humanoid qualities at all, even if it uses them under rather special circumstances. What evolution may be up to could be merely the continuing structuration of the biosphere through increased levels of communication between systems of one level, resulting in more integrated supersystems on the next.”

Ervin László

Source: Introduction to Systems Philosophy (1972), p. 86.

Communication