TIME of A SYSTEM (Internal)
| Collection | International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics |
|---|---|
| Year | 2004 |
| Vol. (num.) | 2(2) |
| ID | ◀ 3563 ▶ |
| Object type | General information, Human sciences |
Biological systems — and possibly social ones — seem to possess a kind of “internal clock”, corresponding however to a non-isochronic flow of time, different from one system to another and reflecting “circular logic and operational closure” (E. SCHWARZ, 1992, p.770).
Internal time has been researched by P. LECOMTE du NOUY (1936) and A. MISSENARD (1940) in biological terms and more recently by B. MISRA, I. PRIGOGINE and M. COURBAGE (1979) in more general thermodynamic terms.
Also R. VALLÉE has developed the very similar concept of “…a time intrinsically adapted to a dynamical system”, which he studied in “globally exploding dynamical linear systems…, in diffusion (or heat) equation (and in)… SCHRÖDINGER equation” (1994, p.33-38).
I. PRIGOGINE et al note: “In addition to the NEWTON-SCHRÖDINGER time, we have to introduce a second ”internal:“ time describing the relations (the ”correlations“) between the particles” (1991, p.3). And, for large complex systems: “… the situation is similar to that of radioactive decay, where lifetime has a meaning only for an ensemble of unstable atoms” (p.5).
The subject remains however still obscure and quite in need of more research.