SYSTEMS THINKING: Some critical appraisals
| Collection | International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics |
|---|---|
| Year | 2004 |
| Vol. (num.) | 2(2) |
| ID | ◀ 3488 ▶ |
| Object type | General information, Epistemology, ontology or semantics, Methodology or model |
In his well known essay on “The Rise of Systems Theory”(1978), R. LILIENFELD was very skeptical about the practical use of systems theory . He wrote: “No evidence that systems theory has been used to achieve the solution of any substantive problem in any field whatsoever has appeared”(p. 192)
LILIENFELD critique was directed obviously at those scientists and technicians who thought that systems theory offered a cheap short cut for the solution of specific problems in specialized trades: a kind of magic bullet to avoid slow and painstaking research in the traditional way
He did however missed the real point, which is that systems's concepts and models offer the base for
1- a transdisciplinarian language that fosters the capacity of reciprocal understanding between specialists
2- a needed complement for an integrated view of complex systems , as they exist and maintain themselves in their environment
F. CAPRA gives the following examples related to this second aspect: “It could be argued even then that the understanding of living organisms as energetically open but organizationally closed systems, the recognition of feedbacks as the essential mechanisms of homeostasis , and the cybernetic models of neural processes - to name just three examples that were well established at the time- represented major advances in the scientific understanding of life”(1997, p. 78)
In fact, traditional research in specialized area are complemented by systemic thinking
The necessarily reductionnist research in specific processes (as for ex. the workings of enzymes) are in no way contradictory to a global view of the living system
The part becomes integrated in the whole , but must still be also researched as a part in itself