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

METAPATTERN: a pattern of patterns 1)2)

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The concept has been introduced by G. BATESON (1979). In each of the different levels of complexity of a system, some pattern can be distinguished for the description of the ways the elements at that level interconnect and interact.

As observed by BATESON, no order of interaction among elements can be totally independent from its context, be it co-systems, or higher or lower levels within the system, or some features external to the system as a whole.

This dependence, or interdependence implies the existence of higher (or lower) patterns of interactions which are in some way related to the pattern originally considered.

These relationships between different patterns can be named metapatterns

As expressed by BATESON "without context, there is no meaning". This is why a supposedly "isolated system"is a purely abstract notion, as it cannot have any exchange of matter, energy or information. This situation condemns it moreover to internal entropic annihilation

For another angle of view, metapatterns have a dynamical character and are frequently recurrent. This is as obvious in history as in music, for instance (A. GOPPOLD, 2000, p. 110-11)

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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