“Before the 1940s the terms "system" and "systems thinking" had been used by several scientists, but it was Bertalanffy's concepts of an open system and a general systems theory that established systems thinking as a major scientific movement”

Source: The Web of Life (1996), p. 46.

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Fritjof Capra43

American physicist 1939

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“With the subsequent strong support from cybernetics, the concepts of systems thinking and systems theory became integral parts of the established scientific language, and led to numerous new methodologies and applications -- systems engineering, systems analysis, systems dynamics, and so on.”

Fritjof Capra (1939) American physicist

Source: The Web of Life (1996), p. 46.

“Systems theory pursues the scientific exploration and understanding of systems that exist in the various realms of experience, in order to arrive at a general theory of systems: an organized expressing of sets of interrelated concepts and principles that apply to all systems.”

Béla H. Bánáthy (1919–2003) Hungarian linguist and systems scientist

Source: Systems Design of Education (1991), p. 31

“A great deal of the thinking here has been influenced by cybernetics and information theory, though this has been used as much to extend the scope of closed-system as to improve the sophistication of open system formulations. It was von Bertalanffy (1950) who, in terms of the general transport equation which he introduced, first fully disclosed the importance of openness or closedness to the environment as a means of distinguishing living organisms from inanimate objects.”

Fred Emery (1925–1997) Australian psychologist

Source: The Causal Texture of Organizational Environments (1963), p. 22.

“Our conception is that of a theory about the system in an inertial state… if the organism is a system in an inertial state, as our law expresses it, the metabolic processes generally have to follow the established system; the ever progressing findings must replace the general expression of 'a system in an inertial state' by a more and more detailed knowing about the nature of this system and its chemical, osmotic, fermentive system conditions.”

Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901–1972) austrian biologist and philosopher

Bertalanffy (1929, p. 95-97) as cited in: Felix Müller, M. Leupelt (1998) Eco targets, goal functions, and orientors . p. 308
1920s

“Of the so-called global theories the one initially stated and defined by Bertalanffy in 1947 under the title of "general systems theory" has taken hold… Since then he has refined, modified and applied his concepts, established a society for general systems theory and published a General Systems Yearbook. Many social scientists but only a handful of psychiatrists studied, understood or applied systems theory. Suddenly, under the leadership of Dr. William Gray of Boston, a threshold was reached so that at the 122nd annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association in 1966 two sessions were held at which this theory was discussed and regular meetings for psychiatrists were ensured for future participation in and development of this "Unified Theory of Human Behavior."”

Roy R. Grinker, Sr. (1900–1993) American psychiatrist and neurologist

If there be a third revolution (i.e. after the psychoanalytic and behavioristic), it is in the development of a general theory.
Grinker, Helen MacGill Hughes (ed.) (1967) Towards a Unified Theory of Human Behaviour. 2e ed. New York, Basic Books. p. ix; cited in: Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1968) General System Theory. p. 7

“General systems theory (in the narrow sense of the term) is a discipline concerned with the general properties and laws of “systems”. A system is defined as a complex of components in interaction, or by some similar proposition. Systems theory tries to develop those principles that apply to systems in general, irrespective of the nature of the system, of their components, and of the relations or “forces” between them. The system components need not even be material, as, for example, in the system analysis of a commercial enterprise where components such as buildings, machines, personnel, money and “good will” of customers enter.”

Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901–1972) austrian biologist and philosopher

Source: 1960s, Robots, Men and Minds (1967), p. 69

“Since it can be argued that both science and engineering are concerned with the study of real systems and their behavior, it follows that a general theory should be concerned with the study of general systems… It suffices for the present discussion to consider a general system as an abstract analogue or model of a class of real systems. General systems theory is then a theory of general models.”

Mihajlo D. Mesarovic (1928) Serbian academic

Mesarovic (1964) cited in: Shatrughna P. Sinha (1991) Instant encyclopaedia of geography. 1. Introduction to geography. Mittal Publications, p. 467

“We consider the notion of "system" as an organising concept, before going on to look in detail at various systemic metaphors that may be used as a basis for structuring thinking about organisations and problem situations.”

Mike Jackson (1951) systems scientist

Source: Creative Problem Solving: Total Systems Intervention (1991), p. 2

Robert L. Flood (1959) British organizational scientist

Source: Creative Problem Solving (1991), p. 2.

“What I consider completely sterile is the attitude, for instance, of Bertalanffy who is going around and jumping around for years saying that all the analytical science and molecular biology doesn’t really get to interesting results; let’s talk in terms of general systems theory … there cannot be anything such as general systems theory, it’s impossible. Or, if it existed, it would be meaningless.”

Jacques Monod (1910–1976) French biologist

Monod (1974) "On chance and necessity". In F. J. Ayala & T. Dobzhansky, (Eds.), Studies in the philosophy of biology. cited in: Brian R. Gaines (1979) " General systems research: quo vadis? http://pages.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/~gaines/reports/SYS/GS79/GS79.pdf", General Systems, Vol. 24 (1979), p. 4

“Before the 1940s the terms "system" and "systems thinking" had been used by several scientists, but it was Bertalanffy's concepts of an open system and a general systems theory that established systems thinking as a major scientific movement”

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Fritjof Capra43

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